graphite pencil, 4″ x 6″

I need to use this kind of funny looking mane in a more involved portrait of a foal. Not sure yet what it will be, but it deserves to be depicted in full detail.

Also, it pays to check what sort of lead is there in the mechanical pencil BEFORE you start drawing. That saves a lot of effort when you get to the darks. I forgot that soft over hard doesn’t quite work if you are looking for even darks, so had to continue with HB. Still wondering how it got into my pencil in the first place.

pastel pencil, 4″ x 6″

charcoal, 6″ x 4″

pen and ink, 4″ x 6″

colored pencil, 4″ x 6″

charcoal, 6″ x 4″

I rarely miss the ocean and its chilling breezes, but today was certainly the day. Too much driving in a car that resembled a hot oven, too much walking and sitting in the sun for my liking. Lots of art activity is good indeed, I just wish the weather didn’t decide early in the morning to suddenly compensate for a cool summer.

pen and ink, 4″ x 6″

pastel pencil, 6″ x 4″

pastel pencil, 6″ x 4″

graphite pencil, 6″ x 4″

pen and ink, 4″ x 6″

ink, pastel pencil, 6″ x 4″

pastel pencil, ink, 6″ x 4″

July 10, 2010 sketch – pastel pencil, 4″ x 6″

graphite pencil, 4″ x 6″

pen and ink, 6″ x 4″

charcoal, 4″ x 6″

China marker and colored pencil, 6″ x 4″

May 22, 2010 sketch – ink, 6″ x 4″

My Rapidograph pen got clogged, not to the point of not being able to draw at all, just skipping lines here and there and refusing to produce dots completely. Lines would not be much of a problem, but dots are essential for what I am working on right now, so this is my attempt to get the pen to cooperate without cleaning it. Anything to avoid cleaning it.

graphite pencil, 4"x 6"

The boarding stables near me have fenced pastures on a gentle slope of the hill. If you walk by, the setting sun will be behind the grazing horses and on a good day their manes would blow in the wind beautifully. This is one of those horses.

ink, 4" x 6" *SOLD*

There is always something very compelling to me about horses greeting each other, be it total strangers or the two who know each other well. For some reason, this pair got a bit of “rabbit ear” going on. Certainly didn’t aim for that, but there is no going back with ink.

colored pencil, 4″ x 6″ *SOLD*

Yesterday I visited a Japanese store that sells slightly defective ceramics for cheap (we ran out of small bowls again, and I refuse to buy real stuff when it gets destroyed so quickly). They had a lot of new designs with pale colors, not all of them even looked like traditional Japanese ware. This is a loose collective impression of what I saw but had absolutely no reason to buy. Yes, I wanted to. I behaved.