Rescued by Rembrandt

Solitary Sandpiper at Morris Arboretum. Conte sketch by KenJanuski

I haven't been showing much here recently mainly because I'm of two minds about it, or more likely three or forur or five. In other words I've got too much thinking and second-guessing going on.

I first experienced this as a graduate student in studio art at the University of California at Berkeley. One advisor would come in, talk about my work, and often suggest certain changes. Within 24 hours another advisor would come in and do the same. Almost inevitably some of it was directly contradictory.

The end result was that I had to think for myself, sift through all the information and decide what I wanted to do. This wasn't too difficult because I've rarely painted to please others. I paint what I want. Still when you get opinions on your work they always continue to rattle around in  the back of your mind, like nagging little voices.

This isn't necessarily bad. It probably helps to confirm me or anyone else in their own decisions. Years ago I  think I startled some of my friends by saying that artists and CEOs were similar: they both had to listen to others but eventually  make their own decisions, and  live with the consequences. I'm not sure how many  CEOs would agree, thinking I assume that what they do is far more significant. But for good, serious art I think the decision making is similar.

In any  case I've had a lot of thoughts rattling around in my head recently. This was compounded when I got two emails within a 10 day period regarding  my work. One was from a well-known  artists organization. It offered a critique of my work,  very complimentary toward some of my linocuts, and fairly critical about others. All of this was done with the best of intentions and was overall quite complimentary. But the words hurried and pay more attention to anatomy still are in the forefront of my mind.

On the other hand I also received a completely unsolicited email from someone who'd seen my work online and very  much  liked it, especially the warbler portrayals. She normally didn't like wildlife art but to her my work seemed an exception. Since I entered the world of wildlife art with great foreboding, not liking much of it myself, this truly rang a bell. It was very appreciated.

Unfortunately now I think of both of these every time I touch pen,  pencil or brush to the surface. Should I worry about anatomy or not? When does anatomical accuracy, especially that of surface rather than underlying structure,  hurt rather than help the artisitic quality of the work?  Just as in graduate school both views are valid and valuable. I just have to decide what's true and what's important to me.

Another factor in my indecisiveness,  though to a lesser degree, was another rejection from Birds in Art. Yesterday I happened upon two blog posts alro regarding rejection in BIA: Sandra Blair and Susan Fox. I'm getting used to being rejected there. The one difference I think with me is that I expect it. And I also don't mind it all that much.

Why? Well unfortunately I'm never really all that thrilled with what I see in the catalogs. I know that it's heresy to say this. And I'd prefer not to say it. I've been included in the last two Society of Wildlife Artists shows in London. I won't this year because I just can't afford all of the costs involved. So I won't apply. But if I'd been rejected there I think it would bother me much more. Some of the artists I most admire are members of the SWLA. It would bother me not to be in. But I'd also see it as something to strive for, a prod to get my work good enough to show with artists I admire so much. Sadly this is never the case when I look through a BIA catalog. I never feel the same desire to work harder. Instead I feel it's best not to apply, that I'm wasting my time and money. Only working in a style not true to myself will ever have a chance of success there.

Some of those SWLA members, and other artists I very much admire,  also show in Birds in Art. But for whatever reason the catalog just always leaves me cold, even though it's a very high quality production.  Every year I flip through the catalog, not reading anything, just looking at pictures  to see what strikes me. It's the same way that I view big museum shows. First I want to see my immediate reaction. Later I can see what my  reaction is after being filtered through the text, ancillary information, etc. Almost without exception I'm not moved by anything I see in the BIA catalog. Only afterwards as I look at it for the second, third, or fourth time,  perhaps after reading the text as well, do I see the worthiness of the work. And I really do. I can eventually find much to admire in most of what I see. But every year I wish it would just hit me the first time through. I'm afraid I'm just on the very periphery of the type of art shown in BIA. This in turn reminds me of the recent appreciative email about my warbler works. Perhaps I have a very, very small audience, one that also would often be left cold by the BIA catalog. (One day later there is something I should add about the catalog. I've always very much enjoyed the essays that introduce the catalog when there is a Master Artist that is featured for the year. Whether it's artists I already like or ones that I'm fairly lukewarm too I almost always end up with a greater appreciation for the artist and their work when I'm finished reading it. In some ways this makes the entire catalog worthwhile even when I'm disappointed in the work that is actually in the show.)

With all of this in the back of my mind I've done various studies recently, most for possible linocuts. And I've looked through my  photos and sketches,  over and over and over, looking for a new subject. None have led anywhere. Too many voices rattling around. How can I do the type of wildlife art I want to do? Should I continue to do what I want to do, or should I try to go more in the direction of what I think someone else wants? This always seems like a mistake to me to I continue to work towards doing what I want to do, towards what looks good and fresh to me.

Then for whatever reason, possibly this recent post at The Best Artists, I got out Volume One of The Drawings of Rembrandt by Seymour Slive.What a breath of fresh air!! Though I admire all of Rembrandt's sketches it was the animals that struck  me most this time. Who has done better sketches of lions? Who has captured the feeling of a lion like this? The same is true of people. If you  look at a Rembrandt sketch you often see that just one line functions as a nose. A hand might almost seem to be a blob. BUT it reads as though it is a hand,  with real weight, attached to a  real moving body. Sometimes that hand will seem heavy as a five pound sack of flour. At other times it will seem as light as a  feather,  ready to waft off in the breeze. This is what Rembrandt captures with just a few lines.

Out of curiosity I also got out the only other Rembrandt book  I own, called The World of Rembrandt, from  Time-Life books. Both of these are very old by the way. Though I've studied Art History at both Berkeley and Cornell Rembrandt always escaped my attention. I have no idea why especially  as  I bought both of these  books long before I attended  either school. I can only guess that I saw his drawings somewhere when I was  very  young and decided I needed to see more of them. In any case the Time-Life book also includes paintings and in them too  you can see his incredible ability to capture the life of what he paints. He seems to have a physical empathy for everything he sees.

I think what really  hit me over the head in  looking at his work was how different it was from  work based on photos, particularly that of so much wildlife art. I did find one sketch of a Bird of Paradise, the only bird in the book as far as I could tell. It's not my favorite but still I like it. Today though  most artists would render every  feather. They wouldn't capture the entire bird. So much wildlife art crops out the full figure of a bird and instead focuses on the surface details of just one part of the bird. I prefer to see the whole bird, to see it as a living thing. I can of course only make the wildest guess as to what a contemporary Rembrandt would look like. But my guess is that it would show the same sense of liveliness and empathy for the subject portrayed, not in a cute, endearing way, but in a way that seems to actually feel the physical pose of each subject portrayed.

Female Rose-breasted Grosbeak. Watercolor sketch by Ken Januski

To make a long story short, well more or less at this late stage of the game, I've tried a couple of broader works since looking at Rembrandt. One is a female Rose-breasted Grosbeak, done from a photo of a bird seen at Magee Marsh about a month ago. I deliberately avoided using a pencil sketch and forced myself to work  more broadly, more like Rembrandt. I also tried the large Conte drawing of a Solitary Sandpiper at top of post, also based on a photo of a bird seen at Morris Arboretum earlier this year. It was incredibly refreshing to force myself to avoid sketching in all the information that was shown in the photo.

Great Blue Heron and Singing Acadian Flycatcher. Field sketch by Ken Januski

It has been non-stop rain here for the last few days so I've done little outside work outside of this sketch of a Great Blue Heron and singing Acadian Flycatcher, done in between storms. But when I next head out I think my Conte crayons will be with me, and Rembrandt rattling around in the back of my head.

Homeboys(and girls) - Early June 2013

Zabulon Skipper, Acadian Flycatcher and Eastern Pondhawk. Watercolor by Ken Januski

Zabulon Skipper, Acadian Flycatcher, Gray Catbird, Veery. Field sketches by Ken Januski

Try as I might I can't find any lingering migrant warblers. They seem to have moved on and now it's mainly the summer breeders that I see on our walks. That's fine. It really is as it should be. But each time spring migration ends it is shocking how quickly it has passed. It almost makes you want to give up sleep during the month of May.

We have seen a few birds that I'm still not sure are migrants or breeders. The Willow Flycatcher at Morris Arboretum, which we see each year, is most likely a breeder but I'd like to prove it this year. The Yellow-billed Cuckoo that we saw at the Breeding Bird Census at Schuylkill Center for Environmental Education last Saturday is even more of a question. Could it be breeding there? The habitat seems suitable but I've never seen it other than in May or early June.

I wanted to include it in the watercolor at  top but it was hard enough  to torture the Acadian Flycatcher into the composition. A bird perched even higher like the cuckoo just would never have worked.

I didn't see all of the species seen here at the same time and location. The Zabulon Skipper was seen in our yard and then also today along the Wissahickon. The Eastern Pondhawk, another first of year species like the skipper, was seen at Morris Arboretum on Sunday. And this Acadian is from a field sketch from today. As  I think about it a Willow Flycatcher might have been a better choice since all three of these species would be likely at Morris.

The other species seen today include a very perky Gray Catbird, another Zabulon Skipper, one of many Veeries, and a very small Blue-gray Gnatcatcher. In a sense they are homeboys and homegirls. This is their home for the next few months.

The watercolor is done on Stillman and Birn 9x12 inch Delta paper. I've always liked all of the Stillman and Birn sketchbooks for working through compositional ideas. This is a somewhat outlandish composition. But I don't like dull ones for my own work. So I keep experimenting.

To me that is part of the fun - to show familiar birds and other fauna in unexpected ways. Eventually I hope to return to linocuts. This sketch is a possibility for one but my guess is that it is currently far too complex. But you never know. One day, soon I hope, one of these will seem just perfect for a lino.

Recent and Not-so Recent Sightings

Pileated Woodpecker Excavating Hole. Watercolor by Ken Januski

In spite of myself I seem wedded, at least for the time being, to these small 5.5x8.5 watercolor sketches in Stillman and Birn Gamma sketchbooks. In the case of the Pileated Woodpecker above I think it was the strong pose that convinced me to try to draw it and then perhaps to use watercolor to add color.

In my mind certain birds are very hard to paint: Pileated Woodpecker, Scarlet Tanager,  Cock of the Rock and others. This isn't because of complicated plumage, which might be the case for instance with a Ruffed Grouse. No it's the very simplicity of their colors. When painted it's very easy for them to look flat, like a graphic. I've yet to see a Cock of the Rock painting I like. I won't even try to paint Scarlet Tanagers though I do recall seeing a painting I liked over the last year or so.

We saw this Pileated four to six weeks ago at Carpenter's Woods throwing his head and bill into this dead tree for all he was worth. Every few minutes he'd lean deep into the tree, almost his entire body disappearing, and start tossing the chiseled wood over his head and out of the hole. It was fascinating to watch.

When I looked at some photos I'd taken I though that the pose just might be strong enough to overcome the problem of his simplistic black, white and red foliage. His head is thrown back ready for another thrust into the hole. His leg is planted solidly in almost a completely horizontal line. Hopefully a viewer can figure out that his massive head and bill will soon go flying into the hole in front of him.

I'm not big on painting trees and bark. But until I go much more abstract I need to deal with them in some way. So this is my attempt. I was a bit afraid that it might overwhelm the woodpecker. But I think it works as is. I've left the background sky and foliage very simple, perhaps too much so. But I wanted a stark contrast with the dark of the Pileated and his tree. Time will tell whether or not I try to do any more work on the foliage and sky.

Young Male Baltimore Oriole. Watercolor by Ken Januski.

This far less successful painting of a first year male Baltimore Oriole was based on a couple of photos taken yesterday at Houston Meadows. I've realized recently that I need to expand my yellow palette in watercolor. Once again I've lost the brilliant yellow I was looking for. The only real reason there is for showing this is as an apology to a person who will probably never read this. While looking at this bird, far too yellow to be a male Baltimore Oriole, two birders walked up to us. One of them argued that it was not a female Baltimore Oriole as we thought but instead a male. We knew it wasn't a mature male because of the yellow color. The head was in shadow and so could have been brown or black. The other birder was convinced it was black. To make a long story short I also took a couple of photos of it and when I looked at them they clearly showed the head to be black. So it is indeed a male Baltimore Oriole, but a first year bird.

Just as with tree bark I really need to do better with the foliage that so many birds hide in at this time of year. This is a start but only that. There's much left to be desired. And the bird lacks the brilliant yellow with just a hint of orange wash that he had in real life. I make go back into this but I think it's too late to salvage it. That will have to wait for a new work. And perhaps a new tube of a transparent yellow watercolor.

Keep Sketching, and Painting

Ovenbird at Magee Marsh. Watercolor by Ken Januski.

Great Egret at Morris Arboretum. Watercolor by Ken Januski

With the arrival of football season once again......... I know it's almost June but the weather has been reminiscent of early fall, with a real chill in the air. We started off birding on Friday morning, after dropping off one of our cats at the vet, in low 60 degree weather. As the rain continued the temperature plunged. Soon we were birding, none too successfully, in 49 degree weather.

When we returned from the vet I decided that I wasn't going to bird again until the wind died down and the weather warmed up. As I sat in my studio trying to decide what to do I looked through some photos and once again turned to sketching, again in my Stillman and Birn 5.5x8.5 Gamma sketchbook.

As Bob Kuhn, among many others, has said: you should always keep drawing. I think that's true. One loss I felt when I turned to completely abstract work was that of drawing. Though I still drew it wasn't from anything real. I always missed that. Now that I'm doing it again I remember just how satisfying it is.

At the same time though I'd add 'Keep Painting.' They really are two different methods of portraying the world, though often quite well merged in many successful artists. There's the desire for line and structure that drawing fulfills. And there's the desire for color, shape, texture that paint seems better at.

For some reason at least to me it seems that wildlife art relies more on the linear aspect of art, perhaps because of its desire for verisimilitude. But painting is about paint, whether oil, acrylic or something else. For me watercolor remains a difficult but rewarding medium. So after I'd done these two sketches I decided to continue on in watercolor. Particularly with the ovenbird it became much more a painting than a drawing with watercolor added. To me it's just as important to keep painting as it is to keep sketching. Do both, and eventually, you'll have something to show for it.

I'd much prefer if I could work from life like this, rather than rely on photos. But it is a learning experience, particularly in regard to learning watercolor. I'm sure it will eventually pay off in the field, the next time that ovenbird walks by.

A Day Without Warblers

Bay-breasted Warbler. Watercolor by Ken Januski.

Black and White Warbler. Watercolor by Ken Januski.



Black-throated Green Warbler. Watercolor by Ken Januski.

Black-throated Green Warbler. Watercolor by Ken Januski

Baltimore Oriole et al. Field Sketch by Ken Januski

After all the warblers of Magee Marsh, seen with very little obfuscating foliage, it's been quite a change to return to my local Philadelphia haunts and find that the few warblers that are here are often extremely high and/or hidden by extensive foliage. Each day out reminds me of the saying about a day without wine being like a day without sunshine. Or perhaps a day without jazz is like a day without sunshine as a public radio station in Kentucky used to say. I feel like I'm going through warbler withdrawal.

But there have been some warblers and also other first of season or first of year birds for Philadelphia. It's been a treat to see familiar thrushes, flycatchers and orioles again. Many of them will remain here and nest. The field sketch immediately above shows some of the local birds, a not quite local Chestnut-sided Warbler seen from more or less straight underneath, a House Finch at feeder, a mystery flycatcher that turned out to be an Acadian, and a Baltimore Oriole.

Each year I promise myself to be a bit more discriminating in the art I show on this blog and elsewhere. My intent it so show more finished work and less working sketches, often of not the best quality. But guess what? It's easier said than done, this producing finished quality work idea.

I've struggled for the last week with small watercolor sketches in my Stillman and Birn 5.5x8.5 Gamma sketchbook. These are all based on photos from Magee, the things I took after I'd done some field sketches. The sketchbooks themselves are fine.

But most of the sketches leave something if not a lot to be desired, especially when you consider the beauty of the birds when seen live.  And of course there is size. I had one Black-throated Green land within a hand's reach of me. At that close range you see how delicate and really tiny they are. All the more reason to pursue my ongoing goal of doing them justice in paint. I've seen thousands of illustrations of warblers. I've seen exceedingly few successful paintings of them.

I recently read a post elsewhere about watercolor not actually being hard. But it is. It is exceedingly hard. It's only easy if you really don't understand how great watercolor can be, for instance in the work of Winslow Homer or John Singer Sargent, both of whose work is full of light and life. If you only use watercolor to fill in areas with color that is something else again. It still requires skill I think. But it completely ignores the sense of transparency and light which in my humble opinion is the only reason to even use watercolor.

Philadelphia Empidomax

Empidomax Flycatcher - Willow? Watercolor by Ken Januski

As we hurried out of the house yesterday to do our bluebird nest monitoring at Morris Arboretum before any rain started I was in such a rush that I forgot my sketchbook and drawing pens. So when this very active flycatcher kept dropping to the ground and back I had no drawing utensils other than the small notebook I use to list birds seen and one of my old Faber Castell Pitt Artists Pen, my previous pen of choice.

There was something puzzling about this flycatcher. It had what is called a teardrop shape eye, something not found in local flycatchers. He also flicked his tail occasionally but was obviously not an Eastern Phoebe, the best known local tail-flipping flycatcher. There was also a fairly obvious vest.

I noted all of this in the tiny sketch that I did. But when I got home I didn't refer to the sketch but instead tried a new sketch based on my memory. This is much progress for me - actually being able to retain a memory of a bird. I think this is due to hard looking and much practice.

Though I had brought along a number of Stillman and Birn sketchbooks on the trip to Magee Marsh I found that I only had time to use the one sketchbook that fit handily in my back pocket, a Moleskine. With more time and perseverance I would have gotten to the Stillman and Birn.

In any case yesterday I decided to inaugurate a 5.5x8.5 Delta hardbound sketchbook with this drawing from memory. This is the first page. But as I worked on it I realized I really needed some of the space on the inside book cover. Since it's made of the same paper it was easy enough to do. As usual the paper erased beautifully so that I could keep drawing and erasing until the bird seemed right. After that I added a small amount of watercolor. Given the overall gray color of the bird there really wasn't much color that I could add.

I often find that painting the bird like this soon after seeing it helps to confirm the ID, or at least suggest a likely possibility. This was most likely a Willow Flycatcher, a common bird at Morris, with a surprisingly large eye-ring. If he had called I'd know for sure but he was frustratingly quiet.

I'm happy with this watercolor sketch and especially with the paper. To me it works beautifully, and keeps a very clean quality in spite of strong erasures, for watercolor sketches such as these.

A Democracy of Birders

Bay-breasted Warbler and other birds. Field sketch by Ken Januski.

American Redstart and other birds. Field sketch by Ken Januski.

 

Horned Lark and other birds. Field sketch by Ken Januski.

 



Magnolia Warbler and other birds. Field sketch by Ken Januski.

 

Prothonotary Warbler and other birds. Field sketch by Ken Januski.

 

I had a hard time deciding on a title for this post about field sketches of birds seen at Magee Marsh in Ohio last week. The most notable thing I think for just about anyone who was there was the number of birds, though there was in fact one very quiet day. For me the high point might have been when a woman who had wandered up to watch me sketch a Blackburnian Warbler from life said something like "You've made my day. This is even better than the birds, especially with all these cameras." What she meant I think was how refreshing it was to see someone sketching and by inference interacting with the birds amidst all the people with their cameras, and whirring motor drives, and flashes, and big lenses, and big tripods.

Since I value field sketching so highly it was easy to make that the title of this post. Instead though I chose "A Democracy of Birders." I did this because I think it is interesting philosophically. It is very easy to get frustrated at Magee Marsh this time of year, perhaps even more so during The Biggest Week in American Birding , an organized event that has gone on for about the last 10 days there. It surely adds to the crowds.

Between rude and oblivious photographers who think nothing of plunking their huge tripods in the middle of the boardwalk and then planting their 200 plus pound selves behind them so that no one can get through and drivers who have to stop for every Canada gosling on the causeway to the boardwalk turning each two minute trip into at least a ten minute trip it's easy to get frustrated. But I think most people feel it's well worth the frustrations because of the wealth of birds to be seen, most at such close range that most people can only dream about.

If you listen to the conversations you soon realize that the level of skill and experience is almost infinite, from the most expert to the most beginning and everywhere in between. And as far as I can tell the excitement and joy of seeing so many birds so close, most of them neo-tropical migrants, makes up for everything else. Barriers between old-style birders and technology-loving birders, experienced and inexperienced birders seem to disappear, or at least be greatly sublimated, in the experience of seeing so many striking birds in so many numbers and at such close proximity.

So that's the nature of the title. The last week, The Biggest Week in American Birding, really did show a democracy of birders, a democracy in all its varied and sometimes uncomfortable or even unwelcome( I'm thinking of big lenses and tripods when I say this) diversity.

The diversity of birds however was as welcome as could be. So from the top I'll enumerate the birds portrayed. They are only some of the many we saw.

Page one: Blue-winged Warbler and Yellow-throated Vireo, actually seen here before the trip, and a Bay-breasted Warbler on left and a Nashville Warbler, Chestnut-sided Warbler and American Woodcock on right.

Page two: Red-eyed Vireo, and a distant sparrow viewed through scope and finally identified as the familiar Swamp Sparrow on left, and male American Redstart, Rose-breasted Grosbeak and head of an American Woodcock on right.

Page three: singing Yellow Warbler and subtly beautiful Warbling Vireo on left and Horned Lark and Least Sandpiper on right.

Page four: Least Flycatcher, Magnolia Warbler and horrible rendering of Sandhill Crane in flight on left and Black-throated Blue Warbler and Ovenbird on right.

Finally on page five: Black-throated Green Warbler and Northern Parula on left and Blackburnian Warbler and Prothonotary Warbler on the right.

Given the plethora of some of the world's most beautiful birds all within close range it's hard to know what to do: enjoy them, soak them in, keep staring trying to capture all that's there in your memory, take photos, sketch. Though I've always tried to do field sketches when you have this seemingly once in a lifetime opportunity it's easy to try to preserve it in film. I'm sure that explains much of the sense of camera-driven birders. But my own experience is that the results are always lacking in emotional resonance. Even on this trip I succumbed to taking quite a few photos. But when I did I was no longer engaged with the bird.

To get around this I started off each day sketching. Only when I'd done a satisfactory sketch or felt it was such a rare view of a bird did I take the camera out of its case and start shooting. For myself I have to say it's been tremendously satisfying not just to see these birds but also have these sketches of them. I just wish I could stay there for a month or so to truly do them justice.

First Shorebird and Yellow Yard Wildflowers

Solitary Sandpiper at Morris Arboretum. Watercolor by Ken Januski

Perfoliate Bellwort in Bloom in yard.

Golden Ragwort in Bloom in Yard.

Yellow Trillium in Bloom in Yard.

There really is not enough time in the day in late April and May. Between the refreshing weather, migrating birds, wildflowers in bloom and garden chores every day is a full day.

Since we spend a lot of time outdoors we've come to appreciate wildflowers and over the years we've tried to grow various ones that we've become familiar with out in the wild. Fortunately a number of local nature centers, arboretums and such offer a great variety of choices. This time of year it is the yellow ones in particular that stand out. Above you see a Perfoliate Bellwort at top. This was sold to us as a Large-flowered Bellwort but both color and stem-pierced leaves make me think it is really Perfoliate. We're not complaining either way.

One of our favorite wildflowers in Shenandoah National Park is Golden Ragwort. That is the plant above with the numerous bright rays. It is a marvelous combination of colors and shapes in its basal leaves, its stem and its flowers. The one difference we've found between this and the Shenandoah plants is that ours do not hold their deep burgundy stems but instead turn green.

The last wildflower and newest addition is a Yellow Trillium, also called Trillium Luteum. It is more common to the Smoky Mountains than here so only time will tell if it will survive. Over the years we've lost a number of trillium but we keep trying. It is with good reason that many woodland wildflowers are called ephemerals and here and gone before you know it. That makes them all the more special and probably explains why we try to grow some in our small urban yard.

And finally along with all the warblers, quite ephemeral themselves, and other neo-tropical migrants that are passing through come the shorebirds. They are far more subtle than the warblers. But their story of very lengthy migration, often breeding in Alaska, is a gripping one. Once you know it it's hard not to be taken by them. Above is a small watercolor sketch of the first Solitary Sandpiper of the year seen at Morris Arboretum yesterday. Oddly enough he seemed to behave oddly, almost as though stunned. We don't seem them all that often but when we do they seem more active than this one did. Perhaps he was just acclimating to his new climate, or just recovering from one long flight. By the way we actually saw our first shorebird in January, a Killdeer. But since they possibly overwinter I'm calling this the first true shorebird.

An Appreciative Review of Green Heron Lino

Green Heron with Twelve-spotted Skimmer. Reduction Linocut by Ken Januski

In my many years as an artist I've heard a lot of complaints from artists about lack of appreciation. To a large extent I have little sympathy. My very first experience with public audiences, as opposed to friends and relatives, took place at an art festival in San Francisco about 40 years ago. As I watched people walk by the 2-3 works I'd gotten in the show I noticed that most people didn't even look. Those that did usually spent less than 10 seconds looking.

When I got into my first juried show as a student at University of California at Berkeley the janitor yelled out in his memorable Portuguese accent that I'd better get my stuff out of the gallery if I didn't want it to "smell like horse****". Some disgruntled, or perhaps just avant-garde graduate students, decided to dump a load of horse manure in the gallery. They called it an Art Attack as I recall.

When I got into my first serious juried show at the University of Rochester about 30 years ago I went to the opening with a friend of mine who'd also gotten in the show. I think he might have ended up winning a prize. Me? Both of my 4x6 foot abstract paintings were hung upside down! When I complained about this I was told that they couldn't fix it until after the opening, when of course the audience would decrease drastically.

Between those experiences, a lot of knowledge of art history and the lives of artists, and perhaps a general skepticism I've come not to expect much in the way of appreciation. Even the best artists are often appreciated for the wrong reasons. So much as I'd like to sell more of my artwork and see more appreciation of it I fully believe that most artists are quite lucky to find even a few people who really appreciate their work.

At some point of course truly appreciative buyers help I think to build an impetus toward sales to a broader audience that may buy less for appreciation than for cachet. Of course if it pays the bills I think most artists can live with that, especially if they know that they have some true fans.

All of which leads to the thought that I almost never read anything in print that I think appreciates my  work, especially something that is more than just a quick comment from generous peers. As I've said I don't really expect this, or wake up each day hoping to find it. I think this is in the nature of art, regardless of whether it is painting, writing, music, or whatever.

But when it happens I'm surely not going to ignore it. So this is all an extremely long lead-in to a note of thanks to Martha Knox for a wonderful review and appreciation of my reduction lino, Green Heron with Twelve-spotted Skimmer, shown at top. You can read the post on her blog Words on Woodcuts. Thank you  Martha!

The link above takes you directly to the post about my work. But I'd recommend looking at other posts as well as exploring all of her collected links. As an only occasional printmaker I often work in the dark. It's always to see the work of other printmakers. Martha has also written appreciations of other print works in separate posts. Eventually I hope to find the time to read more of them.

Art criticism is the oddest thing. I was once asked if I had any  interest in writing it. I said no, definitely  not. The reason is that I'm a fairly critical person and it would make no sense, and I would take no enjoyment, in writing primarily negative articles. Writing an appreciation of an artist I admire is something else entirely though. It's fun to do, though not necessarily easy. I've only written a few such appeciations but  when I do I  enjoy it. I  think what's most enjoyable is that I get a chance to try to share my excitement with the work with others. Sounds corny  perhaps but it is true. And that is what Martha seems to do  in the posts I've read so  far about the work of others. I would heartily recommend taking a look at her blog, especially these appreciations.

Blue-winged Visitor

Blue-winged Warbler in Apple Blossoms. Watercolor by Ken Januski

There was something wrong about the Pine Warbler that Jerene saw just in front of us in an apple along the edge of the Wissahickon. The yellow was mighty bright. AND there was that black line through the eye. Though this was a likely location for Pines there was no doubt that this was our first Blue-winged Warbler of the year.

I did a quick sketch in the Moleskine sketchbook that I always carry in my backpocket. But I also wanted to get a color version. So I brought out my new Gamma 5.5x85 sketchbook from Stillman and Birn and inaugurated it with this sketch. This seemed only fitting after my demonstration of Stillman and Birn sketchbooks yesterday. The demo went very well, as far as I could tell, outside of a minuscule audience. But thanks to you who showed up. I hope you enjoyed it and learned something from it.

I read once of a bird artist doing a second version of field sketches in the studio as soon as he possibly could. Perhaps it was Lars Jonsson but I can't say for sure. In either case it seems like a very good process. Draw the bird as accurately as you can in the field drawing only what you can see. Then elaborate on it on another sheet of paper back in the studio. It solidifies what you've seen but doesn't adulterate your initial impressions.

Speaking of adulteration though this bird was brilliant yellow. Sometimes you just choose the wrong yellow when you go to render something. That's what happened here. And it's pretty sad given that the yellow was the most important part of the bird. Looks like it's time to add a new yellow to my palette!

The rest of the day saw few warblers but many views of Pileated Woodpeckers. I can only guess why this normally shy woodpecker seems so visible now. It's looking for food for young or a female on nest. That's just a guess. Maybe it's just the lack of foliage. In any case it's nice to get so many views of them. It makes up for a 4-5 month drought.