A Busy Time of the Year

Falling, Fighting Blue-Gray Gnatcatchers. Sumi Brush Pen and Watercolor Sketch by Ken Januski.

April is such an extraordinary time of year, and currently my favorite month of the year. The warmth of spring and summer is there but most mornings start off cool, brisk and invigorating. Bird, butterflies, insects and flowers, among others are arriving, departing, flowering or in some other way being fascinating to observe.

Because of this time spent indoors seems wasted and it's difficult to get much artwork done. I have done a few field sketches, but very few and very brief. A couple of an Osprey eating a fish are further down the page.

Often this time of year I take photos but they can also be a distraction where time spent fiddling with the camera means any chance of actually seeing something has disappeared. Such was the case with the blue, gray, black and white mass falling from the trees like a mis-colored Sycamore leaf along the Wissahickon a week or so ago. It floated like a large leaf, slowly twisting in the wind, until that is it hit the ground in a flurry of activity and dust. It was two Blue-gray Gnatcatchers fighting. The experience lasted just a second or two, from drifting drop to dusty departure. I did grab for my camera as they landed but they were gone instantly.

Still such an experience is unique, or certainly rare and I wanted to portray it. Eventually I did so, working almost solely from my imagination in the sumi brush pen and watercolor sketch above. Eventually I may make a print based on it.

Blue-gray Gnatcatcher. Photo by Ken Januski.

A few days earlier I decided to try to do a watercolor which captures the subtle colors and shapes of a Blue-gray Gnatcatcher. The occasion for this was one of the best photos I've ever taken of these hyperactive birds. But subtlety can easily turn to mud, especially with watercolors, and I came close to that here. Only some coloristic touchups a day later I think salvaged it.

Osprey Eating Fish at Morris Arboretum. Sumi Brush Pen Field Sketch by Ken Januski.

The two images at top show two different ways of making art out of birds and bird experiences. Immediately above these quick sumi brush pen sketches done from life show another. I like them but think I need to start using a bigger sketchbook and more time. Hopefully this will lead to more developed work in the field.

First of Year Louisiana Waterthrush Along Wissahickon. Watercolor Sketch by Ken Januski.

Finally another way to celebrate/illustrate a bird or bird experience. This really is more typical of me: a quick watercolor and pencil sketch done soon after seeing a bird, in this case the first Louisiana Waterthrush of the year, and based on a photo I took. Though the Blue-gray Gnatcatcher was also based on a photo it was a larger, more finished work and fairly unusual for me.

These have been the main artworks I've done over the last few weeks, since the end of the last woodcut, and excluding some abysmal failures.  But there has been plenty to see outside. Below you can see some of the many photos I've taken of birds seen recently, the ones that are currently distracting me from doing much actual artwork.

Diving American Kestrel. Photo by Ken Januski.

First of year American Redstart. Photo by Ken Januski.

Bald Eagle over Walnut Lane Golf Course. Photo by Ken Januski.

Eastern Towhee at Andorra Natural Area. Photo by Ken Januski.

Palm Warbler at Morris Arboretum. Photo by Ken Januski.

Yellow-rumped Warbler at Morris Arboretum. Photo by Ken Januski.

The Most Important Thing in Wildlife Art...

Osprey in Tree. Brush Pen Sketch by Ken Januski.

is getting a sense of the life and movement of the subject. A bold statement I suppose and one that many would argue with. But for me I'll quickly say that if I can't see the whole bird, animal, insect or whatever in a piece of wildlife art I'll quickly surmise that the artist is working from a photo which does not in fact show the entire subject and he's loathe to try to imagine what he can't see. It's easier to just crop everything out and hope that the flat, abstract design will be appealing enough to counter the fact that the artist has not shown how the weight of the subject is distributed, where the body is moving, where the eye is glancing, etc. It almost never is enough to counter that huge loss.

I say this mainly because I'm very familiar with it. It is the problem that stopped me cold when I first started wildlife, specifically bird, art. I was completely unsuccessful working from life, mainly because birds wouldn't sit still. And my own photos, the only ones that it seemed right to work from, almost always left part of the bird hidden. Even today it's a great treat to be able occasionally to be able to see the whole bird. I think that is one of the appeals of shorebirds. Often you can see the entire bird. As a bonus it often sits still.

In any case this lack of knowledge of the entire bird still stops me from choosing to work from over 50% of the photos I've taken. The only mitigating factor is that I now have about 7-8 years experience sketching from life and I've learned enough about birds to make a good guess as to how the bird fits together, even when I can't see everything. But the most thrilling photos I take are the ones that show the complete bird in an intriguing posture. Those pictures are irresistible and I want to try to capture some sense of the movement in them.

So when winter comes and I spend much less time outside, especially sketching outside, I often will concentrate on doing sketches from my photos which show the full subject, mainly birds, but often insects and other subjects. All of the brush sketches on this page were done in the last week or so. And in almost all instance I did them because I could see the entire subject.

For me this will always be far more exciting, whether in my work or in some one else's, than the most elaborate reconstruction of feathers. It is the life of the subjects I see that I want to understand and portray, even when I work abstractly, and I just cringe when instead I stumble upon well delineated feathers and feather tracts. The latter may be beautiful but rarely does it have any sense of life.

American Copper, American Lady and Common Buckeye. Brush Pen Sketch by Ken Januski.

Osprey in Flight. Brush Pen Sketch by Ken Januski.

Purple Finch Eating Crabapples. Brush Pen Sketch by Ken Januski.

Red Knot. Brush Pen Sketch by Ken Januski.

Red Knot and Semi-palmated Sandpiper. Brush Pen and Watercolor Sketch by Ken Januski.

Zabulon Skipper. Brush Pen Sketch by Ken Januski.

Raptors Overhead, Watercolor Off the Easel

Adult and Two Juvenile Great-crested Flycatchesrs. Watercolor and Sumi Brush Pen Painting by Ken Januski.
 

I think I mentioned recently that I've been hoping to do some more developed work for an international competition whose deadline is fast approaching. After all those sumi brush pen sketches I finally bit the bullet and started work on the 16x20 inch watercolor and sumi brush pen painting above. I've wanted to make a painting of a scene similar to this for the last 18 months or so ever since I saw one or two adult and two juvenile Great-crested Flycatchers all together at Morris Arboretum last spring. This is based on various photos from that day. We've seen another 3-4 Great-crested at the same location over the last few weeks so maybe that is what spurred me on to this subject.

I still have a bit of time before the competition so there may still be one more painting using this medium in the near future. In the past I've entered this competition twice and had my linocuts accepted twice. But I lost money on all the various costs involved. Even if I'd sold I would have lost money because prints are almost by definition less expensive than paintings. So this year I've decided to enter some paintings and perhaps a couple of woodcuts. We shall see.

Peregrine Falcon Flying Over Backyard. Photo by Ken Januski.

It was after a 12 hour day exhibiting at the Manayunk Arts Festival in 2012 that I hiked up hill to our house. As soon as I got a block away from Main St. and the festival I heard a shrill cry. When I looked up I saw at least one and maybe more raptors. Almost immediately I realized that they must be part of the peregrine family from the nearby church steeple. That was in fact the case and just a half block away were birders keeping track of the adults and the newly fledged young. Later that summer we often heard the same shrill cries overhead in our backyard and saw up to three peregrines at the same time flying high overhead.

We heard and saw them again in the summer of 2013 then not at all in 2014, though they had again bred at the church. They bred again this year, though I never saw them in my few trips to the church. But just this week Jerene heard their cries again. She heard and saw them briefly on Tuesday and Wednesday. So yesterday I sat out in the back with camera binoculars hoping to do the same. No luck. Then at the same time today we heard then saw two of them. I was ready with binoculars and camera but almost immediately they flew into the sun and were gone. I was only able to get the one grainy photo above, most likely a juvenile.

It's amazing to me to know that they breed near here. It's almost more amazing to see some, and I assume that they're the same ones, flying over our backyard!!

Osprey Flying Over Manayunk Canal. Photo by Ken Januski.

Not quite as surprising but just as welcome a sight was this Osprey seen about a half mile downhill along the Manayunk Canal yesterday.

Two Juvenile Killdeer at Manayunk Canal. Photo by Ken Januski.

This time of year can also bring shorebirds and sometimes Night Herons to the canal so I've been looking recently. I've often suspected that Killdeer breed there. Yesterday that was confirmed when I saw these two very young Killdeer with one of their parents at the canal. They always look like a ping pong ball on stilts. I did a couple of not quite successful sumi field sketches which I'm not going to show here. But I wouldn't be surprised if they eventually appear in a print or painting.

July is often considered a dull time for birding. But that certainly has not been my experience.

Seduced by Sum Brush Pen Studies

Osprey. Sumi Brush Pen Studies by Ken Januski.

Ovenbirds. Sumi Brush Pen Studies by Ken Januski.

This hasn't been much of a June so far. Either too hot and muggy to spend much time outside, or too wet to spend much time outside. So I've spent far more time, and ink, using the Kuretake Sumi Brush Pen than I ever would have anticipated. But it is addicting nonetheless.

I think that there are a couple of reasons for this: one has to do with the pen itself -- it makes very fluid strokes. But the other has nothing to do with the pen. It is instead the thrill I've always found in sketches that capture animation, from Rembrandt to some cartoons. I do think there is an almost primordial appeal to art that translates marks into an evocation of a lively, moving body, whether it belongs to humans or animals. Almost like a magic capturing of spirit.

My background is as a formal, abstract artist. Among my many teachers was a famous woman artist in California whose somewhat diaristic art garnered her many avid female (mainly) students. Though I wasn't fond of the adoring followers or the diaristic aspect of the art it was honest as could be I think. I greatly liked her. But she did say one thing that stuck with me when she critiqued my work as a graduate student in art: it was very good formally she said but it didn't seem to be ABOUT anything.

This has never bothered me, the fact that my art was formal and not about anything in particular. But when I started to work from nature I suddenly found that it was ABOUT something. That in turn allowed me to indulge in my liking for art that captured animation, the sense of liveliness in subjects.

So once I started using the sumi brush pen I found that I liked many of my drawings, even though most were done from my photos, because they did seem co capture the animation of birds, the sense of the postures they take, the way the weight is distributed, etc., etc.

Palm Warblers. Sumi Brush Pen Studies by Ken Januski.

Least Sandpipers. Sumi Brush Pen Studies by Ken Januski.

And so with the weather keeping me inside more or less I've continued to do these 11x14 sketches of birds with the sumi brush pen. I'm up to about 40 pages in about 10 days I thnk. Besides the sense of animation there is something else that is very important I think that the pen forces me to do: SIMPLIFY.  I've actually not simplified that much in the sketches of Least Sandpipers immediately above and I think they suffer a bit from it. I got carried away I think trying to show too many of the beautiful feathers. Photography allows us to see the details in feathers and feather patterns that we don't really see with the naked eye. When they're right there in front of us in a photo it's tempting to try to put them all down. But it's far more productive I think to just suggest the feathers by simplifying. It certainly creates a more lively work by simplifying them.

So I may be able to make just two marks for the bill, one above and one below. Even the line separating the two may be too much. So I have to look closely at the photos and then decide which few lines I want to put down. Not all of these work. There are many mistakes and missteps. But there are others that I'm quite happy with. They simply capture the sense of the bird. And they look alive.

Northern Mockingbirds and Pintails Sumi Brush Pen Studies by Ken Januski.

As I said in another post I'm unhappy that I've been able to do so few field sketches with the new brush. Below you see my two newest attempts. Not much to write home about. I think part of the problem is that the sketchbook is too small for the brush, this being a much smaller Moleskine sketchbook. Also I don't have as solid a surface to paint on since I'm holding the sketchbook in one hand and that's not as stable as a table. And of course my subjects are quite uncooperative and move on me. But there are compensations with sketching from life: like the Great Crested Flycatcher eating a Red Admiral butterfly. I thought he had a dragonfly. Until I put the binoculars on him in his new location and saw the unmistakable outer wing edges of a beautiful Red Admiral.

I do like the very simple Gray Catbird at bottom right. And I'm confident that this brush pen will eventually come in very handy in the field.

Carolina Wren, Great Crested Flycatcher with Red Admiral and Gray Catbird. Sumi Brush Pen Field Sketches by Ken Januski.

Picture-winged Fly, Veery and Common Grackle.  Sumi Brush Pen Field Sketches by Ken Januski.

After I'd posted this I decided to try to combine sumi brush pen and watercolor, in my years old quest to get a vigorous watercolor that still looked like something more than random marks. This still remains a goal of mine. With that said this is a 12x16 watercolor with underlying sumi brush pen sketch on Arches 140# paper. It's based on a number of shorebirds, mainly Red Knots, Ruddy Turnstones and Dunlin seen at Cooks Beach, NJ in May.

Red Knot and Other Shorebirds at Cooks Beach. Sumi Brush Pen and Watercolor by Ken Januski.

Another Thanksgiving Osprey Along the Wissahickon

Osprey with Fish at Valley Green. Linocut by Ken Januski.

Juvenile Osprey Along Wissahickon on Thanksgiving Day, 2014. Photo by Ken Januski.

Osprey with Fish at Valley Green, 2010. Field Sketch by Ken Januski.

Juvenile Osprey Along Wissahickon on Thanksgiving Day, 2014. Photo by Ken Januski.

I know I've talked a lot about Osprey in recent posts. That's for a couple of reasons: 1, we enjoy seeing them especially in November along the Wissahickon in Philadelphia, PA; 2, e-bird from Cornell Labs seems to think this is unusual; and 3, yesterday I finished a new linocut, one that was first begun, then abandoned four years ago.

At top you see the new linocut. It's based on the sketch done from life over four years ago. I abandoned it soon after I started because it seemed too clunky and primitive. But when I ran across it recently I liked it. So I reworked it, first with color  as I illustrated in an earlier post. When that didn't work out I made minor modifications and printed it in a small edition of six. One of them is at top.  I had thought we'd seen this Osprey on Thanksgiving but that actually was another one. This one was seen on 11.15.10.

I finished it on Wednesday. Today we went out to walk along the Wissahickon before cooking our Thanksgiving meal. When we first started this 15-20 years ago we saw a Pileated Woodpecker, a relatively rare bird for us at the time. So each Thanksgiving, and Christmas, we go out with the hope of seeing another.

More recently though we've seen something that actually is rare, at least according to e-bird, for this time of year, an Osprey. That was what we hoped to see today. And sure enough we did. Two of the best photos of the 60 plus that I took are above. This juvenile Osprey did not move from this position, except to change direction, in 30  minutes! Often I've hardly begun to sketch him or remove the lens cap from the camera before he's gone. The one, actually probably this one, that we saw a couple of weeks ago flew by and gave us all of 3-5 seconds to view him.

I'm including the last photo because it was illustrates an aha moment. We saw him most of the time with his back to us. What was striking was how short his tail was. As you can see his wings extend far beyond the tail. The overall shortness is due to foreshortening. But the relative length of the wings is no surprise when you consider what they look like in flight - very long wings. But it took us both awhile to reconcile that with the seemingly very short tail.

Among the many, many things we have to be thankful for is the Wissahickon and the wildlife that inhabit it. If you watch the news as we do, it seems like just about the entire world is 'fed up and not going to take it anymore'. I blame this partially on talk-radio and web sites, particularly news sites, that allow unbridled and unedited ranting. Everyone can now rant endlessly, and often anonymously .In any case most people actually have a lot to be thankful for if they think about it. This is all the more obvious when you see Ebola victims in Africa, terrorist victims anywhere, and the poor people of Syria, to name just a very, very few.

Osprey and Goldfinch Prints in Progress

Osprey with Fish at Valley Green. Proof of multi-block Linocut by Ken Januski.

Experience is absolutely necessary in order to learn all that may be done with one's own instrument of expression, and more especially to avoid what should not even be attempted. When a man is immature he plunges into all kinds of senseless experiments, and by attempting to force his art to yield more than it either can or should concede, he fails to reach even a small degree of superiority within the bounds of what is possible... Only fools and weaklings torture themselves by trying to achieve the impossible.

And yet we need to be very bold. Without daring, without extreme daring even, there is no beauty...

Eugene Delacroix, The Journal of Eugene Delacroix, translated by Hubert Wellington, published by Phaidon Press, entry for Sunday July 21, 1850.

So ... to put it briefly, I hope I'm being bold and not foolish and weak by experimenting as I am with the two prints shown here. Above is a linocut that I abandoned about four years ago. It was based on a field sketch I did of an Osprey seen at Valley Green, along the Wissahickon in Philadelphia on November 15, 2010.

I stumbled upon it by accident recently. As I recall I decided it just looked too clunky and primitive for my tastes. But now I find something appealing in it so I'm reviving it. Out of curiosity I printed the image on the back of the mounted linoleum and carved away the pressed wood backing where the Osprey would print. I then used a rolled blend, something I've never tried, onto the pressed wood surface, not the most inviting surface in the world.

Well as you can see it didn't really respond well to being inked. And yet it did give some color, which is really all that I wanted, to serve as a backdrop for the black linoleum print. This is a proof. Most likely I'll do some more carving on the linoleum, getting rid of a lot of gouge marks and probably just print in one color, black. But only time will tell.

American Goldfinch on Thistle. Proof of multi-block Woodcut by Ken Januski.

I started the Osprey print today after printing the proof above for the Goldfinch woodblock. I'm trying to figure out how much of the yellow to keep. Since most of the first proof is yellow, whatever I carve away will stay yellow.

American Goldfinch on Thistle. Proof of multi-block Woodcut by Ken Januski.

Most likely the last printing will be the black from the first side of the woodblock. As I continue adding colors I'll need to carve away much of the black so that it doesn't overprint as it does here. But I proof it continually at points like this just to get some idea of what it might look like, and what I might lose forever if I cut it away now. Most likely there won't be much black left when I finally print that block on top of everything else. But that stage is still quite a ways away. One thing I would like to get, and I think I have it to some degree in the proof without the black, is a fairly bright print, just like my recollection of the goldfinch on the thistle.

November Osprey and Butterflies

Juvenile Osprey at Wissahickon. Ballpoint Pen and Watercolor Sketch on double-spread of Stillman and Birn Beta Sketchbook by Ken Januski.

Variegated Frittilary at Schuylkill Center for Environmental Education. Ballpoint Pen and Watercolor Sketch in Stillman and Birn Beta Sketchbook by Ken Januski.

As I have written elsewhere on this blog it was walking off what seemed to me the disastrous election of George Bush as president in November of 2004 that I came across the first Osprey I'd ever seen at the Wissahickon, less than a mile from our home. Over the years I've learned that it's not all that surprising to find one there, most likely during migration. But it is far less likely to find them in November.

So each November I make sure to spend a little more time birding the Wissahickon rather than other areas so that I can keep that tradition alive. Sure enough Jerene and I saw one last week, flying 15-20 feet above the water and only 15-20 feet away. Since he was here and gone so quickly I didn't sketch him or take a photo. But we could see enough white markings on him to identify him or her as a juvenile. We had a more cooperative juvenile here in 2013 and I'm showing the pen and watercolor sketch I did last year at the top of this post.

Because we've gotten used to seeing them in November it's actually more of a surprise these days for us to find butterflies, excluding the still ubiquitous Cabbage White and perhaps a Mourning Cloak. Yesterday we did see at least one Cabbage White, flying dangerously close to one of the highlights of the day, a Fox Sparrow, one of two together at the Schuylkill Center for Environmental Education.

But the highlight of the butterfly day was the Variegated Frittilary, pictured above in a ballpoint pen and watercolor sketch. My first reaction to the butterfly, without having really looked at the pattern, was that was a Great Spangled Frittilary. But as I read my guide books I saw that this was very unlikely as they mainly fly in summer. As I looked more closely I realized it was instead a Variegated Frittilary, a butterfly that flies into November.

That in turn prompted me to check another butterfly that we found in the same location in late November a couple of years ago. It was a Common Buckeye. Sure enough they also fly into November. But that was news to me! As I said I was actually more surprised by these butterflies than by the osprey.

Thinking about this convinced me to collect some of my artwork based on Osprey and butterflies, primarily those seen in November. I've added them to my Facebook Page. It includes these works along with 5-6 others, including an abandoned linocut of an Osprey seen at Valley Green along the Wissahickon in late November a few years ago. I didn't like the clunkiness of the print so gave up on it. But now I'm tempted to return to it.

As a side note I have to say it's hard to figure out how to use butterflies in an artistic composition. They in themselves are both striking and beautiful. But you really only see them in three positions: 1, with their wings spread flat, making for a very static composition; 2, with their wings closed, making for a slightly less static composition; and 3, in flight, where they are often too small to see. I'm new to painting butterflies but I can already see that they will be far more difficult than birds to work into a successful composition.

I did print the first color of the American Goldfinch and Thistle woodcut today. But it's light yellow on white/cream so not much shows up. Once it dries and I've printed another color I'll get back to posting on it. For now it seemed like a good time to instead celebrate the Osprey and butterflies of November.

The Easiest Way To Bird

Glossy Ibis Flying Over Morris Arboretum. Watercolor Sketch by Ken Januski.

The easiest way to bird, and to see unusual birds, is to arrive somewhere, state that such and such a rare bird might be around and then find it. Of course this method is not guaranteed to work all of the time, or even most of the time. But it's nice when it does.

When Jerene and I arrived at the wetlands of Morris Arboretum on Sunday we saw a very high soaring bird. It turned out to be a Great Blue Heron, not an unusual bird for the wetlands. But it reminded me that someone had recently reported seeing some Glossy Ibis in Pennsylvania. So I said to Jerene that we should keep our eye out for them.

We've never seen them in flight here but they are a common sight in Cape May, NJ this time of year. We've seen a lot of flyovers over the wetlands. I'm not sure if this is because it's just a large open space, with plenty of room to see what's above you, whether it's due to the appeal of the pond, or perhaps something else. Morris is very close to the hawk watch at Militia Hill in Fort Washington State Park. Perhaps it's just a particular flyway. In any case it made me think that a Glossy Ibis was a possibility, though a rare one.

Soon after we saw the Great Blue we ran into some birders and I repeated the idea that we'd never seen a Glossy Ibis there. But it didn't seem unreasonable. Less than an hour later, while I was trying to find what I thought was a singing Yellow Warbler Jerene said 'I think that's a Glossy Ibis.' Sure enough very high above us, but still clear enough to see, was a Glossy Ibis.

I tried to get some photos but found it very difficult to focus at such a distance. Still I did get one that was good enough to serve as the model for the small watercolor study above.

The second easiest way to bird, and one that is a bit more reliable, is to just sit still, perhaps start talking to someone or sit down and just look around. That was the case yesterday at Carpenter's Woods. As I talked to someone about local birding and other things first my first of year Black and White Warbler appeared nearby and then my first of year Yellow Warbler appeared. The Yellow Warbler also solved a mystery. Earlier I'd seen a strikingly yellow bird high in the canopy. I was sure it was a warbler but I couldn't figure out which one. The visual clues didn't add up to a specific species. Once we saw the Yellow Warbler I was pretty sure that's what it was, even though it was far higher than I'm used to seeing them. When I got home a distant photo confirmed it.

Numerous times I've seen late fall Ospreys, a fairly unusual bird, fly by while I was talking to someone along Forbidden Drive in the Wissahickon. The best look we've ever had at a Golden-winged Warbler occurred as we sat and had lunch on a log near a Witch Hazel at the Pocono Environmental Education Center.

Many birders know this but it often looks like few practice it. But we continue to practice and enjoy the Sit Still method of birding.

Because it's such a busy time of year, between newly arriving birds, newly flowering wild flowers and a garden that needs planting I'm not doing much art now. But inspiration is accumulating every day. Eventually it will appear in my art.

Another Election Day Osprey at Wissahickon

Juvenile Osprey at Wissahickon. Pen and Watercolor sketch by Ken Januski.

It was way back in November, 2004, the day after the presidential election that I saw my first Osprey along the Wissahickon Creek in Philadelphia. I only noticed him when I heard a splash behind me then saw a huge shadow fly over me. I then saw him head up the creek, fish in talons.

This was a great surprise. First of all it was a surprise to even find one in the Wissahickon. Second of all it was a surprise to find one in November. Since then I've seen them many times in November, often for weeks at a time.

As Jerene and I headed out for a brief walk today there were a few birds we hoped to see, first of fall birds more or less: Winter Wren, Brown Creeper, and Osprey among them. As we neared the end of our walk, with just a scant 18 species I theorized which of those species we might see in the last few hundreds of yards to up our count to 20.

Soon after Jerene stopped and said there was an Osprey across the creek. Sure enough there was a beautiful juvenile male Osprey, crisp white edges to most of his covert feathers. I've tried sketching them before with mixed results in this situation. So this time I decided on a few photos first, then sketches. Sure enough four quick photos and he was gone.

So this is based on one of those photos. It's done with ballpoint pen on a Stillman and Birn Beta sketchbook, opened wide to use both pages. I then went over the drawing with just a bit of watercolor. My hope was to capture the striking white, and almost punky head, as well as some of the many light feather edges.

I once told an accomplished local birder that I often see Osprey in the Wissahickon in November. He expressed skepticism. But they are there, sometimes vocal, and sometimes utterly quiet as today. But they're there and well worth looking for.

Their little brethren, the Golden-crowned Kinglet, might have been the most numerous bird of the walk. We also saw a Black Squirrel as we left. Now of course I'm toying with just how to combine the Osprey and Squirrel in a painting or print.

Matting and Framing

One thing I never expected when I joined the local Manayunk Roxborough Art Center early this fall was the constant opportunity to exhibit. This is tempered somewhat by a smallish audience but you never know when that might change.

So this Sunday's Holiday Show, with festivities from noon to 3, is one more opportunity to show. I've just finished cutting mats for six prints, building a frame for one paintng, and experimenting with store bought frames for two of the prints.

I've always been an artist who's more interested in the art than in the packaging but that's easier to do when your art stays in the studio. If it's being exhibited somewhere then you need to consider things like mats, frames and of course their cost. I'm surprised that I don't mind this work and the cost hasn't been as bad as I feared.

I guess part of that is that the work just looks better in a mat and/or frame. If it doesn't end up on someone else's wall it might just end up on mine, somewhere outside of the studio. The photo above shows the newly matted and framed work in the studio along with some other work on the walls.

I've only had time to try watercolor on one of the tiny osprey prints. It is below.

I'll probably try another version or two on the two remaining proofs then watercolor the remaining prints in similar colors. This is not my most ambitious work but I still find it somewhat striking.

George Bush and the Osprey

I know that the title of this post probably hints at a nasty joke at the expense of George Bush. I'm no fan of his but that's not the reason I titled it so.

I try to stay away from politics here, not that I don't have very strong feelings and thoughts about it. But I don't believe readers read this for politics and so I don't want to do anything to scare them off, well at least most of the time. Occasionally I can't help myself.

The reason I mention George Bush though really does relate to ospreys. I was trying to walk off the depression of his re-election on the day after the election in November, 2004. I was near Kitchen's Lane Bridge over the Wissahickon in Philadelphia. A huge shadow appeared in front of me and I looked up to see an osprey heading up the Wissahickon with a fish in his talons. I believe it was the first osprey I had ever seen there. It certainly was the latest.

I had mentioned this to an accomplished Philadelphia birder about a month ago and he expressed some surprise. It seemed late for ospreys here. That was my thought when I saw it and when I saw subsequent ones along the Wissahickon in October of numerous years since then. Still there was no doubt what I was seeing.

Yesterday Jerene and I went out to see if the immature Red-headed Woodpecker was still there. YES! Five weeks since I'd first found him. Since they bred here in the 19th century I do have to wonder if he might not stay. When I've seen him he's acted as though it's always been his home. As nonchalant as could be.

When we first arrived at Wissahickon near Valley Green we heard some whistles I couldn't quite place. They seemed wrong for the squeaky whistles of Wood Ducks. But we couldn't find the bird. When we returned from our walk down to the woodpecker though a huge shadow went over our heads. A beautiful Osprey. He sat in a snag directly across from the Valley Green Inn for at least five minutes. Then he flew around the nearby bridge for another five minutes before heading down stream.

I didn't decide to sketch him until just before he left. So the field sketch at top is really more from a visual memory of the bird I'd just seen than from actually looking at it and drawing it. The same is true of the bird as he flew downstream. This is definitely the latest I've ever seen an osprey at the Wissahickon.

This type of sketch from memory is often wrong. I've not made his wings as long as they should be. But each time I do this I learn more. Eventually I'll have a pretty good sense of an osprey's shape before I try to draw the one that just landed in front of me, along the Wissahickon at a time he shouldn't be here.

The watercolor at top is another done on Stillman & Birn Beta sketchbook. It has worked just fine for the washes and watercolor that I use. The ink is the same runny ink from a Bic pen that I've mentioned in the past. One of these days I'll have to explore a ballpoint pen whose ink does not run. For now I'm just using it to ease the way from a drawing to a painting. The painting is based on a photo and field sketch of osprey with punky looking head feathers seen in Cape May last August.

November Ospreys

When I first started the prototype of this blog, at what was then a web site, one of the motivating factors was seeing an osprey at the Wissahickon in late fall, November if I remember correctly. We rarely see osprey here. But the more I've birded the last few years the more common I see that they are, particularly in spring and fall migration.

Still it was worth noting when I started talking to people at the Wissahickon on my last two walks and each time an osprey flew up and landed nearby. Yesterday a woman I didn't know stopped me, I'm sure because of my binoculars, and asked me if I knew anything about birds. Then she described an osprey, which promptly flew up and landed in a nearby tree with a fish.

After a few minutes I told her I just had to draw it. The result is below. It was an immature so had far more markings on its feathers than an adult osprey did.

When I got home I decided to try a linocut based on the sketch. The results are at top. I think it looks quite a bit different than the recent American Bittern.

I had to decide what to include in the background and decided to stick with an empty sky. But I'm not sure how well that worked. To a certain extent the print looks cartoonish. But I think it still gets some of the sense of the osprey.

In researching woodcuts I found an old book I had on printmaking. As I looked at it I realized I got it when I taught a course in printmaking. I'd completely forgotten about this, mainly because is was so long ago. As I recall I only taught etching. Still it was a surprise to recall that someone had once actually paid me to teach it. As anyone who has taught college, or maybe had any job, knows though, someone is always asking you to do something a little outside your area of expertise. Such was the case with me and my printmaking course.

The Best Way to Bird...

is to just sit still. I had to think of this today as I was talking to two friends and an Osprey came up quietly behind us, landed, and stayed at least 15 minutes as we continued our conversation. When they left I took up sketching him and he probably stayed for another ten minutes, always on the same branch.

It's amazing how often this happens. I'd seen very few birds in 90+ minutes of walking and almost all of them the Canada Geese and Mallards in the sketch above. Then we started talking and the Osprey appeared. A Sharp-shinned Hawk also quietly flew in and landed near us while we talked. Meanwhile a Turkey Vulture kept circling the Osprey, getting closer each time before finally drifting off.

In any case it just proves, to me anyway, that often the best way to bird is to just sit still and let the birds come to you. In the case of the Mallards and Canada Geese they are almost always there at Valley Green, primarily looking for free handouts I think. But there's something pleasant about just watching and sketching them and their world, especially on a day as beautiful as today.

Tossing the Paisley Bell-bottoms

Two posts back I mentioned that I was undecided about the state of my new pastel of a Hermit Thrush and Sandhill Cranes. Something made me want to leave a number of areas of white. I wasn't making any sort of statement. It just looked good to me, just as some paisley bell-bottoms did to me, and not just me alone, many, many years ago. But finally I decided that it was more important to put some color in those areas than to leave them white. I ditched the bell-bottoms.

I think that the version above is the last. It seemed more important to me to try to unite the entire drawing by color than to leave the bright white of the paper. I particularly thought I needed more darks toward the bottom and sides and so that white tree trunk on the left became brown-orange.

This drawing is an accomplishment for me in that this scene never existed. It's a composite of two views I saw at Horicon Marsh last fall. The two scenes are only separated by a few hundred yards and a 90 degree change of direction so such a scene could have happened. But it didn't. Not until my imagination came along. I don't think I ever would have tried this in watercolor. But the loose way in which I use charcoal and pastel made it much easier to do.

Among the many skills an artist needs is the ability to alter reality, even if only slightly. Not all artists do this and for all my hankering for expressiveness I've never been one of them. But I felt that I was limiting myself. That's why this seems like a personal accomplishment. It opens up a lot of possibilities for future paintings.



I made far fewer changes to the Osprey drawing. Almost all of them are in the sky. I hope that I've made it interesting enough, through color and texture, to create an interesting interplay with the silhouette of the birds, nest and tree.

NEW BLOG

After my last posting on Devil's Walkingstick I decided that I really wanted to be able to keep track of what birds I, and others, saw feeding on their berries this fall. If you're interested or would like to add your own observations please visit Feeding on Devil's Walkingstick.