Sunday, August 11, 2013

Taking Pen to Paper, Part 1

I decided to take a break from my oil painting series of subway riders and embark on a new series of strictly black and white, pen and ink drawings. 

But my work area was a disaster.

So, first step, clean up my drawing area. Even Goose thought it was an improvement, more appealing than his usual perch on the windowsill:




Next, gather my materials:




My favorite bamboo pens:




Plus a variety of nib pens:




My trusty eye dropper:




India ink, of course:




Containers and a spray bottle of water, plus some blotting tissue:




And a  4" x 6" block of Canson watercolor paper, plus several 4" x 6" hand-cut pieces from a larger sheet of Canson paper:




Then I called up some of my own photos on my computer for reference - 






And then I went to town, using a variety of pens and techniques, even adding washes of ink with a brush to some:



About 34 in all by the time I was through:




The question is, what next? Do I offer prints? Or Mounted Prints? Or something completely different?

Stay tuned for Part 2.

2 comments:

Dan Gliubizzi said...

Good stuff! We share that kind of "process". Something special happens after you make the first few.

VH McKenzie said...

Thanks, Dan! Yes, knowing that I'm going to do several takes the pressure off and also the freedom to experiment. Definitely got flowing after the first few!