Happy Birthday, Tim!

We have talked for years about commissioning me to do a drawing or painting of your house...well, here it is! Happy birthday! Love the flamingos in the yard, by the way!

Le Magasin SENNELIER en 1900

I visited Sennelier Art Store last time I was in Paris. 115 years later, it still looked the same! Except for the car.

Too Much Ink!

I liked the original drawing, but I used too much ink and muddied up the whole thing. Oh well. I learned a valuable lesson!

An art lesson for Tia

Hi Tia! To practice my drawing skills, I think it is really helpful to work only with black ink, so I don't have to concentrate on getting the colors right, too. Take, for example, a glass of water. We know that water is clear, but we have to train our eye to ignore what we know in our brain and just draw what we really see. Look at the water inside the glass...some of it looks black or grey because of the stuff behind it. When I painted this, the water had ice cubes in it, but they melted by the time I took the picture. Have fun! Love you!

Alice 10.3

Alice doesn't look so turtley this week! It looks a bit more like her, but it does not capture her sweetness. Next week, maybe?

Another Sumini

My friend Josetta at the salon tonight. Painted with sumi ink with my plume.

Sketch at bedtime

The fire is now just glowing embers, and as I sit on my couch, I figure that drawing what is right in front of me is good enough. So here is my lovely fireplace and the artsy picasso-ish chair that Sigel gave me for Christmas one year. I will try to be a good girl and ink this tomorrow. Nitey nite!

Where did my week go?

I have been bad. I haven't done any drawing for four days! I think I will pick up my pen and draw for at least 5 minutes before bed!

Am I turtly enough for the Turtle Club?

A quick sketch yesterday in the salon. Maybe I will ink it today.

Unaware

I am trying to capture the essence of a person in a 5 minute sketch without them noticing what I am doing. Our clients almost always choose the same place to sit, so this is very similar to the sketch of Jeanne that I did. How's your 20 minutes going?

Sumini (Mini sumi painting)

I decided to bring my sumi ink and plume de becasse to work. This is the view out the window after I extracted a few cars and buildings. I painted this while color was processing, and gave this painting to my sweet client Linda because I think she is so wonderful.

3 minute sketch

This week has not been conducive to drawing OR blogging. Difficulty in downloading photos AND finding the time to draw. I had three minutes, so here it is!

A Day with Yuming Zhu!

I had the great honor of taking a Sumi Painting class with amazing artist Yuming Zhu of Washington state. Check him out online. Sumi Painting is something I have never done before, and look forward to implementing this brush technique into my current work.

Inktober!

I thought I was being so original, challenging all of you to spend 20 minutes a day drawing. And then my daughter Aly told me about Inktober!

Mise-en-abyme

A picture of my picture drawing my picture, done with a woodcock feather brush that I found in Paris at the oldest art store, Sennelier. Cezanne bought his pastels here. It was a thrill to be in this store!

Here they are

A morning of Inking

I finished off the Deyrolle Taxidermy sketch for my brother, framed it, and put it in the mail for him. I also framed another previous sketch I did for my sister while in Paris two weeks ago, and put that in the mail for her as well. They both have birthdays next week.

My photos won't load, and it's going on midnight. I will try and post them tomorrow. Happy drawing, or whatever you do!

For my big brother Don

A taxidermy shop in Paris where you can find my brother's abalone shells!

I went a little heavy on the ink, but I like the way our sheer curtains have a light-on-dark/dark-on-light alternation. I find it hard to balance between stopping to early or over-working a piece of art. Really... how do you know when you are done?

Today's 20 minute drawing

Here's today's 20 minute drawing. It's a sketch of a beautiful desk my husband gave me. I may try to ink in some of the details of the little birds that are painted on the front. How did you do today?

Here's the sketch of Alice that I did yesterday. Not a great likeness, but that's ok. I will draw more today after my breakfast.

Ok, day 1 of my challenge...since I own a beauty school, and am surrounded by lovely people of all sorts, I decided to sketch Alice, a 95 year old beautiful soul who has been a precious client for 20 years. Not my best work, but a good exercise nonetheless. I really only had about 7 minutes to do this sketch. Maybe I will take it home, refine it and ink it in a bit, and post it. I want to encourage you all, right? What is more encouraging than seeing a piece of art and thinking..."I can do better than that!"

Keep drawing!

Welcome to Sue Shroy Art Blog!

Hi! I decided to create this blog so that I could have a venue to share my work and reach out to others who might need encouragement in their own creative journey. The majority of artists that I know are employed in other disciplines, and have difficulty finding time to art.

My husband and I travel a lot.  With my busy schedule, I feel I can only find the time to do art when I travel, so I carry a very small art box with me and do quick works as I can fit them in between our other adventures.

The above sketch was a 20 minute drawing of Hotel de la Pagezie in Sarlat, France. I carried a watercolor paper postcard pad and fine-tipped ink pen in my purse, so it was with me everywhere I went. Later I would take the drawings back to my hotel room and lay down an ink wash to add dimension.

My goal for the rest of this year is to spend 20 minutes a day simply drawing in any medium to improve my drawing skills. This will hopefully prove as a foundation for me to produce some more serious works by the end of this year and prepare for a show by the end of next year.

Want to join me in my drawing challenge? Let's GO!