Christmas Card Studies for 2016. Quick pencil sketches in a Stillman and Birn sketchbook. I was going to select the bottom left and print the cards and then add watercolor by hand. Change of direction when Staples cannot print onto the watercolor cards. Time to re-think.
The McLaren F1 is a beautiful super car. The hand built sports car was designed by Gordon Murray, had been working on a one-plus-two seating configuration since 1969. Twenty years later, his innovative arrowhead concept came to fruition in the F1. Pentel mechanical pencil with HB lead in a Stillman and Birn sketchbook.
A couple of quick studies for a future watercolor painting of our house. The plan is for more of a graphic painting focusing on the foreground flowers as much as the house. The flowers are Black Eyed Susan’s, Daises and Cone Flowers. Graphite pencil in a Stillman and Birn Beta sketchbook.
This is second attempt at quick pencil study of a beach cottage at the access to Ballston Beach in Truro, Massachusetts on Cape Cod. This is a little more focused and an image that I would like to try a more finished painting. Koh-I-Noor 4B solid graphite pencil with Holbein watercolors in a Stillman and Birn sketchbook.
Unitarian Memorial Church is a historic church in Fairhaven, Massachusetts and was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1996.The Church in Massachusetts was built, financed and donated to the Unitarians in 1904 by Henry H. Rogers in memory of his mother, Mary Eldredge Huttleston. The church was designed by Boston architect Charles Brigham in a Gothic Revival style. It is one hundred fourteen feet in height, one hundred feet long in body and fifty-three feet wide. The nave is thirty-two feet wide and seventy-one feet long. The church, parish house and former parsonage are so placed as to form three sides of a quadrangle, set among well-kept lawns and shrubbery. Granite (locally quarried) with Indiana Limestone decorative carvings dominate the exterior while marble and limestone carvings dominate the interior. All stonework artistry was created by forty-five Italian craftsmen brought to Fairhaven by Rogers. Koh-I-Noor 4B graphite pencil with watercolor accent for the aged bronze doors.
I am always drawn to the water and the Port of New Bedford is very vibrant and challenging. The port of New Bedford is the highest valued commercial port in the United States. Most of the vessels are commercial scallop fisherman trolling south of Nantucket. Tonight I was able to draw this sketch on site (en plein air) on a beautiful summer evening. The “Hear no Evil” is a commercial scallop fishing vessel and was built in 1987. It is also one of the larger fishing boats out of New Bedford. This was a very challenging view in that now only was I looking at the tow vessels in the foreground, but also the masts, outriggers and lines of an additional 10 boars in the background. Pilot Namiki Falcon fountain pen with Noodler’s Black Ink, Pelikan watercolors in a Stillman and Birn Sketchbook.
The Church of the Messiah is located in the beautiful quaint village of Woods Hole, Massachusetts. The granite, Gothic-style church that stands beside Little Harbor is home to Cape Cod’s oldest Episcopal parish. The church, which was constructed in 1888 and consecrated on July 2, 1889. Back to practicing with pencil for tonal a study. Koh-I-nor solid graphite 6B pencil in an Alpha Series Stillman and Birn Sketchbook.
Chatham Lighthouse,known as Twin Lights prior to 1923, is a lighthouse in Chatham, Massachusetts, near the “elbow” of Cape Cod. The station was established in 1808, the second light on Cape Cod. To distinguish it from Highland Light, the first Cape Cod light, and to act as a range, twin octagonal 40-foot (12 m) wooden towers were built. They were on skids so that they could be moved to keep them in line with the entrance channel as it shifted. The current structures were built in 1879 of brick lined cast iron with a Fourth Order Fresnel Lens. Today, the former keeper’s house is an active U.S. Coast Guard station, and on-duty personnel living quarters. Quick pencil sketch with Koh-I-nor solid graphite 4B pencil in the Alpha Series Stillman and Birn.
Nobska Light is located at the division between Buzzards Bay and Vineyard Sound in Woods Hole, Massachusetts on the southwestern tip of Cape Cod. The light station was established in 1826, and the current tower dates to 1876. The light station was added to the National Register of historic Places as Nobska Point Light Station in 1987. Nobska Light is set at the very southwestern tip of Cape Cod, separated from the shore by Nobska Road. The light station includes four buildings: the tower, the keeper’s house, a radio beacon house, and a small oil house. The tower has a brick interior and a metal exterior, formed out of four rings of iron paneling, and rises to a height of 40 feet. A quick graphite value sketch completed with Kohi-nor solid graphite 4B pencil in a Stillman and Birn Alpha Sketchbook.
A SKETCHBOOK ODYSSEY 