Crayon drawing inspired by the exercise A Child Could Do This
Book Review: One Drawing a Day
I took a wonderful book out of the library called One Drawing a Day. The book, written by artist Veronica Lawlor with the help of other artists, has over 42 drawing exercises, some color, some not, some outside, some for at home. I soon discovered that there was no way I was going to keep up with a drawing every day, so I am trying to content myself with one drawing per week, as the title of my post suggests.
There is an accompanying blog to go with the book, also called One Drawing a Day. However, it seems to be examples of drawings as opposed to more exercises, so if you want the exercises, get the book. I may just need to purchase the book, because there is only so many times I can take it out of the library.
The exercise on the top was done with children’s crayons. It is called a Child Could Do This – you are actually supposed to ask a child for suggestions. I just sorted out some of my daughter’s crayons and used those. Scribble and make shapes a kid would make was part of the suggestion.
Below is a sketch of a family member on the computer:
You are supposed to concentrate on the person you are observing and not spend all your time staring at your paper. I did the sketch with a drawing marker.
This was the very first exercise in the book, observing objects in one’s home:
The flower was actually a design on our sofa cover. What objects do you see?
The Jewish Book Carnival for January is up on the Association of Jewish Libraries blog. Thank you for including my review of Jews in Gotham – it turns out that the series (a three volume set on the history of the Jews of New York) won Jewish Book of the Year.
Lorri reviewed a book by Aharon Appelfeld called Until the Dawn’s Light. Appelfeld is a prolific writer, and his words are always well-chosen. Years ago, I heard him speak in person. His topics are not easy ones.
Swirly Gigs created in Illustrator – for the sole purpose of putting some swirls on a post
I’m not sure what the above represents – does it need to represent anything? I’ve been practicing swirls in the software program Illustrator. You can also create patterns with Illustrator. Maybe what this design needs is some nice patterned wallpaper behind it. Stay tuned to see if I play around with it more.
Thinking and praying for Michelle as she writes about her breast cancer. Her surgeon said mastectomy, but “the good news is that there probably isn’t any invasive cancer and that this is treatable by removal.”
Ilana-Davita has been reading some scholarly posts – check out this one on Hapax Legomenon (and don’t let the title scare you – it’s not hard to understand).
This sculpted fish with tehina recipe is adapted from a recipe for fish with sesame spread (Samak bi’Tehineh) in Aromas of Aleppo by Poopa Dweck. It is both healthy and easy (and I can’t say that about many of the recipes in the book – the more complicated ones are fun to read, but I doubt I will try them). Poopa uses oil to bake her fish, which is traditional in the Syrian Jewish community. I used water to bake mine. Guess what – use a good piece of fish and it will still taste delicious baked or cooked with water (and truthfully, I like it better than heating oil for cooking, anyway). Her recipe also called for larger amounts, and since I was 1) just trying out the recipe and 2) aiming to please mostly my husband and myself, I used a smaller amount of fish and other ingredients.
Ingredients
3 or 4 pieces of flounder fillet
pan for baking the fish (and for displaying the fish – or transfer to a pretty oblong platter)
water to cover the bottom of the pan
lemon juice (optional)
1 Tbsp. tehina
1 black olive – cut to one slice for the eye of the fish
1 strip of red pepper for the mouth
several slices of cucumber for the fish scales
Place fish in baking pan. Cover with water (not a lot – maybe half an inch?). Cover the pan. Bake at 350° for 30 minutes or until tender. You can also add lemon juice to the water for flavor before baking. When the fish is tender, take it out and let it cool for about 10 minutes. Mash the fish with a fork and add the tablespoon of tehina. Sculpt the fish into the shape of the fish: add olive for eye, red pepper for mouth and cucumbers for scales. Serve and gobble it up. Multiply amounts for larger crowds.
Leora’s note: I’m not sure how I first connected with Debra Walk, but we seem to have 22 friends in common on Facebook. I enjoy seeing her beautiful artwork, so I asked her a few questions to learn more. Enjoy.
1) When did you realize you wanted to be an artist?
I loved art from an early age, and my high school art teacher told me that I should seriously pursue art, but by the time I reached my teens, I somehow developed the idea that art was not a valuable profession and decided that I wanted to do something medically related as a profession, and art would be my hobby.
2) Please describe the work you do.
I’ve worked in various media over the years – calligraphy, paper cutting, polymer clay, and, most recently, fabric.
When I was younger, I loved the exactly measured type of calligraphy that I did then, but after a while, I felt a need to work in a softer and less exacting medium. I was living far away from my children and grandchildren at the time and wanted to make them things for them that they could cuddle with and wrap around themselves and not just hang on their walls. This led to my beginning to work with fabric.
My “bread and butter” work involves making Challah Covers and Platta Covers, and I guess they fall more into the design category, but in between producing these, I like to work on new art ideas, often involving Hebrew quotations. I’ve had a running list in my head for probably 35 years of some of my favorite quotes and i enjoy interpreting them in the various media that I work with. There are also some basic design ideas that I’ve used over and over with variations, and I’ve come to consider them as a basic part of who I am an what I’m doing in the world.
I enjoy making family trees, often ordered by customers as gifts celebrating 50th anniversaries. It’s a pleasure to help people celebrate their family life. Over the years I’ve done family trees as paintings, paper cuts and fabric art.
I’m currently experimenting with combining my two favorite types of art/craft and doing brush calligraphy on fabric and also reinterpreting some of my paper cut ideas in fabric..
3) How have you used social media (Facebook, blog, Twitter) to promote your art?
I use Facebook and LinkedIn, but I really have to work on that. I have a tendency to use these social media once in a while, and then forget about them for long periods of time.
I love www.etsy.com (see http://www.etsy.com/shop/debrawalk), the online crafts marketplace comprising hundreds of thousands of crafts shops. It has revolutionized the crafts and handmade market, offering international exposure and highly attractive terms of sale for artists and craftspeople and I truly have only good things to say about it. It also is a social medium in its own right – you can follow artists of your choice, correspond with them, “heart” their stores or work and even create your own “treasuries” of favorite items that may be shared with others.
I must also mention Pinterest (see http://pinterest.com/debrawalk/), not as a means of promotion, but as a fabulous way of enjoying the vast array of visual treats available on the intenet and collecting visual ideas. It’s hard to express how much I enjoy looking at the stream of exquisite photography, whether landscape or wildlife, gorgeous gardens, waterfalls, forests, etc. I actually have begun to recite the phrase “מה רבו מעשיך ה’ כולם בחכמה עשית, מלאה הארץ קניינך” “How many are your works Hashem, all made in wisdom, the earth is filled with your creations (loosely translated)” as I surf the Pinterest boards, enjoying my armchair exploration of the wonders of the world.
4) What is your favorite part of being an artist?
Self-expression, work is fun, I feel as if I have little pieces of myself in homes around the world, at people’s Shabbat tables, etc.
5) Where do you look for inspiration?
The many art books I own, Pinterest, as described above, nature, various man-made goods I encounter in the world around me (textiles, housewares, children’s books). I also am an avid reader of “middle-brow” fiction, which nurtures my soul and thus, in some way, inspires me.
6) What are the hard parts of being an artist?
Discipline, disciple, discipline…I’m not naturally disciplined.
As someone who has a very strong critical voice in my head that tells me, among other things, that being an artist is a silly way to spend my life, I’d like to share a teaching that I once learned from Sarah Yehudit Schneider of A Still, Small Voice.
Sarah Yehudit takes the second half of the verse from Psalms, “פותח את ידיך ומשביע לכל חי רצון” and instead of the usually interpretation that seems to state that God fulfills our desires, says that it means that He provides each of us with our (deepest) desires, the ones that are connected to each person’s individual purpose in the world. thus, if one loves to play with fabric and color, that is somehow connected to that purpose.
That has become how I talk back to that negative voice.
I hope you have enjoyed this interview with fabric artist Debra Walk.
