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the architecture of trees - January 5, 2015

1/5/2015

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I’ve always wanted to use that title………

Wow, I can’t believe I went through the whole month of December without one post!  I’ve been just too damn busy.  I have been fitting some art in – I have just finished 4 new scratchboards – but I haven’t done much sketching.

I found a folder in one of my drawers that was labeled “sketches.”  In it were a lot of loose pages with drawings and many of them were of my favorite subject, trees.  I like them because they’re very good at standing still!  I also like their form and structure and how the simple process of growth yields so many unique results.  Many of these are from long ago.  Some I remember and some I don’t.

This first one is from a farm in Connecticut.  I was hosting a workshop and had finished my part and was killing time while the class went on.  This beautiful white pine growing over the pole barn caught my eye.


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Camperdown elms are a unique tree.  I believe they are created by grafting.  Once long ago someone planted a lot of them around the Gardner area.  Someone told me they called them umbrella trees.  I just like them because of all the zigs and zags in their form. 

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Apple trees are another species with interesting form, though one that’s often manipulated by man by pruning.  When they go wild, though, they can get real crazy.

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    Picture
    Some of the best work I've done isn't hanging on a wall; it's sitting in a box in my closet that's full of my old sketch books.  I fill up one or two books each year.  Some of the sketches end up as a basis of a more formal work, but most don't.  They’re more important to me as a pictorial diary and also as on-going training; learning to really see and to understand shape, light and color.

    This blog is to share my sketches as well as my sketching experiences. 

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