Opera Memphis has been inviting our Memphis Urban Sketchers group to sketch at their dress rehearsals. I love how they are so inclusive of a broad variety of arts in the community. I couldn't make the dress rehearsal this time, but my family went on Tuesday night, and I sketched then instead. I started with the pre-opera sideboard, and then did a watercolor of the set before the performance started.

It was dark to draw, and I was thoroughly enjoying the performance, so I only did a quick one actually during the opera. My figures are challenged enough when I have good light to see by. But I love that the modern setting they gave this show and the fact that the prince, disguised as a wandering minstrel, is dressed as an Elvis impersonator. Perfect.

My fountain pen was out of ink, and I was rushed getting out of the house, so I ended up doing pencil sketches today and really enjoyed that. It was a family day -- lunch at the Brushmark, the restaurant inside the Brooks museum here in Memphis. I ended up being early after all, so I sketched this 1950 etching by Luigi Lucioni. Of course I was drawn to the one with the trees. They had a show up of his etchings, and they are gorgeous. Delicate and detailed, and many views of the same scenes, which always appeals to me. I like artists working in the same area over a period of time.

Later I ended up at Huey's, my semi-regular Sunday hangout. I've been going for many years now to hear music on periodic Sunday afternoons. If a band I like is playing, it's my favorite part of the week -- hearing great music, seeing friends, having a glass of wine, just relaxing in a happy place. Today was a new band to me, Le Tumulte Noir. It was only their second gig. But with familiar musicians like my friend Jim Spake of the Boyfriends and Lucero on sax and clarinet, and THREE (count 'em) gypsy guitars plus a fine bass player. Really great stuff.

I was mostly hanging with friends and then my brother, but I did do one quick music sketch.

I did this sketch just before dinner on my last evening in Cape May. It seems a good Christmas Eve one to share. I hope everyone has a marvelous Winter Wonderland kind of holiday with loved ones, wherever you are.

Our Memphis npr station WKNO fm has a wonderful twice daily interview show called Checking on the Arts. I listen to npr wherever I travel, and some of the stations occasionally have live bands in the studio or something, but I have never encountered such a frequent and broadly arts supportive show as we have here. I'm so grateful to Darel Snodgrass and Kacky Walton for their dedication to it, the research they do, the kindness to all of us trying to make a living at the arts, and the great questions they invariably ask.

I love listening and hearing friends, artists, musicians, theater directors, and a whole host of other people each day talking about the things that make Memphis so wonderful to live in.

Darel kindly had Elizabeth Alley and me on the first of this week to talk about our show of travel paintings at Memphis Botanic Garden (up till January 2). I was in Cape May at the time (we had prerecorded it) and completely forgot it was airing, so Darel was also kind enough to share the file with me.

Making art is a solitary and non-verbal process much of the time, and I find that I really learn things about what I do and why I'm doing it every time I go in and sit with Darel and have to think about the probing questions he asks. I also just love the whole crew down at WKNO, so it's fun to have an excuse to drop in the office and hug everyone. Anyway, we had a blast, and here it is if you'd like to hear about our travel paintings and what that process is like for each of us.

Here's an old sketch of Justin Willingham, the afternoon WKNO host, in their studios.

I met professional photographer Jackie Kane while I was up in Cape May. Since I'm working up there on my own largely (though the staff there always make me very welcome), it's fun to get to meet and talk to fun and interesting people. I met a couple of artists this time (I'm talking about you, Doug!), and it's always neat to talk shop. An added bonus was Jackie turning her talents to take shots of me while I was working. (The full set of them is on her site here.)

She found me on the coldest day I actually did work outside (middle 30's), so I'm embarrassed about the hat situation. I need my broad floppy hat instead of my cuter winter hat to give me shade while I work, so I had a stocking wool hat on underneath it. Sigh. A fashion plate I am not.

But it's kind of fun to get to see my set up through someone else's eyes.

Here's my favorite one. It really embodies the act of creation to me.

You can see lots more of Jackie's work here. She's got a great eye and gets that beautiful light I never manage to achieve in my photographs. Her Ferris wheel at night series is super cool.

 Cape Resorts, the hotel group I do illustrations for in Cape May, NJ, has a holiday slide show of my watercolors going across the top of their website. It is such fun to see my work being used.

I'm just about to head back up there, too, and paint their Christmas festivities for a second year in a row. It's a busy week, with the MBG Paris show a week ago (and still up till New Year's), my home show this past Sunday, and my upcoming departure Thursday morning.

The home show was great fun. I loved having so many friends come through, and I made some new ones as well, which is always lovely. The show wound down the last half hour when my friend and touring musician Andy Cohen showed up with his guitar. I got out my bass, and we played a little music before our respective evening engagements. A perfect way to end a fun day.

And now I'm gearing up to go back to a place I've really come to love. I just hope the snow is all gone by Thursday....

More screen shots from the Cape Resorts website:

April in Paris and Lessons in Spanish is UP! It's my joint travel paintings show with Elizabeth Alley at Memphis Botanic Garden. The opening is tonight from 5:30-7:30 -- free and open to everyone. Bring your friends and have a glass of wine on us!

It was a long hanging day yesterday. I'm grateful to be working in a smaller format these days. Instead of hauling huge canvases (or, even worse, huge pastels under glass), I could carry my entire show into the building in one trip. Here it is:

The downside is the long layout process for that many pieces. I ran out of time at the end and didn't get a final count, but I think I hung almost 100 watercolors and prints.

I lay them down on the floor first, take a snapshot of the layout on my smart phone (a marvelous tip I got from Elizabeth last time we hung a show together), and stick them on the walls with poster tape. Marvelous stuff.

There were tons of nail holes in the walls, so my arrangements changed a bit as I moved to the wall, trying to hide as many of them as possible.

I worked so late it was pretty dark to get a decent photograph, and the lights weren't adjusted for my show yet (hopefully MBG can make that happen before the opening tonight), but here's how the first wall looks. Overall I'm pleased.

I needed a break after the last print, which was architectural and complex, so I decided on a garden one next.

I've always loved the geometry and mass of formal gardens and had been hoping to find more of them in France than I managed to. Most of the topiary I found was a disappointing knee high, but I did find a few gardens I wanted to paint.

Chateau de la Chatonniere was a few miles out of Azay le Rideau, where I spent several happy nights at the beginning of my trip. I didn't have a car, so one day I packed a lunch and my painting gear and just hiked out to see the chateau gardens. That was the day I discovered that while the French are scrupulous about crosswalks, they are less likely to give quarter to pedestrians on the side of a country road. But it was a lovely day, and I had fun painting in the gardens.

The carving on this one went much more quickly, which was a welcome break after the Opera print. I was able to pull a proof on just the second day of work and see what it was looking like.

I did a bit more refining, especially in the chateau itself, before pulling the second proof. It's almost finished now, and I'm trying to figure out which watercolor I want to work from next.

I'm putting together my 2014 calendar this week. I spent so much more time painting in Paris this year than I did in Memphis that I decided to focus on Paris this year. It's the work I'm most proud lately.

Because it's not Memphis, it won't be sold in as many locations this year, so put your order in with me now if you'd like one! You can email martha1kelly@aol.com if you'd like to be included in my order to the printer.

Here are the images for the calendar:

I went down to the RiverArts Fest downtown this afternoon. It's a great art fair in general, and the music lineup had my favorite band playing. I wandered around, chatted with a Colorado print maker, ran into friends, and heard Jason Freeman play both a headline set of his own and then close the day out with the Bluff City Backsliders, my favorite local band these days.

I often enjoy sketching musicians in general and the Backsliders in particular, but after doing the one above during Jason's own set, and the one of him below during the start of the Backsliders, I realized that today I'd much rather just stand up and dance and immerse myself in the music out under a gorgeous sky. So I did that. Perfect.