EDMs#33 and 34 Draw an eye - Draw a fall leaf

This is my eye, or to be more exact, this is the mirror image of my right eye. My eyes fascinate me, they are BIG, a little droopy, with very droopy eyelashes, I can even see them when I am reading. But the most bizarre thing are all those meandering red capillaries. I have no idea how I got them. Were they always there? Did I cry too much at some point in the past? Or was it travelling through the desert without sunglasses that did it? Ophthalmologists are not concerned, and friends don't notice them. In fact, I am the only one who seems to see them. Anyway, they really are there, doing their thing, whatever that is. This drawing was done with two 4 colour ball point pens. The next one, the fall leaf, was done using the ink from 'empty' ink cartridges. I love experimenting with different tools, this way every sketch feels unique and a little adventure into a big world of possibilities.

It's summer, of course, so no real autumn leaves around, but this one, that I found near the gym, looks close enough. Perhaps it was brought down by that half hour storm yesterday and then dried out in the afternoon sun. Anyway, an August fall leaf, now become immortal, so to speak.

EDM#24 Draw a piece of fruit

 

Ah, a refreshing pear in the summer heat, watching the end of the Olympics and dreaming of a super fit body and one of those six pack abs that those women runners sported with such nonchalance! Unfortunately, every time I pick up a pear a lot of annoying Italian references come to mind: 

1) Pinocchio who peels three pears and then, still hungry, eats the peeled skins. Reading Pinocchio was compulsory in school, and it's such a scary story, I still have nightmares about him burning his feet.

2) The Italian saying: "Al contadino non far sapere quant'è buono il formaggio con le pere" = "Don't let the farmer know how good it is to eat cheese and pears together", that my mum and grandma used to repeat at the end of every dinner. They were right, by the way, pears and cheese is a very good match.

3) And, the most highbrow of all, my grandad's favourite quote: "Pera colui che prima osò la mano

armata alzar su l’innocente agnella", from the Italian poet Parini. Of course the word "pera" here means "to perish" and not "pear", the translation being: "The first man who dared raise his armed hand against the innocent lamb should perish". Now, all of these disturbing memories should perish too, so that I can eat the other half of my pear in peace. Do you have that experience? When history stands in the way of spontaneous appreciation? Poor pear, sweet and innocent like Parini's lamb.

EDM#22 Draw a piece of clothing

Now, this may seem like a very strange confession. In my life I've inherited clothes from my sister and from some of my closest friends, but I have never bought second-hand clothes. I have a knack for finding new clothes for very little money, they last me forever, so that's that. I never really put much thought into it. Until the other day. I decided that I wanted some more cheap clothes and bought a bundle of 12 tops on ebay for £12, including postage. Not bad. I washed them feeling really happy. But when I was ironing them, I realised they were USED. Used by whom, I started thinking. What was she going through when she was wearing them? Were they attached to happy or sad memories? And why were they so worn out? My clothes never get worn out (perhaps it's the amount of salt I eat that has turned me into stone). Who was this woman? Why did she sell her clothes? Perhaps she thought they were worn out too. And now what, I asked myself, should I welcome these 'strangers' in my life or bring them to a charity shop? I can wear them one time each, I guess, and see if they become mine or keep on staying hers. Or I can draw one of them and definitely make it mine. Here it is, it's quite cute, really.

EDM#13 Draw your telephone

The only interesting thing about my cordless phone is where to find it. It is usually submerged under all sorts of stuff, in this case, hubby's handwritten jazz charts, junk mail, audio cassettes (yes we still have those), and a pile of Cd's. It is also flanked by a springy rabbit who says, 'BOING' when you press the button, a Route 66 shot glass that I don't recall buying, a candle, an old car stereo (you never know, might come in handy one day!?!), and a model Fender guitar. The two unidentifiable objects are a jack adaptor and, of course, a fake moustache. No, don't ask me, I have no idea.

EDM #18 View from my Window

This is the view from my study. I wanted to contextualise it a bit, so I included in the frame my radiator and my dictionary trolley (what? You don't have one?) The fluffies on top of the dictionaries look very exhausted. Did they go out dancing last night, or are they working too hard? Ok, probably I'm the one who's working too hard.

EDM#21 Draw something old, antique or vintage

If I were a collector, I would collect old View-Master reels. I used to have a View-Master as a kid and lately I decided that I really wanted one again, so I bought this one in bakelite from the late 1940s with amusing reels of Palm Springs, Killarney, Wild Africa and Animals. I wanted my drawing to look old as well, so I used dip pen, black and brown inks, charcoal and pastels.

EDM#6 Childhood toy

Baubau is as old as I am, we shared every moment of our lives for ten years, then he went to rest in a closet on top of a pile of towels. I found him three years ago and took him to London with me. He now sits on the couch with the rest of the fluffies. He had a tough childhood, he has no hair, has been mended thousands of times and his eyes are broken buttons. He also has a dot of gold paint on the top of his head. To cover some of the scars he wears a robe from one of my old dolls, gone awol long ago. This is not the first time I draw him, you can find a biro portrait of him here. He may be ugly to some, but to me he will always be my beautiful Baubau. To be more accurate, he was renamed so by hubby, his first name was Canovecchio. His real name, before I could name him myself, I never knew. It's funny how you never really know anybody, not even your childhood best friend.

EDM#4 Draw your cup or mug

 

Meet Gromit II. Gromit I died in a crash landing from the kitchen counter. Gromit II is in reasonable good health, except for his dwindling eyesight, so every so often I have to redraw his pupils with a sharpie. He is also always very concerned, about what, I am not sure. Hubby uses this mug to bring me coffee in bed in the morning or in my study when I am working. When the coffee is too hot Gromit's nose turns bright red and both hubby and Gromit show extreme concern that I might burn myself. Careful, they say, it's hot.

EDM#14 Draw what you see in the morning...

..when you wake up. Most people have a dinky bedside table where they keep a reading lamp and a book or two. I have a trunk! Some of the stuff on my trunk, from left to right: lamp, stereo, Bobby Womack CD, flashlight, alarm clock, creams and lip balms, earplugs, tissues, magic quartz reading set, roll of toilet paper, cinnamon candle, tens machine and an exercise book to improve eyesight (so it claims), plus my usual fluffy friends. The doll's name is Molly and she looks like me. Above the trunk there are three rows of shelves full of books. I wake up to a world of quantity, but it's also comforting, in its chaotic way.

EDMs in Venice

I've been trying to do an EDM challenge a day and felt that if I had left it for a few days, I would get out of the habit, so I tried my best to continue while visiting my family in Venice. At the airport I bought myself some children's markers and drew my foot using the markers as watercolours. The lady sitting next to me was very intrigued and we struck up a conversation. She was an artist who used mainly pastels. She looked in her seventies and has been travelling the world since her husband's death ten years ago. She's been everywhere, China, Vietnam, Africa. What an amazing person.










For my second challenge, I skipped ahead to # 265, draw your neighbor. Beach life in Venice has always included very vocal card players (my dad used to be one). They take their games very seriously indeed. A couple of huts down from ours there was this group of players. The lady on the right never plays, but watches the others for hours, quite funny really.

At the back of the first row of huts, and in front of the second row, there's a line of trees. Every single tree was bearing a sign, so my sister explained to me what had happened: people in the second row of huts physically and verbally attacked people from the other rows who were sitting under this line of trees, claiming that the shade was theirs. Eventually the beach management put a stop to the fighting by hanging a sign on each tree that reads, 'All the CAPLI customers can enjoy the shade of the trees'. Only in Italy!

EDM #26: Draw anything you like. Shell beaches are quite rare, I believe, and Venice used to be a fantastic shell beach. When I was a kid I could collect an amazing variety of shells. I would paint them with nail polish, so that they always looked shiny as if still wet from the sea. Now the variety is much less, but I sill like to walk along the shore and find small treasures. Drawing them, though, is a real challenge. I wish I had a magnifying glass to see all the details and all the ridges and crests. I found myself cursing Fibonacci, but just a little bit.

EDM#8 Draw a piece of jewellery

I don't know why, but these challenges seem to have taken me down memory lane. This bizarre looking bracelet was in my grandmother's jewellery box. The dragon head and tail are in some kind of non precious metal alloy that has a golden or silver tinge according to the light. The eyes are small rubies and the body is made of a string of tiny beads wrapped around the bracelet frame. I imagine the beads to be coral, but I am not sure. I am also not sure as to how this object ended up in my granny's jewellery box, as it was really not her style. It has an Oriental feel to it but very likely it is of European make. 1920s perhaps? Anyway, it didn't suit my granny, but it suited me, and I've had it for many decades. Although the idea of wearing coral, even if antique, makes me somewhat nervous.

EDM#20 Draw something "Dad"

 

My dad's dad was not my grandad, because he died when my dad was 16. He was a clarinet player. He played at functions and at silent movie theatres. He also ran a hotel which was always full of other artists who never paid. My dad was convinced that his dad had died unhappy and poor because he was a musician, and was adamant that I should not pursue a music career. But in his melancholic moments, he would confess to me that the sweetest sound he had ever heard in his life was his dad's playing the clarinet. At some point in my life, I was given grandad's clarinet, which I treasured like a sacred object. It came to England with me and sat on a shelf while I was trying to look for a musician who could play this old instrument. I wanted to make a recording of it for my dad, so that he could hear the sweetest sound one more time. It never happened.

EDM#2 Draw a Lamp

 

Draw a lamp. This has been so far the most difficult challenge for me, as all my lamps and lights are painfully ugly. This is the ceiling light in my sitting room, a very plain, boring thing. So I thought of using some of the children's art supplies that I brought back to England in my pink bag (previous blog entry) to see if I could put some life and character into it. I used Crayola's Color Switchers and a white Conte pencil. I don't know, it still looks a bit sad.

EDM#3 A Bag

The first thing I do when we get to San Diego is to go to Michaels and stock up on art supplies. Of course I NEED them to sketch during our travels, and you know, better safe than sorry, I buy everything in sight. Luckily I like children's art supplies, felt tips, crayons, etc. so not too expensive. But, of course, very bulky. 

When the time came to go back to England, we realised that all those markers did not fit in our suitcases and had to rush to Ross to buy an extra bag. We found this pink bag, and I filled it with my cheap art supplies and other bits and pieces.

In the days in which British Airways was British Airways and American Airlines was American Airlines, you could bring two suitcases each. Now that American Airlines is British Airways and vice versa, things have become very murky re how much luggage you can bring. So when we checked in, a smiling lady said: 'That will be $60'. 'For what?' 'For the extra bag'. I didn't have the heart to dispose of the bag and all of those art supplies, so I paid. And there you are, the most expensive children's markers in the world. So, I learnt my lesson: less might not be more but it's definitely cheaper.

EDM #10 Draw your hand

 

Inspired by Danny Gregory, who is re-doing all the EDM challenges (328!), I decided to have a go, but unlike him who has a dedicated sketchbook for them and meticulously started with #1, I am drawing in a lot of different sketchbooks and choosing the challenges I fancy in no particular order. 

I thought it would be nice to blog about them, as for every picture there are little things worth mentioning. This is my hand. As you can see, it has two wedding rings. The one below is my wedding ring, a silver Navajo artifact. My husband's ring was lost in the Pacific ocean off the coast of Hawaii two days after our wedding. The second is a gold ring and a family heirloom. It bears the date 12 October 1846. My grandmother's aunt, Romilda Pantaleoni, was a famous opera singer (Verdi wrote the Desdemona for her), and was born in 1847. It is very likely that this was her mother's wedding ring. As Romilda was my hero when I was dreaming of becoming a singer, many years ago I decided to wear her mom's ring. The eerie thing is that it is exactly the same size and shape of my own wedding ring.