Neighbors Down the Street

This drawing, done in late September 2021, is from the same trip I’ve mentioned in a couple of other posts – a visit to our son and his family in Washington DC in August 2021.

These houses are down the street from my son’s famiiy home. The neighborhood is block and blocks of similar yet unique houses like these. I could walk around and take photos of plenty of houses to draw and I hope to at some later date. I liked these particular houses because of their porch and front door features.

Once again, I notice that because of my vision problems at the time, the picture slants up to the right. I did not notice this as I was drawing it but only after I had done most of the picture. Once again, I could get smaller areas right but the larger picture wanders. I have found it interesting to see evidence of my vision issues laid out so clearly in my drawings from this time.

Well, on the other hand, I enjoyed communing with these houses as I examined them as best I could to pull out their personality and put some of it on paper. That is enough.

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Tires at a Gas Station

This picture is from the same trip to Washington DC that we made in August 2021 to visit our son and family, and from the same gas station. I loved how the tires were arrayed along the wall.

By the time I drew this picture, my eyesight problems had worsened quite a bit and I had a great deal of difficulty in laying out the lines of the picture. The perspective is out of whack. Double vision in one eye and a wavery spot in the other combined to make the lines all go uphill to the right. I noticed that this was also happening with anything I wrote. I could not see well enough to get a sense of the overall picture, though I could manage smaller individual areas all right.

Well, we keep going no matter what, don’t we. Just because I can’t see what I am drawing, well, then, I should stop? Never!

Focus instead on what you can do and go from there. This picture is a perfect illustration of that idea.

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Gas Station

In August 2021 we made a trip to Washington DC to visit our son and his family. Naturally we needed to stop for some gas. Here you see my husband attending to the needs of our little car Jen McGill (Jen is short for Genevieve, just so you know.

Photo, then drawing. The drawing is 8″ x 8″, done in September 2021.

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Former Barber Shop in Washington DC

It looks like this place is undergoing a transition…

Washington DC, May 2021. Pen and ink in a notebook about 5″ x 8″.

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Purple-Blue House in Washington DC

Here is a house/apartment building in Washington DC from 5/21. The sketchbook is 8″ x 8″.

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Yellow House Postcard

In May I visited my son in Washington, DC, for the day. We walked over to his office. On the way I saw a row of houses. Very cute little guys they were, and the yellow one in particular.

I took a photo. When I came home, I made this drawing and colored it. Then I sent it in the mail to my son.

I’m wondering if I’ve already told you this story. Well, if so, why not again – this little house deserves a second glance…

Drawing With a Pen #2

These drawings were done from photos I took on a train trip to Washington, DC, earlier this summer. One is of the platform in Philadelphia before we boarded the train. The other one is a scene coming into the city. I think I enjoy looking at “behind-the-scenes” views like these more than visiting national monuments or most museums. I think if I could have toured the second location, I could have spent some hours there. Especially if they had let me climb around on some of these structures…

Platform, 30th Street Station, Philadelphia, PA

Washington, DC

Lots of Art Lined Up and Waiting

The Small Landscape Giveaway has occupied the painting space on this blog for a long time – all winter, in fact, right? So I have a lot of paintings that I’ve worked on since the fall to show you and I’ll start in right here.

These paintings are all 6″ x 6″ and done in acrylics on board – some with an applied gesso surface with a texture, some with smooth, and some that I gessoed myself with a slightly rough surface. I see that I was using up the tail ends of a lot of categories of board, wasn’t I?

These paintings were all done around the time of October, 2015. Many of them refer to actual sights I saw – look at the captions for more information, if you are interested.

The chair and the window were in the library of Arcadia University reading room – I added a figure looking out at the open green beyond the window.

This bus just let someone out at Easton Road near the train station in Glenside, PA.

This house was perched up on a hill on a nice street in northwest Washington, DC.

The ladies were shopping at a show I did at Archbishop Wood High School in Warminster, PA.

This train (which in real life is silver, not pink…) is crossing the road in Glenside, PA.

This turquoise bus was moving down the street in downtown Pittsburgh, PA. As you may remember, I love the buses in that city – they are painted in a variety of colors and it’s a treat to watch them go through traffic on the streets.

“Come Alive and Step Into the Street”

I visited Washington, DC, this weekend, and I took this photo. I love mannikins and I love reflections and so – I have both of them in this photo!

“Come Alive and Step Into the Street” – photograph