Illustration Friday: Wilderness

What an evocative prompt! There's so many directions one could go with this. Thoreau talks about how everyone needs a little wilderness, and I would agree with that.

I know this looks like a whole bunch of other pictures I've made, but what I'm thinking about this, and the topic of "wilderness", is that in folk music, you can hear the wilderness of its roots. I play Scandanavian folk music, and I can hear the darkness and cold of the mountains and fjords. It's a wild place indeed. And in American folk music--you can hear Appalachia and the Ozarks in those old time traditions, and the swamps of Louisiana in Cajun music. It's all there, embedded in the music.

Music Sketches

I didn't ever have time to do the Illustration Friday topic of "confined" though I had lots of ideas, but I did have a chance to do some sketches. The nice thing about sketching people playing music, is, though they're moving, they stay in basically the same position, or at least keep coming back to it.

Renewal II

Here's the second one. Several others are absolutely terrible, so I probably won't post them, but this gives me some ideas for some other pictures. It's funny how you have to actually MAKE pictures to get ideas for other pictures.

Illustration Friday: Renewal

This is a double "renewal." Firstly, in the midst of this extended deep-freeze and deep-snow, I'm in the need of some color, in the need of some playing. So I got out my watercolors and water-soluable painting crayons, and just played. It was SO relaxing just to make marks and see what happened. Everyone needs to do that every now and again, to recharge, and discover something new (or rediscover something old). When I do that, I usually work on four or five (or more) picture at a time, adding layers, and working on the next one as the first one dries, etc. This is just the first one that I'm calling "finished." For some reason, my scanner is doing a terrible job with colors, and I have no idea how to fix it so that it looks right again.

The second sense of renewal is the figure itself...floating in a state where she can become renewed. Again, it's something we all need. Babies are in that state while they are waiting to be born, but the rest of us need to return to it--not exactly to limbo, but to a state of relaxation, where you can feel the currents of the universe and not have to be anywhere and do anything, but can just BE. That's what it takes to feel renewed.

New Year's Sketches

New year's day jam with some great out-of-town musicians. And another sketch from a couple weeks ago.....I think at another music event. The funny (tough?) thing about sketching live people is that they're always moving, so you have to watch for them to put their heads back at the same angle you started. But it's all good.