A wonderful reflective poem from Wendell Berry entitled "How to be a poet" is a fantastic foundation for an art curriculum. The last of three stanzas reads as follows:
Accept what comes from silence.
Make the best you can of it.
Of the little words that come
out of the silence, like prayers
prayed back to the one who prays,
make a poem that does not disturb
the silence from which it came.
Reminds me of a Buddhist proverb: Patiently I will bear harsh words as the elephant bears arrows on the battlefield. Words are powerful. They stir emotions. We are the managers of our emotions. It is not what happens to us that is the issue, it is our opinion of what happens to us that is the issue. Peace.
An exercise in observation - quick sketch. I was told that if I made a drawing a day for 365 days, that in a year, I might have a couple nice drawings.
I have quite a bit of traveling planned this Summer...from NYC to Copenhagen to Venice to Berlin and a few more spots. Very much looking forward to all the different colors, cities, and cultures in the coming weeks.
An attempt at organizing my 'why' for making drawing the center of my curriculum, and selling the idea to my students. Suggestions for refinements welcome.
This started as some scribbling with Inktense pencils on large plain drawing paper. Then I was done, I wanted to wet the the drawing to release the "ink," but I found that the paper would not take water without drastic buckling. So, it remains a drawing rather than becoming a painting.
Architectural subjects are not my penchant....but this is a pen line drawing of our house which I did a few weeks ago near the beginning of the "stay at home" phase of our lives. Seemed a fitting subject. Just a couple of micron pens on a smooth surfaced paper.
Yesterday, I was drawing during the Metropolitan Opera's daily streaming. My husband, Mike came by and looked dumbfounded. "Samson and Delilah inspired THIS subject matter?" Walked off shaking his head. We have a good laugh!
I've been so impressed with the ball point pen art that I have seen on this site, that I decided to give it a try. This is a Betta fish (Siamese fighting fish) done in red, blue, and purple ball point pens. Obviously, I have much to learn....but it was great fun and I have ordered some more colors since I plan on experimenting more. I've enclosed a photo of the work in progress and the various reference photos I used. The colors are more true to the final scan than in the flash photo of my drawing table.
When I am angry and frustrated with the world (politics, wild fires, injustice, etc.) I seem to be drawn to drawing raptors. The first one is today's sketch, the other two are from former days.
Blackwing pencil and woodless B4 pencil on Canson sketch paper.
This is the first prompt for Inktober 2020 (FISH). I used a Pigma micron .005 pen to do the black and white drawing. The colored version is tinted with Photoshop. I might print this out and try some other color combinations for fun.
BIC ballpoint stick pen drawing on Richeson bulk drawing paper. This started as a contour drawing and just got squiggly (not the original intent). This was clipped to my board for weeks and I would add a few squiggles from time to time when I wanted to make marks, but didn't have inspiration. It's just a bit under 15 inches (12x18 inch paper) and is probably about 25 hours of making little lines and squiggles. The reference was a Dreamstime royalty-free photo.
Hello, my name is Dean C. Graf, 
