Thursday, March 18, 2010

Drawing inspiration

At the beginning of the year I told myself I was going to draw something every day. I haven't done so well on that account; it's sometimes hard to make the time, and I often find myself uninspired. What to draw?

Recently I was surfing the Net for that very purpose and came across the Urban Sketchers Web site. It's exactly what I needed. It reminds me that very ordinary things are worth drawing, and look somehow not so ordinary when rendered as a drawing.

That evening I went to Spill the Wine restaurant with my husband, and when he left the table for a few minutes, I took out a piece of paper and pencil from my purse (yes, I do carry around a small envelope/pocket of paper and a pen or pencil everywhere!), and drew the parking meter in the snowbank outside the window, incorporating the branches from a tree across the street.

Earlier that same day, I was supposed to meet a friend at a coffee shop, and got my signals crossed, so I was waiting for her at Anodyne while she was waiting for me at Nokomis Beach. While I was sorry for my screw-up, I did take the time to do a drawing of the view outside their windows, and a person sitting there. (I want to practice drawing people more, but I don't want the people I am drawing to catch me in the act!) I have to admit, I find fewer things to draw at Nokomis Beach, even though it's my neighborhood coffee shop and I spend more time there than at any other coffee shop. I may have to resort to doing more people drawings there (discreetly, of course).


 Other than a couple of drawings done this past week for the spring MOQ, which is almost done, I still haven't done a lot of drawing, But maybe I'll change my goal to spending some time drawing every week, rather than every day.

I may have to frequent a variety of coffee shops in order to find more things to draw -- but sometimes we just have to sacrifice for our art!