Behind the Scenes!

I guess this could be called a mountain of cards. A few months ago, someone suggested that I make cards out of my drawings. I had done that before when we lived in England, a long time ago. At that time, I had a choice of two designs. Now we have more than I can count.

These cards are drying overnight after having been sprayed with anti-UV spray. It protects against fading. As a word of caution, refrain from hanging any art, original or reproductions, in bright sunlight.

The cards are printed by my technical associate on an ink jet printer. We’ve been selling them through local retail locations and at recent outdoor summer markets.

New Hampshire!

A late posting for June, as can be seen by the first image. It’s been a busy month.

This is the Independence Day fireworks over Pleasant Lake, with Mount Kearsarge in the background. Drawn on my iPad from memory.

I drew this town as part of my DRAW-NH! project. I added 22 towns to my total last month (I said I’d been busy!), but I’ll space out their appearance here on the blog. This is Washington, NH, the first town in the US named for George Washington. There were, of course, many more to follow. In the foreground is the band stand decorated with cloth bunting for Memorial Day, at the end of May. Most towns keep the decorations up through Independence Day on July 4. In the background are the church, a school, and the town hall. They are painted wooden frame buildings. The town halls of New England are where the annual town meetings take place. Every citizen has one vote, on important topics that need to be resolved, mostly having to do with the annual budget.

I thought I would include a drawing of a bandstand that has a band playing in it. This is the Green, some times called the Common, in our town of New London, NH. The jazz group playing is the Granite State Stompers. (New Hampshire’s nickname is the Granite State, for its local quarried stone.) It was a fine occasion with good music and perfect weather. Kids and dogs and picnic suppers abounded. I like the fact that only the dog is posing for me. I don’t believe the people are recognizable, as portraiture is not my strong point. But the yellow lab might be.

The Town Green is the scene of lots of action in the summer. I’ll be there every Wednesday from 3 to 6 selling note cards featuring pictures from the blog, paintings, and other art work at the artists’ and farmers’ Market on the Green.

I drove to the nearby town of Newbury, NH to draw their recently renovated meeting house. It was a cold, rainy day, so I stopped here for coffee and a peanut butter cookie. This is one of the counters at Marzelli Deli, in Newbury. They have all manner of Italian imported food. And freshly prepared goodies including gelati. Small towns (villages really) often have great treasures. Yum!

These are hop poles behind our local brew pub, the Flying Goose, in New London. Hops are part of the brewing process. I love the blue misty mountains in the background. I don’t know their names, as I need to consult a map. What a view the houses in the center must have. This pub is at a cross roads near our house. I often drive past to catch a view of the mountains. It is only slightly out of the way. If I ever write an autobiography it will be entitled “Taking the Long Way Home.”

The home of Samuel Morse, Esq. in Croydon. He was a judge—not the more famous inventor of the same name. This house was built in 1815 as his home, law offices, and court room on the second floor. The home and museum is open on Sundays in the summer. I would like to view the interior. I was attracted to the house by its frontier grandness, the color, the doorway, and of course the white picket fence. All of wood. Since it was raining, I drew this from the car. I got a few stares as my car was parked at an odd angle, to maximize my drawing viewpoint. I apologized to one person. He seemed even more mystified after my explanation.

This is Main Street in Antrim, NH. I know that this is the name of a city in Northern Ireland. It is likely that the settlers of this place came from there originally. It’s very common for New England towns to bear the name of the Old Country origin of their settlers, with the same name frequently appearing in many of the six New England states as the settlers spread out. These buildings, early to mid 1800’s, are painted wood except for the brick mill on the far left. New Hampshire was founded on water power and mills. My sister and I have often remarked how attractive the displays are in front of this hardware store. I think the eye likes patterns, and it doesn’t seem to matter too much if the design is fine art, or carefully stacked plastic chairs.

This display case is in the town of Weare, NH, in the Stone Memorial Building. The architect was Manchester based William Butterfield. I was wandering around a cross roads of this town, not sure what to draw. And then a woman asked if she could help me. She had the keys to the building I was admiring, and she let me in. She told me the rules ..“We discourage photography.” “How about drawing?”, I asked as I was pulling out my paper and pencil.

These statues are in Tilton, NH, along the Main Street, donated by Charles Tilton in the late 1800’s. On the far left, “Miss Tilton, 1882”, in marble. Her hand is resting on a horse’s head. She is in a small park at one end of town. Draped in linen-like folds, she wears a crown. In the center, is a bronze figure, named Squantum Chief. It is beautifully designed and cast. He is wearing buckskins and carries a bow and arrows. This sculpture was moved to the side of the main street from its original location in the middle of the street. On the right, in carved marble stone, is a figure titled Indian Queen. She stands on a pedestal in the middle of the street, with the traffic circling around her. I find her to be amazing. She has a lion’s head draped over her shoulder. And she has some sort of giant lizard at her feet, gazing up at her. And a strange headdress, and odd skirt, and no shirt at all. I would like to track down the meaning and intent of the sculptor some day. And remember, she stands in the center of the busiest street.

Henniker is a small nearby town. The signs heading into town proclaim “The Only Henniker On Earth”. It is home to New England College. I stopped into a small shop called the Vintage Sparrow to buy some wine glasses I saw in the window. The owner suggested I would enjoy drawing a scene down by the Contoocook River. So I did. This is the back view of Daniel’s Restaurant. I just liked the shape of it, plus the color and the array of solar panels on the roof. My parents were married along the banks of the Contoocook River a few miles down stream in Davisville.

Here is the line up in Salisbury, NH on Old Turnpike Road, the main street. It looks like a toy village. From left to right, the buildings are the library, the town hall, the hearse house and museum, and the Baptist Meeting House (now used by the Historical Society). Sometimes I choose to draw a row of buildings all from a straight on view. This is an example. Maybe another day I will return and redraw them from one standing location so that you will see the sides of the the buildings. That would be an interesting comparison. I find it hard to believe at times that these wooden structures are still standing. Still cared for and repaired by the small populace of the settlements. I call them all towns, but many places I draw have only a population of one to two thousand people.

Behind the Scenes!

Here is the beach at Pleasant Lake, New London, NH. I drew it on my iPad, and it seemed like I was drawing in the dark instead of the bright sunlight. This is because the screen went quite grey in the bright light. So I really couldn't see what I had drawn until I returned home. It is also an odd and challenging art experience because you draw with your finger, which is much broader than the strokes you are making! But it does remind me of finger painting.

Our small lake has one pair of nesting loons, and two chicks born this week. Maybe next week we will venture out in our kayaks to catch a glimpse, maybe. It is important not to disturb the new family.

There will be a 10k run around the lake in July.

Behind the Scenes!

I continue my DRAW-NH! project, drawing all 234 towns in the state. Here I am standing in the road in Marlow. The monument in front of me is unusual because it depicts a soldier from World War l, rather than the Civil War as is common in many towns here.

And my version of the scene. Although I have no aptitude for making three dimensional art, I enjoy looking at and drawing monuments and sculpture of all kinds. I admire the skills of the artists. My paternal grandfather was a stone cutter, brave enough to take hammer and chisel to marble. I spent a lot of time with him and I think my love of stone and sculpture comes from these memories.

Behind the Scenes!

The Rock on Sugarhouse Road

Here is a granite rock, dotted with lichens, and surrounded by ferns. I used to rest by this rock, when huffing my way up the steep road near our house. Now that I am more fit, mainly from striding up this hill, I lean on it no more. But today I drew it. In the background are the rhododendrons, now just coming into bloom, as the lilacs begin to fade. Each bloom is surrounded by flat, shiny leaves.

Behind the scenes!

I have always enjoyed tools, materials, and processes. So my plan is to start sending out one or two photos of what’s going on in the weeks that I don’t post the regular blog. These will show what’s in the works, aspects of how I go about creating these drawings, or other things that might have happened along the way.

Here are my tools....my colored pencils (woodless) made in the Czech Republic (marketed by Koh-I-Noor), a 7mm #2 retractable lead pencil (from Staples), and my pigmented ink pens (Pigma Micron) from Japan. This kind of ink is fade proof.

And an eraser

Here is my sketch of Salisbury, New Hampshire, ready to color. You’ll see it on next month’s blog. I’m working in earnest now on my Draw Every Town in New Hampshire project, DRAW-NH! My paper is so small so it can fit easily into my purse. That way I am always ready to go. This challenges me to capture the scene in just a few square inches, and it allows me to sketch quickly and inconspicuously when the situation demands.

New Hampshire, Alberta, Wisconsin, and Airplane!

Spring has come at last. We are in Colburn Park in Lebanon, New Hampshire. I had in mind to draw the town library, the yellow brick building with columns. Not until I got there did I decide to include the trees, the Veterans’ Memorial, and the swing set. Urban parks have intrigued me for a long time. This one is square, surrounded by a street, and around that are some fine old buildings. The park is used by people of all ages, and it serves a real community need.

I like the pathways in Edmonton, where our younger daughter and her family live. Our younger granddaughter balances on the round river rocks, on the left. A jack rabbit on the right watches us. (The plentiful wild rabbits are large and white in the winter, and turn brown in the summer.) He and his siblings have nibbled the bark on the crabapple trees. That is why they are yellow. He had a good reason, as it was a long cold winter and he got hungry. The snow got very deep and he ate all the way up. I don’t think the bark has been permanently damaged. We shall see. The purple shape on the right is a roof line not a mountain. Oh, that we could see the Rocky Mountains from here. They are a four hour car ride west of Edmonton.

This space is called Café o’ Play in Edmonton, Canada. Good snacks for the parents, and a fun experience for the kids. I drew our grandson three times, as he was everywhere. There were lots of other kids there too of course. In the background I included the mothers who come to meet other mothers. They are all holding their infants, and enjoying their conversations.

Our younger granddaughter again. I liked her black and white dress. Her hair is not really blue and pink and red. My colored pencils just pick themselves up and start to work. Her hair is ash brown with bluish tones in the shines.

Our older granddaughter, aged 8, drew these sunglasses. I thought she did well. I give her drawing lessons sometimes, and talk about observational sketching.

My sister is very kindly making me a pair of earrings. We chose the beads together the day before. Her house is made from a barn that was on their property. It was taken down, numbered, cleaned, moved, and reassembled at 5/8th size, I think. The diagonal beams were in such a configuration in the barn. The windows were added. I love the oak trees on their property with their wavy branches.

Another room in the barn house. Their cat Alibi watches the bluebirds outside. The lilac bushes are all in bloom now. The scent is divine. My sister and her husband maintain bluebird boxes on their land. We opened them up and peeked at turquoise eggs and grey fuzzy newborns.

I saw this sunset from the airplane window. Below is Lake Erie, one of the massive lakes that form the border between the U.S. and Canada. I drew it on an iPad. It is fun to paint with light.

Another iPad drawing. This is the moon as we flew over Chicago. The lake on the left is Lake Michigan. The city’s skyscrapers hug the shoreline. The blocks on the right are of low rise buildings, on the flat Illinois land, with yellow street lights. I come from the East Coast where the roads twist and turn around the hills. I prefer to live in a hilly landscape, but it is fun to see the regular square shapes of light as I fly over the earth.

One more iPad drawing. I love these colorful songbirds. They occupy a very large enclosure in the Ingleside Nursing Home in Wisconsin, where my mother lives. They make nests and have babies. And quarrel and sing and entertain the residents and guests. I try to imagine them in their native habitat.