SketchCrawl April 2011

This sketchcrawl was organized by artist Jim Stigall. A small group of artists wandered through downtown Denver sketching various scenes along the way.

Urban Nature

These are some sketches I've done in Denver. I'm a member of Urban Sketchers group. One is a band that is playing during the People's Fair in the park. One is at the Chalk Fest, with two artists at work in the street.  One is outside the Paramount Cafe, along the outdoor 16th Street mall. Yes, I know it's not nature, but I love urban sketching--sitting and watching people has always been my favorite activity. Sketching is great fun, but I truly had to train myself to draw fast to capture people's gestures and poses. These are all sketched in pen with watercolor washes over the top.

Radish Greens

Springtime radishes are still flourishing in my garden. I have two kinds going--red round as in this drawing and long narrow red and white. Both are tasty! 

Sometimes I slice them for salads, but mostly I just like to eat them whole. And I don't waste the greens! If you eat wild edible greens, you know that the greens from radishes and beets are fantastic as cooked greens plus much easier to collect since they are there in the garden.  The greens are picked along with the root.

In my gardens past, it always seemed a waste to eat just the root crops of radishes and beets. So now I have them as greens early in the season and then cook them into curries later in the season. Too bad the potato vines aren't edible. THAT would be a bounteous crop. Potato and tomato vines are toxic, I believe. So no nibbling there!

This is a pen and ink rendering of a Raphanus sativus.

Watching the Beans Grow

Most life processes are not visible to us. Yet, seeing how plants grow is one of the most fascinating things for me. I love to watch time-lapse images of plants sprouting, growing, moving. To see it happen is like watching a dance. I don't have the techno equipment to follow a bean plant as it grows, but I did do the low-tech, second grade science project of placing a broad bean seed inside a glass cup with some water. For this one, I logged and sketched it as it grew. Then I created this pen and ink illustration of the seed rooting and sprouting. I did this drawing to accompany a children's science article that I wrote about the growth process of seeds. Doesn't it look like a creepy little SF alien? Feed me, Seymour.

What's this scribble?

This is a scribble drawing. It's relaxing to do these in pen and ink, because it's simple, repetitive, and doesn't take a lot of thought. Not like botanical illustration at all!