A Mouth, A Chin, A Hairline

Dripping Wet; IN PROGRESS; graphite; TMDD Series  Winter, 2014-15

There used to be ivy all leafy green
against this wall. I miss it. Snow
patterns are a downer.

Russel Keeter is standing over my shoulder the more I've use my pencil.  You know how you remember certain teachers, but not others? I've been remembering everything Keeter said about drawing--move slow, don't go too fast, take it easy.  Draw lightly. Don't get dark too soon.  Find common points. Measure and measure again. The more I draw each morning, the more I think of him and the lighter the pressure placed on the lead.  I am amazed at how little pressure I have to apply to get a light value that's hardly there.  This morning, I  broke up the line of his  right cheek, the cheek on the light side of his face.  I let the slight shading suggest the form and eliminated  the line I had drawn previously--the viewer's eye will put it in. Bright sunlight washes out form; it's the background that defines those shapes, not the lighting. There will be no background here.

Going at a slower, more deliberate pace, it looks like Dripping Wet will be the last drawing of the Sun Torch Thirty Minute Daily Drawings as we set our clocks ahead an hour Saturday night and gain an hour of morning light, the stuff that keeps us cheery. I'll miss it.  It'll be hard sitting there drawing for no reason other than drawing.

I have to show you how my camera, Nikon L120, took this picture in the light from a North East window at ten to eight AM. Talk about the cold light of morning:  BLUE.  TOTALLY BLUE!  Amazing.  It could be the camera?  It could be me?  It could be me and the camera?  More investigation is needed.

NOTE:  I may have given you all the wrong impression with yesterdays's post?  Ellis isn't starting a new job; he's been a building contractor for twenty seven years.  He just broke off with his associate and activated his own  building company, which was in place for a few years.   I was happy for him (and me) and offered my planning and drafting services should he have a project that needed them. I was glad he hadn't decided to retire.  Retirement would have been a bummer for my workaholic honey.  It was not a bummer for me; I saved the best for last. Painting.