I'm continuing to give myself a slower January after the show craziness of Winter Arts. I'm cleaning my house some to get it pleasant again and doing a bit of print shop reorganzation, but I'm also trying to keep my sketching game going. I did another cold weather sketch on my dog walk yesterday, again just using pencils and crayons without getting out all the paint things. I'm kind of hoping this cold weather training will get me used to being out so I can sketch in the snow tomorrow. I never really want snow -- I like to walk out in the world without worrying about slipping -- but it is quite lovely visually. We'll see if I have the intestinal fortitude to sketch outside tomorrow. Watch this space...
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Memphis Urban Sketchers met inside Crosstown today, a converted old Sears distribution tower that calls itself a "vertical village." It's a wonderful community space with lots of indoor vistas on a chilly January day. I had seen and loved the red tree in the Crosstown Arts area and was glad to see it still up -- I like it when people celebrate the whole season of Christmas and not just a single day. Henry and I settled there for a while to do a fairly intricate and layered space with the tree front and center. Afterwards we moved out to chat with friends, and the graphic orange restroom sign caught my eye, so I did it quickly before our meet up. After more chatting and lunch with Christina, Henry and I walked towards home. It's going to get crazy cold, and I got warm walking, so I decided to keep going to the park and take advantage of the last chance to sketch outdoors for a while. I hadn't drawn "my" tree in a good while. She's decayed a lot but is still lovely, so I camped out on a picnic table and did one good sketch before heading home to warm up. First Saturdays are always one of my favorite days of the month. I love our great sketching crew, and it's a lovely excuse to get out and draw for the sheer pleasure of it.
I keep thinking about food trucks lately, ever since I sketched one in Little Rock on my way to my mini museum tour. They're colorful (often) and interesting visually and fun. I had done a couple for the M is for Memphis book too. I'm not sure where this is going, but I want to get out, sketch a few, and sample their wares in the new year. I had sketched Byway Coffee briefly in the Winter Arts parking lot early in December, then they they showed up again in Overton Park. I went back from my walk to get my full sketching kit and did a color version.
I went without sketching for at least a week after my long trip because I came home to full on family events and house guests. Joyful for sure, but I've also enjoyed getting back to sketching in my daily(ish) life. The first was a forest walk and sketch of the colors changing and a couple of great tree trunks. I started using pencils more with my paints (mostly Inktense water soluble pencils) on the museum trip, and I've kept enjoying them. I like the extra texture they bring. Next is a farm sketch from Saturday. I went out and had a great visit with my folks, a great walk with Henry (we spotted the Christmas tree I want, though I'm not going to cut it yet), and a little bit of sketching time for me. Last is also pencils, using more colors than just one or two base ones. It's the view from the deck of Casablanca yesterday. I had a lovely time sitting out in perfect weather, drinking tea and having lunch and sketching with my best sketching buddy Christina. Always a pleasure.
I am terrible at all daily challenges and have enough deadlines that I resist imposing more on myself. But I did really enjoy sketching most days during Inktober last year. I got a small sketchbook and did something each time I left the house. It reminded me how much I enjoy doing fast sketches out in the world. This week I've reached for my 5.5" square handbook, the smaller of my two regular ones, and a black pen plus a brush pen to carry around with me. They're neat and easy for errands. But I do want to get going with a dip pen too. I remembered this summer how much I enjoy using those, even though the clean up is slightly more than with a fountain pen you pop the cap back on. I had a very bad start to the month just below -- I had a darker brush pen with me instead of my normal one, and I made a total mess of Henry's head. So I switched to line only until I found the lighter, warmer brush pen I like for tone. The first one wasn't playing well with my more absorbent sketch book, but honestly I was also just out of practice. Today I did some back porch sketches, the first one above of my garage and Henry lying with his paws crossed. The tree is an oak my grandfather planted in the back yard when I was still in single digits. It's a marvelous tall tree these days. I'm not a purist and also reach for watercolor to go with my ink, as I did last night at Cafe 1912 having dinner with Christina. Ink and watercolor is my longtime favorite combination, though I do try to mix things up and challenge myself with other media as well.
I've been trying to do at least slightly more restrained sketches lately, but I was ALL over the page with paint and pattern this weekend. But I had a good time with both, even as I watched them spin slightly out of control. Saturday was the East Buntyn Art Walk. I visited a few friends who were exhibiting, had lunch at the fantastic Flipside Asia food truck, and settled in to sketch with Christina. We sat on the curb with our feet in the gutter as per usual, both fascinated by the lovely little field stone church in the middle of Memphis. I had forgotten my black waterproof pen I've been using a lot, and I didn't have a brown one, so I dove in again with the Diamine Ancient Copper. I forgot that I'd intended to use it for natural scenes but NOT architecture because it bleeds so badly into the woodwork I'm trying to leave white. But there we are. I'd like to go back and try again sometime. It truly is a lovely church.
Today I did mostly printmaking, but I did take my sketchbook along for my walk in the forest. There were some great clouds out in the park, but it was also super windy, so I kept going on into the forest where there would be much more shelter. Again I covered the whole page, but it was nice to be outside in the sunshine doing some sketching. I've been working so hard on prints that I've barely sketched since the Eclipse. It felt good to get back to it. Wildflower season in the Old Forest of Overton Park is always my favorite. Henry and I have been walking and watching them emerge, and I've done a bit of sketching over the last couple of weeks. The top one is my overall view of Jacob's ladder and a few trillium in the foreground. It's my much more traditional walk-into-the-scene scale. I tend not to do either huge, swallow-you-up panoramas or really close up pieces. I've got a modest, person sized landscape that appeals to me for my main work, but I make an exception for wildflowers, and teapots, of course! I do also sketch my tea things close up. So here are some closer views of the wildflowers that I have done just for fun, starting with the one small gorgeous circle of yellow trillium. Most of our trillium is that purple-y brown, but I love this one vibrant patch. In other news, these are all in my newest sketchbook, at roughly 5x8 size that opens up to an ever so slightly landscape format. It's by Handbook and has watercolor paper but is more modest than my longtime 8x8" size. I'm really enjoying the change of shape and the smaller amount of real estate to fill. It feels less daunting to sit down and start a spread, but it still has room for what I want to do. I've ordered another one and asked my local Art Center to start stocking them. I think it's my new go-to after trying several different ones over the past year. The trillium above and the mayapples/Jacob's ladder below both have watercolor crayons (Neocolor 2) as their base instead of ink from a fountain pen. I try to mix it up some to keep myself fresh. I enjoy the extra texture of the crayons, but ink remains my go-to, especially for more architectural landscapes around town. But the crayons work great for organic shapes and especially the looser close ups I've been doing with the wildflowers.
I've mostly been doing book work lately, illustrations meant specifically for M is for Memphis. I'm excited about how it's going, but I also feel myself tighten up a bit when I'm painting for a purpose like that. It felt good yesterday to take advantage of a sunny 60 degree day and go get chai with my partner and then head over to the park for some sky studies. The clouds had been amazing as we sat on the cafe deck, but they were moving rapidly out by the time I got to the park and was settled on a picnic table with Henry tethered beside me to hang out.
I did one quick cloud study as the front piece to a new sketchbook. I'm kind of excited about this one. It's a Handbook watercolor book, like my normal bigger (8x8") size, but it's 8x4" or so. I had a vertical one this summer that was 8x10". It was fun to branch out of my normal landscape format double truck and have something more upright, but it was SO much real estate to cover that I was a little reluctant to start a piece if I didn't feel I had a good long time. I don't need a sketchbook that makes me reluctant to open it. The nice thing about that one was that it was slightly landscape format, but tallish, when open. This one is purely square, which isn't my favorite, but it's good to mix up my shapes, and I love the size. I stumbled on it in an art store out west and have been waiting to finish my last bigger Handbook to start the new one. I had fun and did a sycamore tree I love against the blue, blue sky once the clouds had gone. I'll be curious to see how this format feels as I use it more. I spent the lovely last day of 2023 outside at the park with Henry. We sketched and walked and sat and watched the sky and did a circuit of the neighborhood too. It felt lovely. January 1 was much less lovely, though I'm very glad to see a new year coming in.
I still made art that day, meaning to start the year as I hope to continue it. Henry and I had stumbled across a full length mirror in the Old Forest a few days earlier, and I took a series of photos. I can't stop thinking about how magical that pool of reflective light felt in the midst of the forest. I have two big projects on my plate, but I'm giving myself permission to follow the shiny object and do a small graphic essay. That's especially true at the holiday season, but I do try to take advantage of the more persistent inspiration when it shows up. It may not mean much to others once I finish it, but I'm enjoying the process and the play this week and am hopeful it might be something lovely when finished. After struggling to take my normal forest walks for a lot of the past year, it feels lovely to be starting out in a place that inspires me and feeds my work. Oxford American is on newsstands and in bookstores (Burke's and Novel locally), and my essay is also up on their website. I'm so delighted to see it out in the world!
It was a great pleasure to have a physically small winter project to do through the worst of my long covid. I could be on the sofa, under a fuzzy blanket, with Henry on my feet, and work on the 30 small watercolors while watching British mysteries. It meant so much to have a hopeful, exciting project that was also manageable for me. I'm still not standing up to do oil paintings, but I'm back to doing a bit more print work again. This essay saved me through the worst of being able to do none of my regular, much loved activities. WKNOfm hosted me to talk about the essay (and to announce my next big project), and that interview is here. They do such a great job supporting a whole range of arts in Memphis. Here is one more painting from the essay. I had such fun doing a small portrait of Georgia O'Keeffe in her adopted landscape. |
![]() online store Martha Kelly is an artist and illustrator who lives and works in Memphis, Tennessee. Get occasional studio email updates. Categories
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