American Visionary Art Museum (too fast!)

During a trip to the east coast in May, I visited the American Visionary Art Museum in Baltimore, MD. Only had a short time to check it out before I scrambled to catch the train to DC, but it was worth the visit for sure.

No photography was allowed inside, so I just caught a few glimpses of my favorite moments in the sketchbook. (Yay, sketchbooks!)

Really compelling stories of self-taught artists doing impressive work that brought more than one tear to my eye. Hoping I can go back some day soon and dig in deeper.

National Aquarium

During my spring visit to the National Aquarium in Baltimore, Maryland, I was so amazingly glad to have a sketchbook on hand. So many amazing critters to admire!

Even paused to draw one of the many historic ships on the harbor. Really interesting town, soaked in history and culture. Would love to explore more of Baltimore.

Spring, Springing

Portland trees are erupting with lovely blossoms all over town. I decided to challenge myself to an art experiment this weekend: capturing the beautiful pink cherry blossoms in the neighbor's yard using a unusual art tool...being the 16-month-old kiddo.

Step one: Admire the awesome flowers. (Wow, huh?)

Step two: Assemble non-toxic art supplies in the appropriate color scheme (in this case, a gray washable non-toxic marker, a custom mix of red and white tempera paint, a nice soft paintbrush, and a stack of cream-colored cards.)

Step three: Strategically hand art supplies to kiddo during a gap in the incessant going-down-the-slide practice and cross fingers...

Step four: Burst buttons with pride at how nicely that all turned out. Brag on internet, mail originals to grandparents.

Yeah, OK, it's not really that much different than the folks who dip grubs in paint and them them crawl all over the paper...But it's a fun exercise in selecting materials and introducing chaos! (Plus, it's so exciting to watch this grub learn how to re-load a brush with paint.)

Happy spring, y'all.

Modern Bobcat, Ancient Nimravid

Wrapped up an illustration project a little while ago that involved a femur of an extinct "false saber-tooth cat"--Nimravids were carnivores that co-evolved to have the big long fangs that one sees in a Smilodon, but that aren't quite related to modern kitties as we know them.

However, the niches are close enough that I was able to make use of a modern bobcat femur to inform my work...

I was adapting the line drawings that the scientist had made from the original fossil, and creating a shaded version that leaned on the bobcat bone for its structural integrity.

Tonight I'm going to see if I can whack out a stippled chalicothere molar. Ha! Stippling is a notoriously slow way of doing illustrations, since it literally goes One. Dot. At. A. Time. But the results can be nice when you put in the time, and it does have a "timeless" look that comes across nicely in publications. Wish me luck!

Scarcely even a baby now

Looking through my sketchbook of late, I found myself thinking--"Oh man, there's almost nothing but sketches of the kiddo in here. I bet folks might get annoyed if I only ever post that stuff..."

And then I did a double-take and decided that I should be proudly embracing this life stage both in person and on the blog. So here you go, internet: some almost-recent doodles of this growing changing toddler. Enjoy!

Oregon to Alaska

Work trip to Fairbanks, Alaska! Had a lovely time sketching out the window of the airplane as we connected the travel dots today.

Lift-off from Portland Airport; volcanic trio; then watching the Columbia River drain into the Pacific Ocean.

Minimalist coastlines of British Columbia shift to dramatic mountain ranges. 

Envying odd peaks out the far side of the plane, then the landscape gets rugged under my side of the plane too.

Descent into Anchorage

Even lower over Anchorage. Sunlight reflects off ponds; snow-capped peaks; low angle of sun behind trees casts dramatic shadows on the water.

The fabulous mountain view from Anchorage airport.

Lifting off from Anchorage, en route to Fairbanks: already the sky turning golden with sunset at 2:30 in the afternoon!

Brown and Brown

We rented a car last weekend and as surprised how easy it is to get from one end of the urban sprawl to the other--as well as to get out in the woods.

More of my current brown-on-brown phase is posted over at Urban Sketchers Portland, if you're curious.