Mango Show Honolulu 2015

Our Sunday life drawing workshop group was invited to participate in a mango show art exhibit at the Honolulu Hale to be held from July 20 to August 9, 2015. The exhibit will also be part of a one day festival celebrating the mango on August 8, 2015.

This is the painting I submitted for the show. It's called A Girl and Her Mangoes. It's 32"w x 42"h, oil on canvas.

I have yet to see the exhibit and I think I'll stop to look at the show after work to see what the others have done. I think I may see some still lifes and many different artistic styles, but I'm hoping to see some really creative take on the mango.

I'll take some photos or do a video tour to show what the exhibit looks like. I may post them at a later date.

Life Drawing Workshop - 7/12/15

It wasn't the usual full house at the workshop today but it was a pretty good day for drawing the figure. This particular model that we had today has a mixture of white and dark hair that I sometimes have a little trouble depicting in my drawing. But I thought I got some good drawings off of her.

Below are one of the ten sumi ink warm-up sketches and two black and white charcoal drawings on toned paper.

Life Drawing Workshop - 6/21/15

Today's life drawing workshop had a new model that I had not drawn before. She had these long, thick hair that would hide much of her face but when she moved them aside it revealed a very pretty face.

These are 20 minute drawings done in three colors (red, black and white) on toned paper.

Life Drawing Workshop - 5/31/15

One of my drawings from today's life drawing workshop.I added a bit of reddish-brown to add some warmth to it. Maybe I should go back to working on my three color chalk drawing again.

New Painting In Progress - The Barista - 1st Draft

Sometimes the progress of a painting, from idea to sketch to canvas or panel, can go really slow. I have one right now on my easel that I know is going to take a long time till it’s finished. My vision for it is just not that clear.
However, this one painting that I worked on today, called The Barista went rather quickly from idea to sketch to panel. I was doodling for ideas in my sketchbook last weekend when I came up with this idea. The next day, while watching an NBA playoff game, I made a more detailed sketch with a ballpoint pen in a sketchbook as shown below.

I wasn’t sure yet whether to turn it into a painting but as this weekend came along I decided to do it. There was already a gessoed panel that was of the same proportion so I quickly transferred the drawing using the grid method.
After about two hours of painting, I had the painting as shown at the top. It’s about finished but there’s some more things I want to do with it. I’m going to take a long look at it and then see what I’ll do. It could change a little bit the next time I work on it but I think it should come out a little bit better.

Life Drawing Workshop - 5/17/15

New black and white charcoal drawing on toned paper from today's life drawing workshop.

Life Drawing Workshop - 5/10/15

We had a model today that had very familiar classic features. He looked like a model that stepped out of some French Academic drawings. His poses too had that French Academic feel. Reminded me a lot of Pierre Paul Prud'hon drawings.

I heard someone mention that the model reminded him of someone from the golden age of Dutch painting. Maybe it was because of his mustache.

When I looked at him a bit closer, I thought he had features resembling Vincent Van Gogh.

But anyway, I was a bit inspired and I thought that I did very well today.

Here are some twenty minute drawings done in black and white charcoal on toned paper.

Life Drawing Workshop - 4/19/15

Twenty-minute charcoal drawings on toned paper at the life drawing workshop.

Life Drawing Workshop - 4/12/15

Drawings from today's life drawing workshop. This model likes to tie her hair back tightly in a ponytail but someone asked to let her hair down and I thought she looked much better that way. Her loose hair did get in the way of her face in one of her poses but it provided a challenge in the drawing of her features beneath her hair.

Life Drawing Workshop - 3/22/15

I missed last week’s workshop because I got sick, but I’m well again and got to draw this weekend. Here are a couple black and white charcoal drawings on toned paper done at twenty minutes each.

Life Drawing Workshop - 3/8/15

Made it to the life drawing workshop for the second week in a row. I might not go next week though because it's also about time I get to the archery range and do some shooting. I had planned on doing archery at least once a month but I think I've already missed two months.

Anyway, I felt good about today's workshop. I think I had a good feel for my drawings.

On top of that, one of my fellow artists gave me an oversized book on Edward Hopper, which had been withdrawn from the library. I'm a big Edward Hopper fan so I was very happy with that. I'll have to think of something to give back to him.

So here are 2 of the 10 two minute warm-ups.

Below are twenty minute black & white charcoal drawings on toned paper.

Life Drawing Workshop - 3/1/15

It was great to attend the life drawing workshop after missing it for about a month. The model was someone I haven't drawn before and I hope she becomes one of our regular models.

Here is one of the warm-up poses done in sumi ink.

Here are a couple of twenty minute drawings from today's workshop.

Life Drawing Workshop - 2/1/15

I was surprised at how easy it was to draw this male model. You'd think that it's easier to draw male models that have a bodybuilder type body with overly defined muscles but a lot of times the muscles just get in the way. Some times there's just too many muscles to draw.

This model that we had today was very easy to draw because there were enough muscle and skeletal definitions in his body that added interest to the drawings. Below are some samples from today's life drawing workshop.