In the Studio - Belcarra Diary

Origanizing, What To Do First?

I drove into Belcarra to my house sitting gig through a thick fog. It was late afternoon and still light out. After a day of packing and two days of organizing my paint gear I decided that I'd bring the studio stuff over in a couple of days, by then I'll have realized what I was missing in other essentials and would have been making my lists. By next week I'll have everything here and will be able to settle into a steady creative practice, whoopee.
This past week I have been trying to do some more thumbnail sketches of compositions. Having decided that I would be starting to try and do these on location more often again as I haven't been outdoors painting in quite a little while now and I am out of practice doing notans. Deciding on what are good compositions to paint and now I might ask myself did I ever get there with compositions. It is such a large and full subject to take in.
Over the holidays I had been trying to finish reading the book on drawing - 'Sketching from Square One...to Trafalgar Square' by Richard E. Scott. This book has been such an eye opener for me and since August having practiced daily drawing sessions discovered my love of drawing again. I started with 45 minutes each day but these have stretched into several hours and I found myself drawing instead of painting. Today I started a 15 minute drawing practice at the front windows. The fog was lifting and the view was stunning. First thing I asked myself was - What about this scene had most grabbed my attention? Today the patterns of fog and the layering of the landmasses, which I'd say was also atmospheric perspective.
This first practice and first thing in the morning is to start to sketch for 15 minutes before I do anything else, is to develop my sketching hand to get practiced at quick studies. It's a plan, yah.

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