Ewan MacLeish no longer has an active account at Drawger. As you may know, Drawger is a subscription-based service and it could be that Ewan MacLeish decided not to continue using Drawger. That's okay. People come and go over time.
Working in Monochrome
posted: February 19, 2008
Working in full color can get in the way of what I really love to paint: light and atmospheric effects. I've been experimenting with a limited color palette with some of my Michael Sloan work lately (reason: I'm not getting great full color prints from my Epson printer when using my favorite printmaking paper).
Now I'm experimenting with limited colors here, too. This watercolor painting follows the "Wanderer" theme of my work shown in the Watercolor Paintings gallery on this site.
Several years ago, I dreamed that I was taking the F train home from Manhattan to Park Slope. I fell asleep as the train went underground approaching Prospect Park. I awoke on the other side of the Park when the train becomes an elevated line again, and found myself in a part of Brooklyn that I didn’t recognize. It was nighttime, and everything was in black and white. The city was shaped like a bowl, surrounded by buildings that looked like they were alive.
The city seemed endless (as Brooklyn can be south of Prospect Park), with viaducts and bridges, bright lights coming from unknown baseball stadiums, and impossible, monumental architecture from another era.
I remember feeling fascinated and anxious in my dream; I don’t like getting lost. I’m amazed that several years later this dream is still so fresh in my mind, still a source of inspiration to me. Here are a few of the drawings that this dream inspired.
Here's my birthday present to my son Dylan. He loves animals, especially birds, and I love painting fantasy architecture. I think this painting could lead to a nice illustrated story for children.
These three pastel drawings document the progress of a thunderstorm in May over Merindol, a tiny village in the south of France. As a group, these drawings capture several things that I love to sketch: architecture, and dramatic light and weather.
Above is the first drawing of the day from my friend's hilltop ruin. It is late morning, and the storm clouds are forming to the south.
In this second drawing, I have walked down to the village. The clouds and the light have become much more exciting. Now the thunder is rumbling in the distance. The thunderheads move majestically from left to right.
In the third drawing of the day, the storm is about to break. The air smells of the coming rain, and the wind is picking up. The thunder is loud and nearby; I work quickly to finish this piece before the rain arrives. The two splotches in the center of the drawing are the first raindrops to hit. I pack up my gear and run back to the house, getting completely drenched along the way. This is the best day of outdoor sketching I've ever had.
From time to time when I want to remember this day, I take these three drawings out, put on my Ravel piano music, and get a glass of red wine. Ahh... Magnifique!
