New York Night

My special New York night was two weeks ago when I attended the American Watercolour Society dinner and received my signature status. It was a big deal for me, and my family surprised me the next night with some champagne and a really special gift — a gorgeous Pilot fountain pen. I’ve never owned a pen this beautiful, and now I understand why there are so many pen aficionados in the sketcher world. You kinda feel like a million bucks when you’re drawing with one of these.

Today I filled my pen with de Atramentis brown ink so I could draw this Helleborus, which was another special gift from friends who saw the AWS show in NYC. To commemorate these two gifts, I used my Pilot pen to sketch the plant. And I also recorded some info about the Helleborus (thoughtfully chosen for its name, no doubt) which blooms in early spring. I hope to draw it in bloom next year when the black-purple flowers are out. Sketched in my Hahnemuhle 100% cotton sketchbook while sitting outside in the sun.

Another CAT

Now that I’m not on the road, it’s time to catch up on my daily sketches. This scene is just outside my office window — trucks lined up to pave a driveway — and it’s the perfect subject for a quick drawing. I grab what’s close at hand. A fountain pen with blue ink and a sketchbook with smooth paper for drawing. I hope that they will stay there until I am done. A seated figure on the CAT would have been even better but I am not so lucky. Maybe they will be back another day.

Cat and dog

I don’t have many opportunities to draw cats, but on the weekend we visited our son who has a roommate with a cat named Indigo. Indigo is a very friendly white cat, but he’s young and he’s curious around new people, so he spent a fair bit of time leaping around us, from sofa to windowsill to tabletop. When he finally tired himself out, I was able to draw him in his favourite spot on the back of the couch. The line through his head is the start of a previous drawing, but guess what? He got up and moved, so I had to start again.

I’ve been away a fair bit lately, and Alice has been with the dog sitter for a good part of April. She’s always so glad to see us again and to get back to her normal routines like eating, running through the woods on our walks, and, of course, sleeping. And as much as I love travelling and teaching in wonderful places, I have to admit, I’m happy to be home too.

Pride of Madeira

If you like spring flowers, April is the right time to visit Carmel-by-the-Sea. Calla lilies grow like weeds, the pink flowers of hardy ice plants are blooming all over the coast, and the conical purple spikes of Pride of Madeira cover landscaped beds as well as wild hillsides. I had never seen these shrubs before so I took a photo of one of the plants and posted it on Instagram with the question: does anyone know what these are? Of course many of my California friends responded because, besides being a native of the island of Madeira, the only other place where this plant is abundant is in coastal California. I thought I might not have a chance to paint the tall purple spikes, but I found a little time for this demo on the last day of my Carmel workshop. Painted on a pad of Arches CP paper, in the company of many bees, a ruby-throated (maybe) hummingbird, and a wonderful group of students.

California in spring

It’s been a great week of teaching with French Escapade in Carmel-by-the-Sea, California. Everything is so green here — Calla lilies, orange poppies and Pride of Madeira flowering everywhere — and we’ve had lots of sunny days, which is a good thing for this winter-weary Montrealer.

My first group of sketchers left this morning and another group arrives tonight, and in the middle I thought I’d share a few of the views we had this week.

On a sunny morning we set up along the wall at Lover’s Point in Pacific Grove. There were seals and otter not too far off in the water, pelicans flying above us, and perfect waves crashing over the rocks. This is the view from my easel. Excuse the bad iPhone shadow in the photo.

If you’ve been to Fisherman’s Wharf in Monterey, you know it’s pretty touristy and can get quite crowded, but we found a good viewpoint on the water side of the wharf, and some good afternoon light. It will be sailing season soon in Montreal and I can’t wait to get out there to paint the boats, both in and out of water.

On my day off today, we went for a long walk along the coast. Earlier in the week we had sketched Frank Lloyd Wright’s Clinton Walker House from a distance, but it’s much more striking from the other side, especially if you go down to the beach and get up close to it. Completed in 1952, it’s Wright’s only house on the coast, and it has a hexagonal floor plan and a big stone point jutting out into the water like a ship’s bow. I didn’t see any signs of life in the house today, but I did a bit of research and found out that it sold in 2023 for $22 million. If you are in this area, it’s really worth taking a walk on the beach to see it.

Berry Hill, Nashville

If I can, I usually arrive at least a day early at a new workshop location. I feel more comfortable teaching in a place that’s at least a little bit familiar to me. That was the case last week in Nashville. I arrived on Monday evening so I had Tuesday to drive around with my host and sketch in the Berry Hill neighbourhood of Nashville where Warehouse 521 is located. It’s a great area, and the art studio is surrounded by recording studios, small cafés and restaurants. I sketched Nashville Jam Co, which I thought was a music venue of some sort but it turns out that it’s a brunch place where they make their own jam. You can see all of my Nashville sketches in the latest issue of my newsletter The Wheelbarrow. And there’s a link there for a new YouTube video of me in my kitchen sketching these green onions.

As good as it gets

Happy first day of spring! This morning I had a snowy view outside my window in Montreal, but it certainly was more springlike last week when I was teaching in Nashville. I’ll post my urban sketches later in the week, but here’s one from my last day in Tennessee. On the recommendation of one of my workshop participants, we visited Cheekwood Estate and Gardens, just outside of Nashville in the suburb of Belle Meade. Besides flowering magnolia and cherry trees, there are over 250,000 bulbs in bloom. Daffodils and tulips as far as the eye can see. I sat on a bench in the sun to sketch these pink tulips, and then ate an ice cream for lunch. That’s about as good as it gets.

Like butterflies

I can’t stop painting these mini-daffodils. This time I painted them in my portrait format sketchbook. When I looked at them up close with all their delicate details, they reminded me of butterflies, so I added a deep sky blue background with some Prussian Blue. It’s not that easy to paint around all these shapes so I wet the paper first, as best I could, around the flowers. In some places I went back with a second wash of paint which ended up a little too dark in spots. Sketched in my Hahnemuhle 100% cotton sketchbook.

Daffodils

Last week I bought a pot of tiny daffodils. They seemed to hold all the promise of spring. At first only one bud was half open, and I could see the tiniest glimpse of yellowish orange. Each day since then a few more flowers have opened. I’ve painted them several times — at first, just a quick sketch of the pot on my window sill…

…and then today, the open flowers in all their spring glory. I chose to paint them this time without the pot, imagining that this might be how they would be coming out of the ground in my garden. This second time is painted in direct watercolour (no pencil drawing) with a dagger brush, using a limited palette of a few yellows, a few blues and a little Cadmium Orange that was left over on my palette from yesterday’s clementine sketch.