Art in my Sketchbook – Part 1

Posted on March 18, 2021 by Mama Cormier

…I haven’t posted any art for awhile

I haven’t worked on any large pieces lately. My focus has been mainly on drawing in my sketchbook. I signed up for two classes. One was with Lewis Rossignol called
Sketchbooking and the other is a two week class with Karen Abend called Sketchbook Revival. The latter is a free set of classes with 27 artists that each give a lesson that takes about 30 minutes. Sketchbook Revival is free and you can still sign up. https://www.karenabend.com/sketchbook-revival-2021/

Lewis’s focus is on being loose and not too precious with your sketchbooks. In fact he encourages you to mess up your pages a bit so that it is easier to start drawing. He likes to work in ink, pen, and pencil and he uses collage to add interest and balance.

Here are a few of the sketches that I did after watching his lessons.

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I will post my art from Day 1 of Sketchbook Revival in a post tomorrow.

Purple Rain Bird

Posted on January 31, 2021 by Mama Cormier

…my version of Prince as a bird

On Saturday I took an on-line class with Mark Brewer from Etchr Labs and learned about sketching characters and adding watercolour. All of us in the class did the same bird. It was fun and because it was a Zoom class we could see everyone’s work at the end of the hour.

Now Kevin thinks I should take over Wednesday’s Wacky Bird. Too much pressure and besides I wouldn’t want to take away the joy he gets from drawing his lovely birds. Maybe I’ll contribute once in awhile.

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My Art Challenge – Days 11 and 12

Posted on January 12, 2021 by Mama Cormier

….finished way too late last night to post my finished piece

Yesterday I was inspired by Lisa Congdon after watching one of her art videos. I really enjoy making line drawings of flowers and Lisa takes it a few steps further by adding lots of mark details and another thing that I love, collage. Adding all the marks is very time consuming but also very meditative and I think that’s why I lost track of time when I made this piece.

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The second photo is the piece that I just finished today. After not being very happy with my last ‘family portrait’ for Carla Sonheim’s class I decided I would try another. I’ve discovered that if I take my time and let things dry before moving on I get a much better result. Also this time I really enjoyed the assignment where as with the first attempt I wasn’t having much fun.

A Hot Mess

Posted on January 10, 2021 by Mama Cormier

….and back to drawing flowers

I’ve just started another year long course with Carla Sonheim. Lesson one started on Friday.

The first lesson is to draw a series of made up characters that represent a fictional family. We were to use a variety of media and techniques but the most important part was to have fun. I don’t know why but I wasn’t having fun and at one point I really wasn’t happy and I added water to my painting. I made quite the mess but I decided to let it dry and make something out of it with more marks and layers. Like I said it’s a bit of a hot mess but I don’t want to give up so I created a smaller piece with fewer characters. I’ll try a larger family later.

I’ve also gone back to my floral drawings. Today I drew a peony.

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My Messy Journal 30 Day Challenge

Posted on May 26, 2020 by Mama Cormier

….30 days to fill an entire art journal with messy pages

I know it sounds a bit strange but the challenge came from Kara Kramer, one of Carla Sonheim’s guest artists from her year long class called 2020: Words and Pictures. The idea is to be loose and free and fill the book and then come back later and using prompts add more to the pages. I’m still in the filling the book stage. Here are some of the pages of the 42 that I’ve done so far.

58 pages to go!!!!

Watercolour and Doodles

Posted on April 25, 2020 by Mama Cormier

….finding time for art

I’ve been squeezing in some time for art. I really don’t have any excuses for not doing more but I have thoroughly enjoyed watching art videos and when the moment to create strikes I have my supplies close at hand. This happen a few days ago when I watched a YouTube video by Creations Cee Cee.

I had note cards handy and I wanted to send my father a card anyway so I decided to paint and doodle right on the card. The whole process started with laying down areas of colour with watercolour paints and then letting it dry.

Once the paint was dry I took a black ink pen and started doodling shapes around the colour splotches and then added leaves and more details to the blooms. I finished it off with some white and gold marks in the flowers and around them.

Sketchbook Revival – Day 8 – 100 Dots

Posted on April 13, 2020 by Mama Cormier

…thanks to Noah Scalin for this art activity

On day 8 Karen Abend featured Noah Scalin who showed us how to open up when you don’t know what to draw or paint. 100 dots is literally an activity where you randomly place 100 dots on a piece of paper and then you look for dots to connect to create a picture. I decided to look for a face. Here is my creation.

Sketchbook Revival – Day 7

Posted on April 11, 2020 by Mama Cormier

…thanks to Karen Abend for hosting these wonderful free on-line classes

I haven’t done all the classes but there are so many to choose from. On Day 7 the featured artist Juliette Meeks and she gave a lesson on painting and drawing with watercolour. Our subject was a bunch of flowers. I normally sketch out my paintings first with ink and then paint the colour in but Juliette had us go straight to the watercolour and created our shapes without the aid of pencil or pen. I enjoyed the process but need to practise more.

Starting With a Doodle

Posted on March 24, 2020 by Mama Cormier

….day 2 of Sketchbook Revival

Today in Karen Abend’s Sketchbook Revival class we were introduced to Mary Beth Shaw who is a journal artist. She took us from a doodle sketch done in pencil to an abstract spread using collage, ink and acrylic paint. It was a fun process and a great way to start a painting when you have no idea what you want to paint. Here is my day’s artistic endeavour.