First day of spring, spent browsing through antiques stores in Hudson, NY. Kudos to the town for mostly keeping out the chain stores on Warren Street. And what a long, walkable, shoppable street it is. Finally walked down to the river on this visit; next time will have to check out some of the side streets, plus the other area towns.

Every four years, people suddenly rediscover an interest in the somewhat obscure sport of curling. They watch the hypnotic, focused rock-throwing-and sweeping (this year, after the market close on CNBC each day) and wonder how hard it could be and whether it should be in the Olympics at all. Well, whenever those questions start, Bridgeport's Nutmeg Curling Club stands ready to answer. It's apparently one of two curling clubs in Connecticut, with members who love curling and love to talk about it. Which is a good thing, because at their open house this past Sunday, the line of people waiting for a "curling experience" ($10 for 25 minutes of ice time) stretched out the door. We stood shivering in the doorway and listened to them talk about the rocks (granite, last 50+ years, 42 pounds each), the brooms (often microfiber, fairly inexpensive), and the shoes (OK to curl in sneaks but the pros have Teflon soles on theirs). When we finally got out on the ice, we found that yes, it's much harder than it looks to push a 42-pound chunk of granite across pebbled ice while twisting the handle the right way; and yes, it's equally difficult to sweep sideways and shuffle forward while not touching the moving rock and not tripping over other rocks.

Yes, there's a reason it's in the Olympics.

Four of us met up at New Haven Green for Sketchcrawl yesterday There wasn't much snow on the ground anymore, but it was still a bit chilly so we headed to the Yale Center for British Art to start things off.

I began with a pencil drawing of a Yale University archway, drawn from one of the windows in the Center. I colored it later with watercolors and Pitt Artists markers.



Next, I sketched some of the objects (as well as a fellow SketchCrawler drawing) in the Center's exhibit "Promiscuous Assemblage, Friendship, & The Order of Things." It's an eclectic collection of skeletons, butterflies, curios and art -- it's what might inspire a store like Anthropologie's decor.
Apparently there's a sister exhibit at the Sir John Soanes Museum in London, which I hope to see when I'm there in a few months. (These were drawn in a Muji kraft paper notebook with a Lamy Safari pen/Noodler's ink in Lexington Grey, highlighted with a white Sakura Gelly Roll gel pen and colored with Pitt Artists markers and Caran d'Ache Neocolor II water-soluble crayons.)



Two of us then stopped to get some tea and then headed to the Yale University Art Gallery across the street. I drew a late 19th/early 20th century Suku mask from Congo, which is in the Laura + James J. Ross Gallery of African Art, and then a view of the gallery space.



Since the gallery was closing at 5, we headed over to Geronimo, a favorite restaurant on Crown St., and sketched while we waited for the other members of our party to join us for dinner. We watched the bartenders and staff preparing for the evening rush of customers, and then I sketched some of the customers at the bar.

I was inspired by Jennifer Lawson's EDM challenge sketches of Olympic athletes, so I decided to try some myself while watching the games.

First up was ski cross. Since I had recorded the afternoon's broadcast to watch at night, I paused the action and sketched the athlete on the left as he was doing some stretches to warm up. The sketch on the right was done "live" without the pause on -- much harder since these people absolutely zoom down the slopes!



Here are more ski cross sketches done from "live action":



Next I tried my hand at biathlon -- again, all done from the action except the one on the far right, where I paused the recording to get a good look at his shooting stance.



I then switched media and took out the dip pen and ink, for some quick studies of the downhill portion of the super combined:



And finally, an impression of U.S. ice dancers Emily Samuelson and Evan Bates skating their original dance program:

Just got back from a six-day painting workshop trip to Elbow Cay, one of the "out islands" in the Bahamas. The workshop was taught by Susan Abbott, a wonderful artist and teacher whose sketchbooking workshop I had taken last year at the Art League in Alexandria, VA. We stayed at the Hope Town Harbour Lodge, and spent hours each day ogling the Atlantic, painting the lovely pastel-colored houses en plein air, and just watching the fronds of palm trees sway back and forth. I went snorkeling at the coral reef just off the hotel's beach, rode a golf cart to Tahiti Beach at the other end of the island, and climbed up the stairs of the island's iconic mechanically operated lighthouse. While the food options were a bit limited (there are only a handful of restaurants on the island, and anything stocked in the small "grocery" stores has to be ferried in), the views and weather more than made up for it.

We started off with a few quick sketches as we took a walk through Hope Town:









Then I set up my easel on the beach and did this larger painting:



As I walked through town, I'd spotted a bright red shutter on the firehouse and decided to paint that:



Here's a quick sketch of the water as seen from a bench on a bluff overlooking the beach:



And here's an alley in town, sketched at twilight:



When we went to Tahiti Beach, we came upon a group of kiteboarders with their colorful equipment. I had to work fast to capture them:



And here's a quick sketch of that beach:



A color study of a wall in town:



On our last day of painting, the weather wasn't very cooperative. I started this painting on the beach as the sun rose, but finished it under the hotel's awning as a torrential rain set in.



We did a color study exercise; I worked on this while waiting for the paint on my other work to dry:



The rain eventually subsided, and we sat at the Harbor's Edge restaurant and painted after lunch. It's not quite clear what time of day it is in this painting, as I made the sky rather too dramatic!

Here are more sketches done during the three-day workshop I took in Mystic, CT. First, more of the sea shanty singers...















And finally, a caricature of an old gentleman looking at books on the neat, curvy bookshelves at the Seaport bookstore:

Here are some of the results from the 3-day workshop I took at Mystic Seaport two weeks ago. Unfortunately it was very cold that weekend, plus it turned out that the rest of the class members weren't new to this and had been working on longer-term projects at Mystic, so it wasn't quite what I expected. Still, I suppose it did force me to draw for three days, so there's that.

We were supposed to document the restoration of the whaling ship Charles W. Morgan, but there weren't a whole lot of people working on it over the weekend.




I sketched this one from the warmth of the bookstore:



And this from inside the reception building (anything to stay warm!):



Perhaps the highlight of the weekend was a community sea-shanty sing, held in the German club building across from the Seaport. One after another, people young and old of all shapes, sizes and facial hair abundance got up and sang traditional sea songs ... and the audience couldn't help but join in the fun.

After 40 minutes of getting the blood flowing by racing around Terry Conners rink in Stamford (dodging hockey tykes and those ridiculous walkers they use to teach kids to skate these days), I went up to the bleachers with my not-so-loved Moleksine sketchbook (I cannot WAIT till I'm through with this sketchbook, it's like drawing on a manila folder) and did a few chilly drawings. I know, some people do very well on these pages and use watercolor and dish soap to make it work. It's just not for me.









(Lamy Safari with Noodler's ink in Lexington Gray; colored with Faber Castell Pitt Artist markers.)

As the first snowfall of the season starts melting away, I thought I'd share a little of what I've been up to over the past month... and what I'm looking forward to. First, here's a peek at what I've been up to while conspicuously neglecting my sketchbook:

That's my take on Ann Budd's Knit Father Christmas design, finished just in time to display in our house for the holidays. And right now I'm frantically knitting a sweater for my 6-year-old niece (hopefully it will be done by the 25th)!

But while I'm knitting and purling my way toward repetitive stress injury, I'm also packing my gear for two very exciting workshops I'm attending next month. The first will be a reportage workshop at Mystic Seaport from the folks at Dalvero Academy/Studio 1482. It promises to be intense, cold and a bit crazy. (Fingerless gloves? Check.) The second is a plein air workshop in the Bahamas, taught by Susan Abbott. The lightweight easel I've ordered from Judsons Art Outfitters is (according to UPS) slowly making its way across the country. I'll have to be careful not to pack too much for this trip, as part of the journey involves a small propeller plane. And in the middle of all this, I'm hoping to get a quick roadtrip in to the middle of Pennsylvania to see friends and learn to ski! Whew!

Hope everyone has a fabulous holiday and a very happy new year!

I know this is a week late, but as the weather gets colder I find myself getting busier!

We started our crawl in Chelsea Market near the Chelsea Wine Vault, with a good-sized crowd for once:





For this next one, I used a dip pen that I'd bought in New Orleans, along with Higgins India ink. It was the first time I used a dip pen "out in the field," so to speak. Surprisingly it wasn't too hard to handle the bottle, ink, paper towels, etc.



Then a bunch of us moved on to the High Line:



After that I left the group to meet up with M. and have lunch. All in all, it was a good crawl!