EDM Challenge #262 & #263

It's been years it seems since I posted any EDM sketch challenges here. Firstly, here is my shower. It's amazing how something you look at every day just isn't 'seen'! I am definitely moving on getting that new shower rail after this!
This one is 'draw your favourite cleaning product'. Favourite cleaning product? Well, as much as I hate cleaning I must admit I do have a favourite 'product'. Because I hate all products (they make me sneeze and the skin on my hands peel off, I make my own which is not only Jan friendly but environmentally friendly too. I've been using this for a decade or more now. What more recommendation could it need?
I'm wondering what others 'like' to clean with now actually. Do you go for 'smells nice' or 'cleans like paint stripper'? Or do you make your own?

An Illustrated Life

It's been a long time since I did a rave about Danny Gregory here on my blog. I started this blog originally to share the challenges I drew for his Everyday Matters group. At the time his books weren't available in Australia so I initially just interacted with the group online. Then I bought The Creative License from Amazon and waited a couple of months for it to arrive. (With the exchange rate etc I couldn't justify the cost of air freight.) When it did finally arrive I could not believe how perfect it was for me. I have revisited that book so many times! I do loan it to friends from time to time and by the time it comes back to me I'm desperate for a Creative License 'fix.'

Challenge #27 Books
Originally uploaded by DannyGregory

I'm a bit backwards at times, so after the success of my first Danny Gregory purchase I went back and ordered Everyday Matters, his first book. Wow. It too is wonderful, different to The Creative License, but just as wonderful.

So, I was excited when he released his latest book An Illustrated Life, drawing inspiration from the private sketchbooks of artists, illustrators and designers. Thanks to the global economic downturn, I was reluctant to buy it when it first hit the virtual shelves of Amazon but on a recent trip to Sydney I was thrilled to find it on the analogue shelves of Kinokuniya (my favourite book shop in the real world). I snapped it up, brought it home, looked at the pictures and put it on the side table next to the chair that gets the morning sun and... well, life went on, as it does, and the book sat there.

Purchase guilt set in. I don't know if you suffer from it, but I do. That truly annoying voice in my head started saying things like "you bought it and now you're not even reading it!" in a guilt-inducing tone. OK! I'll read it.

An Illustrated Life from DannyGregory on Vimeo.

Well, it turns out those voices in my head have a purpose! This books is, dare I say it (?) the best book I've bought in a very long time. I don't know what you look for in a book but I'm looking for a) inspiration to actually do my own work, b) I want that inspiration to be 'open' so I can do 'my' work and not be prescribed to or overly influenced and c) a gentle hand on my shoulder that says "you're fine! We all feel like this and it's OK. Just do the work and you'll be fine." This book does and says just that. The strength of the book is that it says it in fifty voices! Fifty unique voices and hundreds of sparks of inspiration.

If you like to imagine you are someone who keeps sketchbooks or a journal or such then this book will help you to see how easy it is and reinforces the fact that you just have to touch pen (or pencil) to paper and be yourself within the pages of your own book to create something that not only records the visual aspects of the world, your life, etc, but also improves the quality of that life. It seems intangible, strange, unlikely, but doing this does create a preciousness of what usually just slips by us - our 'everyday' life.

EDM Challenge #14 - Draw what you see in the morning

This is my view when I look up in bed. It looks like a funny face to me.

EDM Challenge #19 - Draw something you've made

On the little wire table on our bedroom balcony is the ceramic sculpture I made of Gaia. She lies, each part of her body is a world in itself, gazing at the world she holds in the palm of her hand - planet Earth. She never looks away.

I've started ANOTHER journal...

I bought this book in Firenze (Florence, Italy) on my last day there last year. To be honest, I found Firenze a bit of a shock. So old, the streets so narrow and twisting, the architectural and artistic 'icons' all squashed into the tiny Medieval space. I guess it was my Australian sensibility kicking in, but I had expected to be able to stand back and look at the sites, but in Firenze the only way you get to see anything is by looking up, or so it seemed to me. We were staying right in the heart of the old city, a stones throw from the Duomo. Our street was incredibly narrow but our hotel was fabulously extravagant - perfect for Firenze.But, back to the book. I have always loved the fleur-de-lis symbol. I really wanted a full-on Firenze souvenir with it on. But I couldn't choose. I left it, thinking the perfect souvenir would present itself to me, but on the last day I was still undecided although I did know it needed to be something in leather. I had seen a book like this but with an attached cover. I liked it, but knew the 'pressure' of what to put in it would be too much for me and I'd never use it. Then I found this one with a reusable cover. I could replicate the book itself with my bookbinding skills later. The pressure was off. I could write or draw in a book that could be replaced with a new one in its fabulous cover. "I'll take this one!" (My Italian is nonexistent.)But, up until last week I could never bring myself to use it anyway! I have many journals in current usage, but the temptation is always very strong to start another. I love books! I started this one off with writing down all my most recent 'ideas'. (I have a lot of ideas. I often don't write them down which is always a mistake.)Then I began to be a little disappointed with the black writing on every page, no colour, so I thought I'd try a quick sketch to see how the paper held up. It's not designed to be a sketchbook.I'm surprised how much I like the format of the book. It is a delightful size. It's thick, has substance but isn't too big. It's light and robust and the paper is lovely to write and draw on in spite of its thinness and slight translucency. I'm looking forward to seeing "lived in" signs on its leather cover. It will only help to make me love it more.


Post edited 17.9.2007
I've realised I can claim the mozzie coil drawing as EDM Challenge #59 - Draw a sign of spring.
And I can claim the apple one as EDM Challenge #24 - Draw a piece of fruit.
And the herbs as EDM Challenge #136 - Draw something that's alive.
Yay! It's good to be getting some more challenges done!

Drawings

In my drawing course I was first asked to draw a group of chairs on A1 paper. This is done with charcoal, graphite and ink and had to use only lines. I was surprised initially at the exercise because it asked for me to arrange some of my chairs in a thoughtful composition. Chairs! We have chair issues in our house! We have soooo many chairs. We love chairs. We can never possibly own another chair... and then we see one... and it is gorgeous!... can we fit in another chair? (No we cannot!) (but sometimes we do...)
My composition is supposed to look a little uncomfortable, as if the chairs are vying for attention, as if they are trying to move up the chair-ladder of our esteem, as if they feel (ever so slightly) threatened by our lust for more chairs and how that might bring about their demise.






The cupboard under the sink in the toilet is on A4 and done with felt tip pens, pitt pens and textas. It too had to be only lines. (It is not a good scan, for some reason the thick black texta showed up much darker than the rest.) I had to draw objects of different surface textures inside a 3D space. I chose this because I thought the S-bend and the toilet paper would be interesting to draw.




I find it interesting that both these drawing exercises are very similar to Everyday Matters Challenges. I never got around to EDM challenge 30 - Draw a chair, or 64 - Draw your sink, but now I've done them!


P.S. My computer is back and has a really big bandaid (sticking plaster for those non-Australians) to keep it going until April! And in April I'm getting my first Mac. I'll give it a go and see how I like it. These computers only last 3 years anyway, so I can always go back to a PC then if it doesn't work out.

Thinking about my spare time...

Blogging has been one of the best things I've done with my spare time. It is not 'the best', but up there. It came initially as a response to Danny Gregory's Everyday Matters website, then books, then Yahoo group. All these things got me moving again. Moving led me on to blogging. Blogging led me to view the Internet in a whole new light.

Now I have filled my spare time to the brim! I'm the busiest and happiest I've been in a long time! I'm working 'full time' (my definition of full-time tends to differ from others - but it is full-time to me!) and studying full-time. I'm about to get a bit more real about that and cut back to 4 days a week work because my study has become so important to me.

So my spare time is practically non-existant. This is a reality I have always dreaded. I'm a 'spare time' freak. I must have it. I must be able to do, create, make, dabble in my spare time. I go nuts if I don't have it.

But I'm not nuts. I love it. My non-spare time is filled with things I love doing. I don't want to slow down. I want to speed up! I want more. I'm getting more. I'm doing more. I love more! I've always been a fervent upholder of what I've called 'the extraordinary found in the ordinary everyday'. Danny Gregory was right when he said every day matters.

Note:
For the purpose of acknowledging chronology, these blind contour drawings of Roly have been inserted in the order they were drawn, not the order they appear in my Moleskine.

EDM Challenge 29 - Local Architecture

Sketching down at the marina. It was so windy that me and my book were buffeted constantly making detail impossible and fast sketching an absolute necessity. The noise was amazing, the tapping of cables agains masts, ropes creaking and a something that sounded like one of the giant masts must have been hollow and the wind howling across the opening was making that blowing-across-the-open-neck-of-a-bottle sound. (Yes, I have imagination; no I don't know much about boats.) And then the spray kept coming over the breakwall behind me... And then it was time to go home!












This is my local post office. I keep a private box there, post my letters, pick up parcels. It is one of the few buildings in
Coffs Harbour
of any great age. I think it is actually the only surviving brick building from pre 1950's. It is dominated by the high school and it's heavy 70's architecture. And it is opposite a nice pub which I think I will have to draw another day. Maybe when it is hot. I might need refreshment...

And now I find I've actually completed another EDM Challenge unbeknowns to me! Yey!

EDM Challenges 2, 4, 13, 40 and 52 - all on one page!

Home sick today. Decided to go a grid of quick sketches. Actually did all of the above challenges on one page and while sitting in bed! Not a serious attempt. Just filling in the day.

EDM Challenge 76 - Draw some fresh flowers

Well, it feels good to have done some sketching. I've found it hard to start up again after the painting thing. I decided to re-live the heady days of only a couple of months ago, when I discovered how inspiring it can be to participate in the EDM Challenges, so I looked it up to see what was there to do. Flowers?! What a coincidence! I've been having a bit of a flowery week after being flowerless for a long time. Ok!

Back to the Moleskine. Why are they so seductive??? If I know it doesn't take watercolour or ink the way I want it to, why do I reach for it first every time? This time I remembered about the watercolour thing (I HATE it when I forget and start off and ... yuk!, now what do I do with this page?). I had read in the blurb that comes with them that the Moleskine sketchbook is suitable for blah blah blah and gouache. I've done a bit of gouache in it before, and yes it does work. Thought I'd try to do a mainly gouache sketch. (Actually think I've done EDM Challenge 62 - use a different medium to what you're used to, as well, almost accidentally.)

So here it is. I'm not a flower painter and I don't usually paint in gouache, and I haven't sketched for a little while. And it isn't a good scan. But enough with the excuses!

EDM Challenge #70 - Draw What You Fear!

I actually suggested this topic to the Everyday Matters Group. I came to this, with one of those flashes of 'inspiration', while at work. I was in the computer lab at school and the Year 3's were researching 'minibeasts' (or bugs as they are commonly known). Surfing through a couple of suitable websites they came across a myriad of ugly insects. Now I'm not afraid of spiders or snakes, but when I turned around to see a huge ugly grasshopper on the screen infront of me... well, my life long phobia kicked in and I found I was gasping for breath, my heart racing and having to suppress a scream (which I managed to do, thankfully). I was able to joke about it to the teacher there, and then I started to wonder if drawing it might help me 'get over' an obviously illogical fear... but isn't that part of the meaning of 'phobia'... an illogical fear?




I decided to include the whole journal page even though the other half is a little off-topic.




I also feel bad about the length of time it has taken me to get this challenge done. It unfortunately coincided with a trip away, internet problems and a very busy patch of 'everyday' life.
Thanks for looking, and I hope it doesn't scare you!

EDM Challenge #69 - Draw a beverage

Just a quick sketch of my wine tonight. Used the same nib as in lower left (previous post). Also did thick outline of the frame with same nib as in lower right (previous post again) and was VERY disappointed in the way the Moleskine paper just sucked the life out of the line! (Is that the wine talking? I might try this challenge again later in the week with coffee and see what effect that has on the result!)

EDM Challenge #68 - Draw your computer

My computer is (surprisingly) my new best friend. I have really enjoyed the world it has opened up to me. I have met more people of like interests through my computer in the last few months than at any other time in memory (probably doesn't mean anything). I have received freely given positive criticism and those with negative opinions have kept them to themselves. It has been the best venue for my art that I have yet found.
The conundrum is that the more this works for me, the more I am motivated to work, the more work I produce, the more I am motivated to post, the more I am motivated to surf, and lur, checking the work of other [who are working - not lurking!] and the consequential lack of priduction is, motivated by those I saw while lurking, replaced by working, working, working, which I then post, which leads to...

EDM Challenge #10 - Draw a hand

I found a second hand copy of a book on henna tattoos. I've long had a fascination with tattoos of all descriptions so I couldn't resist. This is one of the beautiful hand tattoos. It also happens to be an Everyday Matters Challenge! I am slowly getting some of them done. The fingers are still a bit 'banana-ish'. Once again I've used my new found friends the Faber Castell Shades of Grey Brush pens, my new disposable fountain pen and a couple of Pigma Microns. I do love love love the Shades of Grey pens! They so easily elevate a drawing from a flat line drawing to a reasonable tone drawing in a very short quick time.

EDM Challenge #51 - "Dancing With The Stars"

Lots of great suggestions received with thanks. One suggested drawing from the TV. I've not ever done that... there's a ballroom dancing show on NOW! Ok, time to try... here's the result.

Ok, so I didn't spend a lot of time on the 'quick sketch of the dancers'... but my Mum was visiting for her birthday and it was fun to draw.

4 May - Changed the title of this entry to include the EDM challenge I didn't realise I was doing at the time! Thanks to Shirley for the info!

EDM Challenge #63 - Go on a nature walk, pick up items, draw what you find.

Skipping Stones.

I did this journal page today after a walk down to the creek behind our house. This is a page in my Moleskine which I had accidentally 'wreaked' by drawing on the next page with my new Sharpie Twin Tip. The ink not only went through the page, but also onto the next one. At the time I gessoed the page to cover it up and waited for a suitable 'loose' subject matter to appear. I drew with pencil, graphite and watercolour and went over again with more gesso and watercolour. Perhaps this is partly explains why I think the original is better than the scanned image - too many contrasting textures to reflect the scanning lamp(?).