Craftsmanship and Art

 

Whimbrel at 2-Mile Landing. Original Moku Hanga by Ken Januski. Copyright 2021.

I've spent a lot of time over at least the last five years listening to, reading about, and listening to audiobooks about music, particularly classical music. One of  the things that I've particularly noticed is that, at least in the past and I'd guess today as well, musicians learn some basics, for example harmony, sonata form and other forms, etc. The vocabulary for musical notation is astounding. I say all this as a non-musician so I realize that I'd have a slightly different take on this  if  I were a musician. But on the whole I think I'm correct.

Still it stands in stark contrast to my artistic  education and I'd guess the artistic education of  many. I have a lot of art education. 80% I'd guess is  in studio  art, two years at a community college, a year plus as an undergraduate at a very good school on west coast, and graduate studies at the same west coast school and at an Ivy League school on the east coast.  And two graduate degrees in  art. Big Deal! No, not at all. All that education doesn't  necessarily translate  into good art. I only mention it because there was a common theme to those many years of art education as a studio artist: be enthusiastic about what you do and  have at it! That was it, though  it wasn't put in such blunt  terms.

Was I unhappy with this?  No. It's just what I wanted. Particularly I wanted to PAINT, and paint I did, mostly on my own, but also with a few regular studio mates, especially on the west coast.  I don't think either we the students or our teachers expected we'd get a much out of the formal classes. We'd  learn and improve  through  studio practice.

It's only in retrospect, realizing how much theory that there is in music and musical education, that I  wonder about art education. Is there something similar in art? Is it just taught at schools other than the ones I went to? Would I have wanted a different education, one more structured and with a distinct syllabus, if I actually had the opportunity? My guess  is  that no I would not.

There of course is  the old nostrum about reinventing the wheel. Generally it is a very good nostrum. I'm just not sure how well it works  in art. Since I live in Philadelphia I do have to  wonder  about the Pennsylvania Academy of Art. I never took any courses there though I have known people who studied there. But I never talked to them about their training. But  I do have the impression  that at least the painters get a fairly classical education. And at least one  of my old  friends who shared a studio  above mine  and who studied there went on to fame and fortune as a  more or  less contemporary classical  painter. I could tell that we looked at painting quite differently, though I don't think he ever looked down on my own work. And I admired  the technique and ambition of his own work. But we did  seem to come from different worlds.

In any case it just reminds me that people do get different training in the arts and often that training stays with them.

Before I started classes at the west coast school I arrived on campus a few months  early and took  some printmaking courses in the student union.  They were pretty much one on one  and I loved them. I learned enough to do some lithography, etching and a bit of  aquatint, just enough  for me to start experimenting on my own. I loved it. But in a  few months my classes started, I had almost 24 hour access to a painting studio  and I jumped back into painting. The person who  taught  me printmaking at the student union was also a student in printmaking. So I was introduced to both the faculty and her fellow students in printmaking. But there was just something that put me off about taking a course in it. There seemed to be some odor of technique, of tradition, of something or other that just seemed  foreign to the freewheeling  attitude  I had toward art. I never had any subsequent training in printmaking.

So here we are today, where I have been doing more  printmaking  than painting over the last 10 years or more. I started with linoleum block printing, then added some shina wood blocks  in conjunction with lino, then did just western style printing with one or more  shina wood blocks. And now I'm finishing  my fourth year of moku  hanga. My most recent print, about 6x8  inches  is at the top of this post.

This very lengthy introduction  to my newest print stems from the fact that it could look to many like  I have neither general printmaking technique, nor more  specific moku hanga technique. Additionally I realize that almost all of  my moku hanga prints probably seem quite foreign to the spirit of traditional  moku hanga. I have to say I can't  really deny that.

And this I think gets to the title of this post:  Craftsmanship  and Art. When I was getting my education in art crafts, at least as far as I could tell, were starting to be considered by many  in the art world if not as exactly equals then at least on the same fluid, sliding scale. But that's not what I'm talking about. I have no argument with the idea  of  traditional crafts as art. (I don't know enough about non-traditional crafts to have an opinion on them). But some art media I believe have more of a craftsmanship tradition than others, at least today. Printmaking seems to value craft more  than painting.

One of the first things I realized once I started using more  than one block in any type of relief print was that registration was a big consideration. If you use more than one block it generally is with the purpose of  using a different color and you want the second color to register(match up)  with what you've already printed on your printmaking paper from printing the first block. As I didn't have a printing press I used various handmade jigs and devices to help with registration. They helped but there were still problems.

The thing is I didn't really consider them serious problems. For myself I didn't care all that much if things lined up properly. My guess is that if  I went through all of my multiple block prints of any type I'd find that areas of color rarely match up perfectly. It's not a goal of  mine.

Now I have to say, as I'm sure most printmakers will say,  that sounds a lot like sour grapes or something similar. You choose to be happy with less than perfect registration in printing because you're technically incapable  of getting perfect registration! I'd have to agree that I'm technically incapable of  getting perfect registration. But  I also don't believe it's worth the time and effort, at least for me. Just what is gained  and what is lost by perfect registration? For me not much is gained, but a lot might be lost, including the ability for the print to breathe.

But it's very easy to see where at least in printmaking  good registration is just considered part of the craft of printmaking. Since I  didn't have an education in printmaking I'm only guessing that this  is the case. But I'm pretty sure that I'm right.

This is only one element of  what I consider, from an outsider's perspective, to be the craft of printmaking. Another element is consistency in prints in an edition. Especially with  a complicated print involving many colors, many blocks, perhaps intricate carving there are more and more areas where the smallest little slip or lack of concentration will make one print slightly different than another. Printmakers have to decide whether or not  to include small anomalies in an edition,  My guess is that much of the final decision depends on how you've  been trained.

For me this  is  particularly difficult where I've spent a lot of time and effort in the printing, mainly due to it being a complicated print. After all that effort do I really want to toss out more  than 50% of  what I've printed? Of course not and yet expectations are that there be at least some basic similarity between prints in an edition. My guess is that I'm more lenient than many but still I cull a lot from editions.

It's easy to understand this desire to have a consistent edition. And yet here too I find  that the craftsmanship of  printing is perhaps getting in the way a bit of the art of printing.

Moku hanga has a much better method of registration than western hand-printed prints. And yet I suspect that because of this there is a greater expectation of excellent registration in moku  hanga prints. By those standards I fail pretty badly. I suspect moku hanga also has particularly high standards of paint application, even surface, etc., etc. mainly due to the incredible craftsmanship  of  traditional moku hanga. Though I strive for these and don't usually have deliberately uneven surfaces it's not something  I care about all that much. It undoubtedly is part of traditional moku hanga. It's just not something I can bring myself to consider the most important part of the print. I usually won't cull a print because the color application isn't the best.

For me it is the overall experience of the print that is most important. What is it like visually, not technically? For me that means that I'm often quite happy with my prints, especially my moku hanga, even though I'm also disappointed that the registration isn't a bit better, the paint coverage a bit better, etc., etc. For many I imagine  it looks as though I've failed at the craft of printing and it's hard to see beyond that. I can only guess but I expect that this is true. I can understand it. But I'm still quite happy with my prints.

It may be pushing this to suggest something similar in painting and drawing but I'm going to anyway. I love drawing, and painting as well. But I don't at all like drawings that enclose shapes in non-stop, continuous, undifferentiated lines. That may be a technique that was taught in classical academies hundreds of years ago but it is largely lifeless. The varying and incomplete lines of someone like  Rembrandt are far more impressive. They go beyond technique into art, into something that is moving. The art of Rembrandt breathes.

I've gone on at such great length that I'm reluctant to say much more. In some ways I'm just thinking out loud. In the end I guess  I'd use Winslow Homer as an example. He did quality wood engravings in his younger years. He was a master of line. But as he matured he didn't let himself be constrained by line. Instead it became an often invisible structure in his wonderfully free watercolors. Technique has its uses but it can also be the kiss of death for  an artist. My guess is that many artists would be better off knowing when to forget about technique. On the other hand I can't help but think of Odubel Herrera, Pat Burrell and Hunter Pence, all players at one time or another for the local Philadelphia Phillies. I used to scream every time I saw one of them at the plate with their idiosyncratic wild swings. But they still got hits. I hope my prints don't remind anyone of them, especially Pence or Herrera!

  

  

WIP - 2021

Working proof on moku hanga of Whimbrel at 2-Mile Landing. Copyright 2021 by Ken Januski.

 Very sloppy printing I know. This is the best of four proofs I've done on a new moku hanga. It might look familiar as it's based on the acrylic painting I showed in the last post. So far I've used seven 6x8 inch blocks. I need at least one and perhaps two more. As I got further along in proofing I started losing patience in my printing because I was eager to see if the print was starting to come together. So what had been a fairly nicely printed proof got sloppy at the end.

When I started I just grabbed some paper that was lying around, not even sure if it was printmaking paper. Only as I was printing did I happen to see an Arches watermark. Eventually I'll print on a different paper but this one has been fine for proofing.

After I'd done block six I believe, the dark green block I still had only areas of flat color. Something inme wanted to scream. Though flat color, with possible grading through bokashi, and with some complex but regular pattern are part of traditional moku hanga I needed something different. That's been true in most of my moku hanga. I just am not comfortable with all that flat color. So I carved into much of that green block, creating quite a lot of pattern, movement, etc. I think it  was just what the print needed. I did the same to a lesser extent with the last block, the brown one, though that one I had planned at least a little variation on.

So there you have it: a work in progress.  As with most of my work it is an ongoing dance between simple and complex. Stayed tuned to see where the dance ends.

Is That What I Want?

Whimbrel at 2 Mile Landing. 9x12 acrylic painting. Copyright 2020 by Ken Januski

I have had a number of "successes" and a number of "failures" in my artistic career. I put quotes around the terms to indicate that there is a bit of artificiality in them. For instance I have been in a number of competitive art shows in my career and I have been rejected from quite a few as well. I have gotten some likes on Facebook, a very low standard of appreciation I know, and I think a much greater number of non-responses. I have sold some work, often looking quite different from one another, but I haven't sold anywhere near as much work as I'd like.

Sometimes these are more meaningful to me than others, for instance I'm always quite happy to have my work accepted into the annual exhibit of The Society of Wildlife Artists because I think so much of the work that I'm showing with. I've been excited to get into some competitive shows when I was an abstract artist often to find that I wasn't at all happy with the work that hung beside mine. But I also realized early on that competitive shows are often the end result of competing tastes on the part of judges or other 'stakeholders'  and that the show reflects it. Often they are odd hodgepodges. Again I think that this is not the case with 'The Natural Eye,' and that's why I'm always happy to be in it. I used to be somewhat depressed not to get into another competitive show that I applied to frequently. But I always got the catalog of the show. And finally, after quite a few years, I finally said to myself:  "This is silly. I don't LIKE most of  the art in the show." And a year or  two after that I stopped submitting work.

My end of submissions isn't necessarily a critique of  the show but it is an understanding of myself by myself. I'm far better off creating art that I like and only trying to exhibit it at shows I'd be happy to be in. What's the point of  trying to get into a show, even a prestigious one, if you don't like most of the art in it? In the same vein what's the point of trying to gain entry to various galleries or associations if you don't appreciate the work of  most of  the other artists involved?

To make a long story short at some point I decided I really have to make sure I'm the judge who counts most. What do I think of my work?!

And that leads me to my most recent painting at top. I like it!

I have been reading Tolstoy's Anna Karenina over the last month or so. In it there is an artist, Mikhailov. I'm not really sure of why he's there but what struck me is a section  where he expects very little from the people who come to look at his paintings, then begins to think much more of them when they say something  that might possibly be interpreted as positive. Tolstoy I think is criticizing him but I think the scene might also ring true for many artists. As soon as someone says they like your work, or purchases it, you tend to see them and your work in a slightly better light.

I'm reminded of that by the watercolor painting I did of two Whimbel pictured below.

Two Whimbrel at 2 Mile Landing. 12x16 watercolor. Copyright 2020 by Ken Januski

It is one of a number of paintings and drawings I did on the way to the painting at top. It is a bit more realistic. It's also true that I've sold a number of my watercolor paintings. I'm happy with the watercolor paintings and I'm happy that someone likes them well enough to buy them. But I realize that I might disappoint some of  those buyers because I don't too often put those paintings up for sale. That's not because I'm too fond  of them. It's because I don't do that many any more and I'm often not happy when I do most. But when I put them up for sale it's because I do like them.

The thing is I realize that my own watercolor paintings don't do much for me. When I'm done with them I ask, as the title of a well-known blog says: Is That What I Want? I've come to realize that though I admire many who work in watercolor it's not something I really aspire to in my own work. When I do I often feel more like I'm imitating something I like rather than painting what I like.

What I'm getting at is that whether I achieve what I want in a work of art, even if I don't know what that is when I start the art work, is what determines the artistic success. It is meaningful to me. There are times of course when I'm fooled. I  think I've made some sort of breakthrough, then days, months or  maybe years later I decide that the artwork wasn't all that I thought it was. But most times this is not true. If I'm really happy with a work I stay happy with it, even years later when  I might work in a completely different matter.

I've had a number of such moments with the acrylic paintings that I've done over the last 6-9 months. To me they are showing me the path of the future in my work both in paint and print.

Some are more successful than  others. The sumi brush pen and water soluble crayon drawing/painting below is somewhere in between. It seems like a step toward the painting at top. There are things I like about it but it seems a bit derivative. I'm not sure I would have done the painting at top without it. But the painting at top seems like What I Want.

Whimbrel at 2 Mile Landing. 11x14 inch sumi brush  pen and crayon drawing. Copyright 2020 by Ken Januski

I realize that not all artists can worry about What They Want. They have to worry about what their customers will buy so that they can pay the bills, etc., etc. I've seen no sign in my life that it's easy for an artist to make a living as an artist. Throughout history many of  the most successful artists in any medium have had to keep their customers/patrons happy. I can't criticize that and I don't. What I'm saying is really more personal. I do know when I've done something that I'm happy with, regardless of what others think. That is my idea of artistic success.

Whimbrel Studies. Sumi Brush Pen. Copyright 2019 by Ken Januski

Just to round off these thoughts the drawings above are done with sumi brush pen and are all based on photos that I took. I like them in many ways but I'll probably never really like work that I do that is  based solely on photos.

The sumi brush pen sketch below on the other hand was done from life at 2 Mile Landing in Cape May, NJ in May of 2019. I was looking through a scope at some distant whimbrel and was thrillled with this sketch  that I did over a 5-10 minute period. Later I looked at it and realized how crude it was. But I still loved  it! It captured my reaction to what I saw. It too is an artistic success, far more so than the sketches above or even some theoretical sketch from photos that is far more detailed. Such a sketch wouldn't be successful to me because it's not what I want. It would just be a study

On the other hand I was thrilled with the field sketch below and I think I'm even more thrilled that i've been able to do a painting based on it that still has the same feeling. That to me is true artistic success.
 

Whimbrel at 2 Mile Landing. Sumi brush pen field sketch. Copyright 2019 by Ken Januski.

Cape May Field Sketches - Part Seven

Sumi brush pen sketch of Black-bellied Plover at Nummy Island, by Ken Januski.

We visit Cape May, NJ at least once a year most years and during that visit I almost always do some field sketches. For many years I've also posted some of them here. But it seems like I've not done so in a number of years and 2019 is rapidly disappearing.

So, hoping that my post doesn't get eaten by Blogger as happened the other day with my last post, I'm trying for a quick one that will mainly just have captions  on  the various drawings. These are not photographic studies. They are generally done very quickly, before the bird changes position or flies off. Sometimes they are hard to  do. A photo is so much quicker and easier. But photos always lack in liveliness. For me there's nothing more exciting than field sketches, mine or those of others. And if I ever do use photos it's always because I feel like I've really gotten acquainted  with the bird through  sketching. That allows me to take some liberties with any photos I might use.

Sumi brush pen sketch of Black-bellied Plover at Nummy Island, by Ken Januski.

Sumi brush pen sketch of Boat-tailed Grackle staring up at Double-crested Cormorant at The Wetlands  Institute, by Ken Januski.

Sumi brush pen sketch of five American Avocet at South Cape May  Meadows, by Ken Januski.

Sumi brush pen sketch of juvenile Hudsonian Godwit at Nummy Island, by Ken Januski.

Sumi brush pen sketch of juvenile Hudsonian Godwit at Nummy Island, by Ken Januski.i.

Sumi brush pen sketches of various shorebirds and Least Tern, the latter at Two Mile Landing, by Ken Januski.

Sumi brush pen sketch of male Bobolink at Garrett Family Preserve, by Ken Januski.

Sumi brush pen sketch of Least Terns at South Cape May Meadows, by Ken Januski.

Sumi brush pen sketch of Horseshoe Crab, Red Knot and Laughing Gull at Reed's Beach, by Ken Januski.

Sumi brush pen sketch of sitting Pectoral Sandpiper at South Cape May Meadows, by Ken Januski.

Sumi brush pen sketch of three of 140 Black Skimmers at South Cape May Meadows, by Ken Januski.

Sumi brush pen sketch of three Whimbrel at Two  Mile Landing, by Ken Januski.

Sumi brush pen sketch of two American Avocet at South Cape May Meadows, by Ken Januski.

Sumi brush pen sketch of Wild Turkey at Belleplain State Forest, by Ken Januski.

And since I seem to have made it through this entire post without technical hiccups I'll celebrate by wishing all readers a Happy New Year. I should add that I hope Blogger will survive. I hesitated devoting more of my energy to Facebook than it for years until I realized most of the people whose work I was interested in were on Facebook and most of my own Blogger readers seemed to be bots and other undesirables. But Blogger offers much that Facebook and other social media does not. Hopefully it and its audience will come back to life.

May You Be Forever Sketching

Willow Flycatchers. Sumi Brush Pen Sketches by Ken Januski.

As I was completing the two pages above in a Stillman and Birn Epsilon sketchbook yesterday I was thinking about how much I've been enjoying drawing recently, especially with the sumi brush pen. Then on the radio I heard a version of Bob Dylan's 'May You Stay Forever Young,' a song I've always very much liked. It seemed to parallel my feelings about sketching: may I and anyone else who likes to draw continue to do so. It is hugely rewarding.

Cedar Waxwing, Fish Crow, et al. Sumi Brush Pen Field Sketch by Ken Januski.

I mentioned on another post that many of these sumi sketches have been based on my own photos. I started somewhere near the beginning of my boxes of them, all alphabetically sorted. As you can see with the Willow Flycatchers above I'm reaching the end. There are no local birds whose names start with 'Z'. That just leaves 'Y', with all those Yellow Something-or-Other birds.

I've also tried to continue using the sumi brush pen when I'm out birding. It creates a line that is a little too large for the size of the sketchbook that I carry in my back pocket. But I'm getting better at being able to use finesse and sensitivity of touch to be able to work this small. Above a Cedar Waxwing and young Green Heron, both seen along the nearby Manayunk Canal, and a Fish Crow on telephone pole and as yet unidentified wasp on the flowers of our Mountain Mint, both seen while I sat in a chair in our backyard.

Grass Spider and Wasp, Ruby-throated Hummingbird, et al. Sumi Brush Pen Field Sketch by Ken Januski.

I spent about 10-15 minutes watching the scene above in our backyard, just a foot away from where I sat, through my Pentax Papilio Extreme Close-Focus Binoculars. (I'm not trying to name drop in this post but when a product works well, like Stillman and Birn sketchbooks, the Kuretake Sumi Brush Pen and the Pentax extreme close focus binoculars I'm happy to mention them in case others might want to use them. In fact I only know about the binoculars due to a talk by an accomplished local birder on Birding Beyond Birds, e.g. dragonflies, butterflies, etc. where he mentioned how good they were).

For the first time ever we've noticed a not of three-dimensional spider webs in our yard. They can be as deep as they are broad. As I watched the small wasp and the spider in the web I really couldn't figure out what was going on. Both were upside down. Was the wasp trapped and desperately trying to get out? If so why did he sometimes seem to approach the spider rather than vice versa? Was the web sticky, like most are? If so why did he seem to move so freely. As I watched it through the binoculars, mainly so I could see the spider better, I decided I might as well try to get it down on paper. That is the scene in upper left.

Later when I went inside I investigated and found that the spider is most likely a 'Grass Spider', one of many funnel spiders, whose webs are not sticky. This spider is also timid and will often run from whatever is in its web. Well that pretty well explains what I saw here. It is amazing how much there is to see in nature if you take the time to look.

Also on the page one of the visiting Ruby-throated Hummingbirds, feeding on the Monarda in the yard, and a Willow Flycatcher at Morris Arboretum, the same bird portrayed from photos at the top.

Whimbrel and White Ibis. Sumi Brush Pen Sketch by Ken Januski.

There is a big juried show coming up that I'm preparing to submit work for. No it is not Birds in Art. In any case as I continue to do sumi brush pen drawings from my photos I'm always thinking about which ones could be used for something more developed. Above are two pages of Whimbrel, seen in Cape May, NJ over the last few years, and an immature White Ibis seen at Heinz NWR in Philadelphia a number of years ago. I never know until I do the drawings which resulting drawing might convince me that it is the one to develop more. Time will tell. There are only a couple of weeks before submissions are due to I'll need to decide soon.

Common Whitetail., Killdeer, Great Blue Heron in Tree, et al.  Sumi Brush Pen Field Sketch by Ken Januski.

And finally a couple more small sketchbook pages of sumi brush pen sketches from life. Except for the Common Whitetail at top left, all of the images are from the Manayunk Canal a few days ago: another immature Green Heron, with nearby Killdeer, and three versions of a Great Blue Heron curled in various intriguing shapes up in a tree.

I realize that in switching from pen or pencil to sumi brush pen in my field sketches I'm losing a lot of detail. But I think I'm gaining life and/or animation as well as a greater concentration on the entire scene, all of which are helpful in doing a more developed painting or print. It's well worth it to me. And it probably has something to do with why I have a renewed excitement about the possibilities of drawing.

Free Paintings

Whimbrels and Lauging Gull at Nummy Island. Crayon and wash by Ken Januski



Swamp Sparrow in Papermill Run. Crayon and wash by Ken Januski.

No, I'm not giving away any free paintings. Instead I'm referring to the feeling I have when I've finished a Caran d'Ache Neocolor II water-soluble crayon sketch with wash on Stillman and Birn sketchbook pages. Used the way I'm using them they are actually more like small paintings than anything else. Best of all they allow more working, reworking, overworking than any other medium other than acrylic and/or oil. And I don't need to do it on canvas. I can use these small pieces of paper.

For someone who's not an artist this may make little sense. The main problem is that, especially with watetcolor, you can't do to much experimenting. It's extremely difficult to put a light color over a dark color if you decide that the dark color doesn't work. Continued working turns the painting to mud. There's no brightness left. And you need to use good quality watercolor paper if you're going to keep working and reworking what's there.

This combination of materials gets around that to a large extent because the Stillman and Birn papers are very hardy. And you can always go back into the painting with the crayons to bring back more brilliant color if things have gotten a bit muddy. The only thing that doesn't work is bringing back a brilliant white. For that you really need to resort to white gouache and even it may be a bit darker than I'd like. Still I've never seen a quicker or easier way for working through ideas for paintings. And as I've said before, if the sketch turns out well eough that you'd like to keep, frame or sell it, the quality of the paper allows you to do this without feeling guilty. I have done other sketches that I've always been reluctant to offer for sale because I wasn't sure how long the paper would hold up.

By the way the birds portrayed are numerous Whimbrel and one Laughing Gull from Nummy Island in New Jersey and a Swamp Sparrow, always elegant in gray and chestnut, in Papermill Run at Morris Arboretum in Philadelphia. I'm still wating to see my first Swamper of 2013.

Field Sketches, Old and New

It seems like I don't get that much developed work done during the months of April and May. I'm not sure about June. Because so many new birds are arriving, both migrants and ones that will breed here, there's always a desire to be out in the field, sketching what I see. Above is one of the more interesting sights from the Wissahickon - a male Hairy Woodpecker digging up grubs and giving one to a juvenile. Even though most migrants have passed through there's still a lot of interesting bird behavior to see, much of it family related.

On the same walk where I saw the Hairy Woodpeckers I also stirred up the Carolina Wren above, who wouldn't stop scolding me. I was near an American Robin's nest at th e time but I'm sure he wasn't acting as a cross-species sentinel. Most likely he had one too. There is a competitive edge to much birding as well as an overeagerness to get a bird quickly identified. I don't really like this. It makes it into too much of a sort of shallow game. Check off the bird and be gone, off to check off another one. But many birders also come to love what I've portrayed here, the actual life of birds. The bottom bird in the sketch is a Louisiana Waterthrush. I suspect that he is one of a nesting pair and hope to get more sketches of him and perhaps his family as the months go by.

I never posted all of my Cape May sketches so here are a few more. Above a Whimbrel at bottom, one of the many, many that we saw. Above him an osprey. You'd never guess it but I spent at least 15 minutes on it. He was bringing food back to a nest. But he never stayed long enough for me to to anything other than get a bit more of the face. Since they sometimes will sit stock still this was an unusual and somewhat disappointing situation. I kept hoping I'd end up with a full portrait. It never happened.

One of the more exciting birds, at least for us that we saw in and around Cape May, was a Yellow-breasted Chat. They are often easy to hear but hard to find. This one cooperated by sitting right out in the open on a telephone wire, though only for a brief period. He was really hunched down, perhaps due to the wind, and looked far pudgier than usual. Above him a Worm-eating Warbler drawn from memory a few minutes after seeing him. And finally one of the irresistible American Oysteratchers. They are so fascinatingly odd that I can never resist sketching them if I have the opportuniy.

And finally a Black-crowned Night Heron and Eastern Kingbird also from Cape May. The next time we stop at Morris Arboretum in Philadelphia I'm sure we'll see some more kingbirds. But it's always nice to see and sketch the first of the year.
For me there's rarely anything as exciting as field sketches. They have a raw connection to nature that is so often missing in more developed work. And yet more developed work allows me or any artist to use the more formal aspects of art to create something expressive. I love that as well. But when I first started using birds as subject I really didn't want to just use them as skeletons upon which to hang some abstract mark making and design. I think I've accomplished that. No matter how abstract or expressionistic I might be in my work it is always founded in field work.
I'm not sure that there's much of a market for this type of work but at least I am doing exactly what I want to do. You can't ask for too much more than that. Well maybe winning a prize or two. Speaking of which I just heard that I won't be garnering any honors as a BBC Wildlife Artist of the Year. I was a finalist but did not get further than that. This is disappointing and I'm sure when I see the results I'll question some of the winners. But I also know how high the quality has been for some of the former prize winners. It can be a stiff competition and I'm happy to have been a finalist again this year. I look forward to seeing the actual winners. And to see if any are online friends and acquaintances of mine.

Thoughts on Field Sketching

The small watercolor, about 7x10 inches, above is based on a very quick field sketch I did of a Whimbrel raising its wings on Nummy Island near Stone Harbor, NJ a couple of weeks ago. The field sketch is below.

One of the things about sketching, and not photographing birds, as you see them is that you can convince yourself to try difficult but striking poses. Often in nature you get these surprises that are just there for a split second. As an aside at about the same time I saw this bird I also saw the grisly spectacle of a Great Blue Heron finding and swallowing whole a Clapper Rail youngster. It was too far away for me to see clearly. Grisly as it is I might have been tempted to sketch it if I could have seen it better.

My point though is that I think it allows you the chance to try something that you might think is beyond your abilities. As with many things you often find that you can do better than you expect, if you just try.

Now I have a lengthy history of deep disappointment with my field sketching so I'm not being hopelessly optimistic about this. But time and experience has shown me that the biggest obstacle is just the fear of trying. If you keep at it the results are surprising.

In addition you can come home with the seed of a painting of a striking experience. It's possible that I might have been able to get a photo of this. Unlikely but possible. The problem for me as an artist is that I don't get much artistic inspiration from my photos. Not for all of them but for many. With field sketches though I really recall the entire experience. There's a real desire to put it into a painting.

In fact I also have some photos of whimbrels I saw a year or two ago. I've looked at them many times but never felt enough of a connection to start a painting. But once I decided to do a painting based on the field sketch it was much easier to use the photo as the source for the background birds here. But it took the field sketch for me to decide to do it.

The sketch took about a minute. The bird had its wings up for a split second. I had to trust that I had seen it well enough in that split second to put it down on paper. Over time I've gotten much more trusting about that. And I'm almost always pleased with the results. I think we always underestimate how sentient we are.

Fieldsketching Shorebirds around Cape May

It's been quite awhile since we took a birding workshop. We learned to bird taking them at Pocono Center for Environmental Education about 15-20 years ago. The last we took was at least 8 years ago, a week long course on Spring Migration at Cape May Bird Observatory.

But we've been getting more and more interested in shorebirds and CMBO was offering a course, 'Shorebirds With the Man Who Wrote the Book' last week. The 'Man' is Michael O'Brien, and the book is 'The Shorebird Guide.'

We couldn't have made a better choice. Michael, along with his wife, birder and artist Louise Zemaitis, is a wonderful and extremely knowledgeable birder and teacher. At the end of our three day course we finally feel somewhat comfortable with shorebirds. More than that we both feel that we've learned how to look at them, so that we can figure out what something is when we see it.

That said almost as soon as the course was over we were faced with a bird that looked exactly like a dowitcher, more likely Short-billed than Long-billed, but behaved much more like a Pectoral Sandpiper. Last night as I looked at my guides, photos and field sketches I still wasn't sure and started to lean more towards a Long-billed Dowitcher. That's really not important though. What I think we both find so exciting is that we are now able to look at a shorebird and figure out how to decipher what we see. The sketch above includes the mystery bird below and a Common Tern above. One bonus about this week was that terns were included free. Everywhere the shorebirds were we seemed to see some terns as well. They are also pretty unfamiliar to us so I spent a lot of time sketching them.

At top are some of the first birds we saw: two American Oystercatchers, a Piping Plover, and a Long-billed Dowitcher, facing away but with his head turned 180 degrees and buried in his mantle. As you can see I spent much of my time trying to sketch and annotate diagnostic field marks of the various birds.

We did see a wealth of birds. I'm amazed that I was able to sketch so many of them during the course. Below two sketches of a distant Marbled Godwit with a Least Tern in between.

Next a very small Osprey which seemed it must be an immature, except that his plumage indicated adult. And with him a Caspian Tern, that stayed just long enough for this sketch.

Next an immature Great Blue Heron drying his wings. I skipped most herons and egrets I saw this trip but this pose was too striking to pass up.

Now some young Piping Plovers, almost invisible on the sand of Stone Harbor. One of the surprises of this part of the trip was the discovery of Loggerhead Turtle tracks, seemingly there to lay eggs. A naturalist with the group recognized them. The local naturalists said they had no knowledge of any sea turtles ever trying to lay eggs in this area. I've not yet had time to read up on them or to find out whether this is a real nest or a fake nest, which is always a possibility with Loggerheads I guess. Local naturalists are pursuing this.

Moving from sea turtles to a Ruddy Turnstone with his head stretched out looking for food, and a juvenile Western Sandpiper, complete with notes as to why this is a Western and not a Semi-palmated.

A Short-billed Dowitcher with Least Tern below.

Two of my favorite sketches: a juvenile Semi-palmated Sandpiper with bright, fresh plumage and a distant Whimbrel who raised his wings momentarily. One of the things I love about field sketching is being able to capture moments such as this. The only way to do it though I think is with constant practice. The more you sketch the better you get AND the more chances you have to see something like this. As I've said before it can easily become addictive.

And finally two White-rumped Sandpipers and a Sandwich Tern, both birds we've never seen before.

Our vacation was short, just three full days and two partial days. But it was one of the best ever. Fresh, invigorating ocean breezes, new birds, a very knowledgeable and effective teacher and many field sketches. It's hard to ask for anything more.