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A colleague brought painting supplies to our semi-annual retreat and set them all up so invitingly during yesterday’s long stretch of open time. Here’s my painting, which is acrylic on a 4×6 canvas panel.
The whole time I was painting it, it was turned 180 ° from what you see here, but I like this better, maybe because it’s new to my eyes.
All of these are in ink pen in my 5×7″ sketchbook. Most are from life, some are from photos I took, and one is from a photo by someone else. I was walking through the lovely Warehouse District of Minneapolis after the march on January 23, wondering how I was going to hail a ride given how much the -20 F weather had drained my phone battery, but too high from the company of marchers to really fret. I looked up and saw a beautiful, pink, spiral fire escape, and (since I wasn’t going to stand there and draw) dug out my phone to snap it for later, but remembered that my phone wasn’t up for a text, much less a photo. I found a spot in the warm, my phone recovered, I got my ride, and once back in my friend’s home I looked up the fire escape. It was so noticeable that I was not surprised to find several photos. Gratitude to Kelly Schnell, who posted an excellent one in her Flickr account.
All ink pen on 5″ x 7″ or 17 x 17 cm sketchbook paper.
My practice: go outside and draw something I see every day. I’m not being purist; if it’s pouring, or I wait too long and it’s dark, I draw inside, and in a pinch, from a photo I’ve taken. It has been a very rainy start to the year, and once I sat in our enclosed entryway while the rain fell on the poppy leaves just outside.
After the first day, I have drawn with a gel ink pen. I might return to graphite pencil at some point, but right now, given my tendency to get fiddly, I’m enjoying the constraint of having only black to work with. These are all 5″×8″ or smaller, the size of my current sketchbook.
Several years ago, inspired by my friend Janet and her daily butterfly practice, I drew a leaf of a California tree every day for the entire year, mostly from photos. I really enjoyed it and stuck with it, which is rare for me for a daily practice. So I am doing something similar this year, combining two spiritual practices: I will go outside and draw something I see there.
I’m not going to be a purist about it; if it’s pouring rain, I’ll draw indoors (ideally, drawing something outside from indoors). I thought I might have to do that today, but the rain let up and I went out to our back garden and drew a fern there. I’ll post my drawings now and then with the tag, “Drawing outside every day.”
Getting outdoors and making art are also both good for my mental health, even if I only do them for a few minutes. I’m prone to anxiety, and various studies show that spending time outdoors and drawing both reduce anxiety–certainly for people like me, who enjoy them. I don’t need to go to a big natural expanse, though I am very much looking forward to pulling over now and then on my commute through Marin and Sonoma Counties and drawing some of the more scenic stretches. Even spending attentive time with a weed growing through a crack in the sidewalk is an experience of awe and beauty.
Why I carry my sketchbook and notebook with me. When our feet get tired and it’s time to sit and rest, I can write or draw, which makes the extra several ounces in my backpack very worthwhile. Yesterday, when the heat and elevation forced a rest, this nopal cactus across the street from the Santo Domingo church caught my eye.
I think I’ve probably adjusted to the elevation now. I used to dream of going to Macchu Pichu, but I don’t know if I could now. A jump from sea level to a mere 5,800 feet–Oaxaca’s elevation–takes me a couple of days. As with so many things, sufficient water and sleep help a lot.
We are on a week’s vacation in Mendocino, where I have never been before. I’ve seen lots of stunning photos of the stunning coast hereabouts, and now I have seen for myself how beautiful it is and have taken my own.
Tomorrow we’ll go to MacKerricher State Park and actually get down to the beach to explore some tide pools. Thus far, we have viewed, heard, and smelled the ocean from the tops of the cliffs.
Yesterday we walked out to the lighthouse on Point Cabrillo. I used to fantasize about living alone in a remote and beautiful place, and lighthouses seemed particularly appealing. I would actually find such a life very lonely; I like living with other people. But someone could sell me on a short retreat in a lighthouse, for sure. Preferably with a few resident cats, and actual lighthouse-keeper duties to fulfill.
I love the shapes trees take under the pressure of the wind off the ocean–hence this drawing of the trees beside the historic house of one of the lighthouse-keepers. One can stay in it as a vacation rental. Not, alas, in the lighthouse itself.
During today’s exploration of the botanical garden, I thought I might like to draw the branches of this tree (bush?) sometime.
Today began with a solo hike through a redwoods forest down to the waterfall in Russian Gulch State Park, and so it is ending with an early bedtime and pleasantly tired legs. One of the attractions of the cottage we’re staying in is its proximity to the waterfall. It’s a lovely place, built by one of our hosts and full of pieces made by the other, who is a ceramic artist. Mookie says her bed is actually quite comfortable. It doesn’t spontaneously fold up and turn her into a taco.
All in my 5×7 sketchbook in graphite.
I have been listening to people’s stories from Israel and Palestine (This American Life has had several lately) and looking at photos of the devastation. In one photo, the figure of a man standing in a doorway of a shattered building (his home?) seems so small, but also immovable in both dignity and grief. I was hearing the same in the stories, all the stories. I kept coming back to that photo until I realized that he was the person I needed to draw.
The drawing is conté crayon, about 4″ x 3″. The photo is below. I have seen it with various captions on different websites, usually with some editorial slant, but all agree that the photo is of Khan Yunis, in the southern Gaza Strip, and shows the result of an airstrike by the Israel Defense Force on December 6, 2023.
Sermons in Stones 
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