Student on his iPad

This is a watercolor of another of my students. Not a happy picture, but I do like how some of the things are rendered. I like how the items on the table look. There is also some water star-bursting in the background.

“There has never been another you. 

With no effort on your part you were born to be 

something very special and set apart.

What you are going to do in appreciation 

of that gift is a decision only you can make.” 

~ Dan Zadra

Ashlyn @ the HIFF

So the Honolulu International Film Festival, HIFF, is in town and my friends and I are watching movies voraciously this week. There are blocks of time between the movies, so it is a perfect opportunity for me to draw and paint.

Above is a portrait that I did of Ashlyn while we were waiting for a movie... She looks a little surprised in the picture.

So far it's Monday, and we have seen nine movies at the festival. There are two highlights so far.

Dead Sushi is the Japan extreme movie at the festival. If you're not familiar, they are a blast-- in the Toxic Avenger or Godzilla vein. It left me laughing at how amazingly awful, over the top it is. This one lives up to form featuring schools of CGI zombie sushi attacking people like piranhas. It even features a cute Tomago sushi singing like Gizmo from the Gremlins
 
Caesar Must Die is an Italian movie that is part documentary, part Shakespearean play. It's about a group of prisoners who put on a production of Julius Caesar. There is a passion and a magic to the film that is captivating.

The festival goes on till Sunday. I hope to keep drawing and painting. Let's hope for some good art and some great film.

Italy Sketchbook 5: St Catherine - Roma

So this was one of my favorite drawings in this sketchbook. When I went to Rome I fell in love with this sculpture. This sculpture is of St Catherine.

It is located Piazza Pia a public park in Rome just outside the Vatican and Castle San'Angelo.

I love the hand and the profile of this drawing. I really think I started to play with the gray background in this sketch. I also managed to keep the dark and light parts well separated.

Student Drawings II

So here is another few of students. I like how these came out. Again no names.

HMoA Drawing Class 10/08/12 - Katelyn

Drawing class for this week, I am happy with the drawings from this class.

Above is the most successful of the night in my opinion.It is a pair of great gestures and a portrait on top.. I was in a portrait mood that night.

This was the last drawing of the night. It is two gestures with a 20 minute sketch on top. I really dig the two gestures in the background.

This was three gestures and two five minute drawings.

This is two gestures and then a 10-minute drawing on top with a portrait on top. I was actually worried with this drawing. It was the first pose of the night and she took a reclining pose. This is worrisome because aside from being difficult, reclining poses are normally the last pose of the night because its easiest on the model. If the model needs to recline in the first pose it unlikely they will do any other kinds of poses. One of the people in the class actually left when she took a reclining pose. I was in a portrait mood that night.

This life drawing class is on Monday at 7PM. It is located at the The Honolulu Museum of Art School, formerly the Academy Art Center at Linekona. There is a 10 dollar class fee. 

2012 Koolau 1-3

I had so much fun working on the Little Mountain Book,  I began another watercolor book. This book is bigger then the small 5"x 3" book I did that group on. This new book is 8" x 5.5".

Starting on this new book I am struck with a few things: one how much longer these larger watercolors are taking me to complete and two how many more pages are in this book then the last one (43 as opposed to 26).

Mainly because of that second point I think these watercolors are going to take me the better part of the year . So I do not have that much of a problem calling this book 2012 Koolau.

I have also taken to writing one the back of them so I have things to write here. All three of these paintings were done at Kailua High School.

Above was done 10/03/12 at  9 AM

The next two are from 10/09/12. The Vog was really bad the day before, covering the mountains with a haze.  When I drove to work on the 9th it look like it had cleared a bit over the night. The landscape was really clear, no clouds or mist.

I took some time around lunch to do this watercolor. There was a slight hint of a Vog in the sky.

This is what the same mountains looked like a when I got to my car at 5. The vog was catching all the light of the afternoon. It completely obscured the ridges of the Koolau mountains. The haze shimmered in the afternoon giving the mountains a glow to them.   

"Why do two colors, put one next to the other, sing?

Can one really explain this? No."

 ~Pablo Picasso

Italy Sketchbook 4: The Bargello

So the next four sketches are from the Bargello, one of Florence's oldest public buildings. Above is Michelangelo's Bacchus. There is some awkwardness with the torso, but I really like how I rendered the hand.

I spent an afternoon there and was struck by a number of things. One all of the sculpture's penises have been broken off, which was apparently at the request of the owner.

Second was this statue below, Florence's Victory over Pisa. I had never seen it in an Art History class but really liked this statue.

I did one drawing and wanted to do a wider view of the statue. So I did the next one.

The next one is the statue from behind.

So the next section of this book is from my week in Rome. 

Forms in the Ink I

 

I am very happy with this monotype print and need to work on some others similar to it. It has a number of things I really enjoy about this process.

There is the overall crispness of the print. I then used some water on the plate to create the watery effect on the lower part of the print. I then worked with color pencil on the upper corner. There is a neat push-pull with all the things going on in the print. I enjoy this print a lot and will have to do a few more of them.

Women on the Handivan

While on the Handivan with a few of my students I did this drawing of some of the other riders.

I am actually very happy with this watercolor. There is a nice glow from the window in the background and the figures look very strong. I also dig how I rendered the ladies outfits.

Danielle Reclining

I did this picture of Danielle while she was watching Netflix.

It is actually not a very good likeness of her, but it is still a very nice painting. I like how a lot of the paint pooled on the page.