In the Kitchen

When your life inspires your art, your art inspires your life.

In other words, be involved with your subject, keep your eyes open, carry your sketchbook and camera everywhere. Look for colors. Look for light. Zoom in. Zoom out.

I just started a new class this week and will begin another next week. I am asking the classes to pick a theme and really pay attention to that subject. It can be tangible or intangible.

A couple of people have chosen to do barns. They'll be doing sketches and photographs to to use as painting references. They'll do barns in various lights, pay attention to the textures, the insides, the outsides...

Some others are interested in doing figures. They'll want to carry their sketchbooks everywhere. They'll benefit from doing quick gesture drawings and from getting family members to do some longer poses.

I'm going to play along with the classes by doing "in the kitchen". My kitchen could use a little attention, poor neglected thing, and it is the first place I head for when the season changes from summer to fall - just part of my nesting routine.

The image above is an almost-blind-contour drawing of a couple of onions and my great grandfather's sugar bowl, done in my sketchbook while waiting for my toast to pop up.

Why did my great grandfather have his own personal sugar bowl? There is no one left to ask. It will be one of life's mysteries for me. I'll have to get over it - it's not important.