Pierre Noire pencils

I discovered a new art tool that I really love. Pierre Noire pencils are compressed charcoal/clay (I think). They are big fat pencils that are soft enough so you can smudge them easily. I drew the outline of this dried weed with a brown fineline marker, then added shading with the Pierre Noire pencils in two shades of brown. Very easy and fast!

knit happens logo design

This is the new logo for our Thursday night knitting group. We plan to order nylon bags with this logo printed on them. The bags will be black and the logo will be turquoise (not red, as it is shown here).

We need to order a minimum of 25 bags and would like to get your order prepaid as soon as possible. The site where you can see the bags is Advance Custom Promotions.

Foetid iris and other lovely things

Sunday, I finished the pencil and ink drawing of a dried flower pod with red berries that I found in a San Mateo garden last month. I brought it to my botanical art class and the teacher knew what it was: foetid iris. Online, I found an image of an old botanical print of the same plant. In class, we drew clothespins as a warmup exercise, went into the garden to examine leaves, and then did several sketches of the same leaf.

Palo Alto Sketching

Today, my daughter and I went to the Palo Alto Art Center, where we drew from a live model. They have these sessions twice a week and the drop-in fee is only $7. The sketches you see here are pencil, we stayed for about an hour. The model took breaks but always went back to the same pose, and there was no room to move around the room for different angles, so it got a bit boring. But I'm glad we checked it out.