Faces 11 and 12

Face 11

I have got a bit behind, so it is catch up.  The drawings are of my friend’s children, Gloria and John.  I based the sketches on photos she took last year.  I used watercolour pencils and only one colour for each, as I want to concentrate on form, and colour can distract from that!

Face 12

This and That

Face 10

For my 10^th face I have chosen to honour an inspirational young lady.  This girl was drawn from a picture that I pulled from a magazine years ago, with the intention of drawing her, she so reminded me of a young girl my cousin adopted from Rwanda.  I first met her when I was living in the UK not long after she was adopted, and this little 4 year old insisted that they grew strawberries in the orphanage in Rwanda.  At 22 she is still very strong minded and determined. She has since made a trip back and found her mother and sisters and is able to make their lives easier.

The prompt for illustration Friday is storm.  This is great, as I need to do a drawing of a storm for Mystery in Arcadia.  I am using Blurb to publish it.  Which has been a lesson in itself; I didn’t have enough drawings to spread out evenly through the story.  So, I have to get to and draw and draw.

So have a great week creating lovely art everyone and thanks for your visit, I appreciate it.

Linking to Sunday Sketches, 

Illustration Friday and 

29Faces

What is your dream?

Face 5

We are never too old to dream the seemingly impossible.  It is not just the providence of the young.  Yesterday, I was reminded we all have dreams no matter our age.  I was waiting at the Bus stop and got into a conversation with an elderly lady who revealed she was 92. She was telling me about the 5 km fun run she had taken part in during the weekend, she did say she walked it. But still!  She said her dream was to be doing it when she turned 100!  She had put up on her wall a chart that went to 101, and every year she achieves it she puts $500 aside for a world cruise or a visit to her native country – South Africa when she reaches 101.  She reckoned she would have enough by then. I reckon she will do it too.  Amazing inspirational lady!

It made me think what is my dream?  Oh I have the usual, win lotto! Good health, success as an illustrator, a beautiful garden, but I don’t have an extraordinary dream like the lady today.  I think I need to address that.

What is your dream?  Is it an extraordinary one? 

For Face no 5 I used pastels, I haven’t used them for ages and I had forgotten how much I liked them.  They certainly give that soft dreamlike quality to the young girl above. 

I am doing Face 6 as well today as tomorrow is a holiday - NZ’s national day Waitangi Day.  I will be busy with visitors and don’t know if I will get any time for art.

Face 6

I’ve decide to do a portrait of the lady at the bus stop from memory in water soluble graphite pencils.

I think I got the look of her, but I am not happy with the mouth.  She was always smiling and no matter how I tried I couldn’t get it right without her looking as if she was smirking.  I tried showing her teeth and that was worse.  How do you draw their teeth without them looking like a shark?

Check out the other participants of 29 Faces in February Challenge at Ayala’s blog. (Button in sidebar)

Linked to

MandarinOrange Monday

29Faces in February

Faces 2 and 3

It is so hot here at the moment that I haven’t done much in the way of painting over the last few days. Yesterday was a stinker, my thermometer said 39o Celsius.  That’s hot for here, wasn’t surprised to see on TV we had the hottest temp for all of NZ. 

   

So this morning I was up before the larks, it was relatively cooler so got my journal out.  I got cracking on my 2^nd and 3^rd faces for the 29 Faces in February challenge that Ayala is hosting.  Go there and check out some of the wonderful work others are doing.

I decided that I wanted to test drive some new pencils I got last week.  They are Derwent water soluble graphite pencils and they come in a light, medium and dark wash.  I have just received a batch of photos from my sister of her two grandchildren (Yeah that makes me a great aunt!).  They live a eight hour drive away from her, so she doesn’t see them that much, and when she does, there are millions of photos flying my way.  She is such a proud grandma! 

FACE 2

Here I used the medium wash pencil in the traditional manner.  Kendal loves to pose, as her father, my nephew, says she loves to work that camera!

The next picture is of Flynn at the harbour making friends with a seagull.  I used the medium and light wash pencils with water.  I think that this has possibilities for my illustration work.

FACE 3

The next picture is not really just a face its Kendal on her beloved bike.  I was on a roll, and the theme at Illustration Friday is Wheels.  I am not going to link it there as I really struggled with this.  Kendal was okay to do, it was the bike, and I couldn’t get the perspective right.  Inanimate objects can be a problem for me.  Any way I used the dark wash pencil in a traditional manner.  I will come back to this later as I think the picture has potential. 

 

Well I am up to date now, so think I will go and stand under a cold shower for half an hour, its only 9 am and it is 31!

Have a lovely week Sunday Sketchers and blessings.

Linking to Sunday Sketches