Sketching with ink, 50 shades of gray.

 Outside is raining, has been raining since the weekend, grey, cold and very VERY wet. My sketches of today are matching the weather and the colors outside.

I sketched this image in pencil last Thursday. Hubby, Mona and me drove to Palo Alto and we had a coffee a Coupa Cafe.
It was my favorite coffee place when we used to live in Menlo Park. I s really cute, welcoming atmosphere, nice service, amazing coffee .

We drove to the Bay Area for the Painted Chair event, unfortunately my phone stopped working after this first picture! :(
It was a great event! LOTS of people and my chair was featured between the best chairs:) HAPPY ME.

I draw this sketch on Monday, another rainy day. We had a huge storm actually! I went to school for a workshop in the afternoon, I got there a bit early so I went to get a warm tee at Small, a nice coffee place on 2nd street, close to my building.

Today ( is still raining ) I had to go to Court because of a red light violation, the queue was LONG! this is just a tiny part.

I enjoyed sketching with black ink! I really like the illustration effect, thanks to my friend Farah for introducing me to this technique. What I love about attending the Academy is also getting inspired by people.

This is how it look outside today and just to add a touch of color…Mona :) super cute! as always :)

Lemon and silver cup.

11x14 inches

Lemon and silver cup

oil on canvas board

Last still life from my Academy class, the point is here was to paint a reflective object, with reflections on it.

I enjoyed this assignment and I am happy with the result.

Especially I like the lemon! I know it was not about the lemon but…… i still like it a lot!

And i think the color combination yellow and blue is so neat :)

Happy Sunday everyone and Happy Birthday to my mom! The most special mom ever!!!

Auguri mamma! Buon compleanno!!

Waiting at the DMV….

Yesterday I went to the DMV to renew my driving license, I was smart enough to drive to Daly City to do it, a city just outside San Francisco, instead of going to the San Francisco office. 

I drove past by the SF DMV yesterday and the queue was just incredibly long, long beyond my imagination actually!!! 

I would have had plenty time to draw over there, maybe even too much!!! ;)

That was the ling in front of me, not bad at all!! I wend around lunch time, by the time I left it was 4 times the size.

And this was a quick sketch of the people by the desk doing their paper work. Of course I did mine too! My new  driver license should be in the mail soon!

I have been asked sever times how long these drawings take me, so here is the answer:

 1. sketching from life in pencil, can t say exactly the time amount since it depends on the amount of details I draw. I love this part, is fun, and times flies by while I draw.

2. redrawing with the pen, I LOVE this part.

3. coloring with water color pencils. This part is BOOOOOOring :)and takes way too long…but is necessary if I want to have colors :)

4. using the brush, FUN part .

Red earrings, work in progress

11x14 inches

oil on canvas board

WORK IN PROGRESS

Red earrings.

This is the still life I have been working on for last couple of days.
As assignment for my still life class at the Academy I was supposed to paint a still life with a shiny object. The metal cup is borrowed from my very nice upstair neighbor.
Thanks Kitty!! :)
The doily was handmade by amazing grandmother and is so very dear to me.
The red earrings are among my favorites, I bought them at a small market here in SF when we first arrived in California. They are a bit heavy, but still very VERY nice:)

Here is a picture of the real still life next to the painting in progress.

Next step, taking the painting to the Academy at my still life class, getting a feedback from my teacher, and deliver the finished painting by the end of next week.
I ll post once finished too OF COURSE!!
Have a great day everyone!!
Next step, taking the painting to the Academy at my still life class, getting a feed back form my teacher, and deliver the finished painting by the end of next week.


Have a great day everyone!

I ll waste a good part of mine at the DMV here in SF, need to renew my driving license. The  good note is that I ll take my sketch book with me and I am sure there will be plenty of bored people over there! it might be fun :)

Quick study with palette knife. One off banana, two mandarins and one mini apple.

I painted this study with the palette knife yesterday afternoon.
After spending  the whole morning fixing tiny things on a complicated still life for for my still life class at the Academy, In the afternoon I put down my small brushes, picked up my beloved palette knife and started painting something more loose.
That banana I mentioned at the beginning of the week was already almost black, time to paint it and then eat it!
Here it is: my 50 minute study.
Completely in love with the texture created by using the knife.

8x10 inches

oil on canvas board with palette knife

Foursome

Black sky, huge clouds, angry ocean and super rain….on my way to school!!! I would love to go back to bed today!:)

Figure drawing, 20 minutes poses.

Yesterday afternoon I attended a figure drawing workshop at the Academy, a couple of hours of pure fun !!!
I LOVE FIGURE DRAWING :)
Especially when the model is a woman, with a  nice curvy body and very flexible.
I have recently discovered that the only man I like to draw for more than one sitting is my husband .  :)

Here are some of the drawing from yesterday session, all 20 minutes poses.

 20 minutes

figure drawing

 20 minutes

figure drawing

 20 minutes

figure drawing

 20 minutes

figure drawing

Here are some 2 minutes drawing done at the beginning  of the class as a warm up .

I ll be attending this workshop every Monday afternoon, so more for you soon!

Ice cream and bananas, HIGH CALORIES still life :)

11x14 inches

oil on canvas board

Ice cream and bananas.

This still life was everything but easy, I find the bananas extremely difficult to paint (!) and of course the ice cream too.

It was not a real idea cream! It would have already melted away by the time I was done with the sketching part! It is a plastic idea cream ! The bananas were real though:)

I stock up with bananas and I am planning to paint a couple more, I should do this already today since they are getting black!! I am paint off bananas then ;)

Happy Monday everyone!