Summer Art Camp at Leesburg Center for the Arts

Each day this week, a different famous master artist is being covered with a short video first thing about the artist and then three different art drawing lessons that represent what the featured artist was famous for.

Monday and Tuesday of this week, I volunteered to help out at the Center during the morning art lessons provided to children ages 8 to 11.

Monday  I was there early in order to help the kids fold and cut their own accordion fold journals.  These journals were being made for them to enter something in it each day  to keep them busy between lessons while things were cleaned up from previous lesson and set up for the next.

Yesterday's featured artist was Leonardo DaVinci.  I was there with material drawn up for the kids to draw Mr. Potato Head as the Vitruvian Man DaVinci is famous for.  Carolyn (who heads this art camp) presented the lesson while myself and others walked around to help each child if they needed it.  The Vitruvian Man exercise was Lesson #2 with the first Lesson having children draw the MonoLisa using a picture of themselves as a starting point.

While preparing for Lesson #2, these kids went to another table to draw in their journals.  This sketch represents five of the 13 that were there.

Worked in a large Stillman & Birn Beta journal.

CJ Ink and Wash Exercise 3

The exercises I'm doing is not exact or in order to the exercises as listed in Cathy Johnson's Ink and Wash mini course.  Don't want to give everything away that's included in the course or follow things exact with my posting publicly ;-)

For this exercise, I purchased a new pen trying it out in the Stillman & Birn Alpha series journal.

It's the Hero 578 purchased through Isellpens.com

The pen is a solid but heavy pen compared to what I've ever handled.  Not sure I could sit for a long period of time sketching or writing with it as it would bother my hand (which I have a history of problems with).  BUT.........I find this pen to be a lot of fun sketching with.

The nib is a bent nib that depending upon the angle the pen is held can deliver a thin to thick line of ink.  If you follow the link above, you can view what this pen looks like to include a close-up of the bent nib.

This illustration shows the variation in line thickness I achieved with a watercolor wash over top after the vine was sketched.  Ink dried quickly on the alpha paper surface (vellum).  Ink used is Noodler's Lexington Gray.

Cathy Johnson's (CJ) Ink and Wash Exercise 2

After playing with several pens just to see how they made marks on paper, I worked my first true exercise.

And the pen I chose wasn't even tested on the previous exercise as I forgot I had dip pens with two different type nibs.

Here are the steps I worked choosing a knife and sheath as my subject that belonged to my dad for many many years given to my husband when dad passed in 2007:

1)  Pencil using a Twist Erase mechanical pencil
2)  Dip Pen with Noodler's #41 Brown ink
3)  #10 Round taking water to the ink lines.  Notice how subtle the ink washes out.
4)  W&N Bt Sienna and Fr Ultramarine for the watercolor wash and #10 Round
5)  Dip Pen with Noodler's #41 Brown ink in some areas for final detailing.

* The little nib illustration is using the Pilot Prera pen with Lexington Gray ink; as is the writing on the page.  My pen was low on ink so was misbehaving a bit putting down ink.

Page in the Stillman & Birn Alpha series journal.

  

Cathy Johnson's Ink and Wash Mini Course

Although I have been working quite a lot with ink and wash for some time now, I jumped on Cathy Johnson's new mini course.

This lady is a jewel and I love her various ways of teaching between the books she has out, DVD courses, DVD course downloads, Online Classes, YouTube Videos, and her self paced Mini Courses.

Her work is spontaneous and her teaching methods extremely down to earth full of great examples for incentive.  To me her approach reaching out to folks is beautifully encouraging.  I think what strikes me the most about her is the fact she doesn't push her way as the only way to do things.  She shares her experience helping to lead or direct but leaving it up to the individual to be free with their own personal expression in handling the materials, tools, and methods she covers. 

If interested in this course or any of her other courses and instruction, please check out the following:

Ink and Wash Mini Course 

Other Mini Courses and Online Workshops

Cathy Johnson's Books through Amazon

YouTube Videos

Instructional CDs/DVDs


It's because of this lady I have changed direction by working in art journals.  To me this has proven to be the most gratifying for myself.  Fun and relaxing without all the fears of getting everything so perfect.  To be more spontaneous and free to express whatever one might wish to on any given day.  Learning it's OK and in fact a positive to make mistakes from which we truly learn from. 

Getting back to the mini course, I decided to take the newest she just released yesterday.........Ink and Wash.  I have received the first lesson which includes a pdf file and links to videos as well as links to some of the pens she happens to mention.

So far after reading through the first lesson, I've dug out my various pens and decided to do a quick play with them.  This is just the beginning..........a rough idea on standard paper before diving into my journal book.  From this I plan to sit and map out how I want to proceed practicing with the information provided in her first lesson.