I was struck by some of the unusual colours most of the small towns you pass through in Mexico seem to have on all of the buildings. Lots of bright colours, reds and oranges, not really arranged with any pattern either. Just whatever the owner fancies I guess. The building style as well was interesting, row-ish houses span whole blocks, with some unifying details, while other items like windows vary from building to building. Overall it makes for some unique visuals.





I snapped some photos driving by for sketching material and this is one of the resulting doodles. The line work is done in a very unpicky style, giving way to some light watercolour washes to capture the differences between each quarters.

There's a cool initiative that's been happening for a few years called InkTober. I'm not sure why I've only just heard about it, but basically for the month of October, artists from the world over, contribute drawings trying to produce a drawing day.

I haven't really kept up with the pace, but here's a brush pen sketch of Buffalo from this month. I'm always intrigued by Buffalo driving through it, seeing it's different areas. The revitalized downtown with arena and ballpark, the waterfront, the faded Rust Belt factories, the dense urban decay and the older spires and deco buildings that remind me of Gotham.

Here's a little drawing of a house downtown I've been working on. Some houses can be pretty broken down and uncared for, and giant eyesores...but if every house was a brand new executive in the suburbs there wouldn't really be anything to draw. Buildings have unique character just like people, from the cracks in the walls to the style of window pane.

This particular house had a lot of random unique details that kind of called out to me. Crazy chipped walls, uncut grass, white mod chair, broken shades...the list goes on. I just thought it would be a fun subject to experiment with layering on top of an ink wash. I drew out the house more detailed than normal in pencil, then did a grey wash over top to start. After that I added in some digital colours, tweaking some of the watermarks, and really exaggerating the aged feel with some grunge brush texturing. At the same time I was trying to picture what it might have looked like brand new in all its glory, without the dirt cloud of neglect

At the tail end of a busy winter painting season, I managed to finished up a few paintings and drawings including this conceptual one I call Distance. It was something I've had in my head for a long time, inspired by a Calvin and Hobbes strip. In it, Calvin brings a plane to show and tell to emphasize how much distance he will soon be putting between himself and classmates he doesn't like. I thought a traffic jam would be an obvious symbol representative of a place someone might want to escape from. Really, the underlying idea is more important though, that distance is a strong emotional state of mind, whether it's wanting to put distance between something, or wanting to close the distance and get somewhere faster.

A large painting at over four feet tall, Distance was built up in several layers of mostly acrylic. First a full fill of random notations and lists, followed by a monochromatic traffic scene. Then, on top of that, the hand and plane in a linear style, meeting up with the typographic message.

Having been unable to sleep due to the inability to breathe through a wall of allergies, I found myself awake very early in the morning. I was up before the sun, and I think even before the birds. It kind of felt like I was experiencing this weird private earth quiet time, that humans really aren't supposed to be a part of. Like getting to see all the toys come alive when you aren't there.

The experience reminded me that ideas can strike at any time, out in the world when you aren't watching, or in your head while you're sleeping. I wanted to capture the moment so a few hours later when the sun started to come up I snapped some photos.

The Hammer isn't always pretty...or not really at all. But its years of decay and neglect as an aging industrial city do produce some interesting subjects to draw and paint.

Here's a view somewhere in downtown, done about five or six years ago. Painted with acrylic over a wax resist, along with xacto scratching, it takes on an interesting feel and texture, which seems to suit the grittiness of the area

Sometimes it's good to work in a method you normal wouldn't consider the best for the project at hand. Breaking free of your creative routine is an important tool, not only in refreshing your artwork, but also in making new discoveries. If you just stick with what you know, then you will grow extremely familiar with that, but never actually grow as a whole.

Personally, I often find it difficult to disregard the "proper" methods of drawing and working, fused inside of me from schooling and experience. For example, no matter how much I try to draw like a child, it is never anything as unique, innocent and unrestrained as a real five year old would actually produce.
To break free, I like to just grab a random medium, and start to create, without any burden or expectation of producing something great. Shown here is a recent sketchbook doodle looking out the studio window, done in large pink oil pastel. The pastel specifically forced me to ignore details and realism and just draw away. It's certainly no masterpiece, but rewarding all the same.

After buying an inversion table, I had a bunch of large cardboard lying around that I couldn't bear to recycle without attempting to repurpose first. Based on a blurry roadtrip photo, this painting of an old barn, seemed to make pretty good use of the material.

My idea was to harness the natural cardboard grooves and turn them into the wood planks of the rusting barn. Barns themselves can be quite interesting subjects to paint with the various shades and textures of weathering and degrees of decay. Though the scene is from a bleak winter day, I wanted to accent all of the cool grey and white with some warm colours popping around the composition, to generate a bit more interest.

This year Mother Nature kindly waited till the first of December, to provide the Christmas season's inaugural snowfall. But soon enough, the streets will be covered in the familiar mass of powdered white, slushy grey and hectic holiday shoppers, all muddled together in one big mess.

Snow is one of those painful things to paint...I like to lump into the snore category along with clouds and trees. Not surprising then, that I had to venture back about ten years to find a painting of a full winter scene. This one, of the downtown bus terminal area,  was done in watercolour on rough paper, and captures well, the cold grey of midwinter.

Inspired by the orange brown colour scheme of the new living room, I could feel the creation of an orange painting was only a matter of time. Done on a horizontal gallery canvas in acrylic, East vs West began just as an an abstract mix of colours. On top of that, I layered another round of abstract colour, keeping the brushstrokes more defined and unblended. Feeling ok with that stage, I dropped on with oil pastel, two different line drawings. There is a New York scene done in light colour, and a San Francisco scene done in darker grey. Both drawings merge with each other to create an interesting visual collage. Depending on if it is brightly lit or dim, only one city sketch pops out from the mass of orange.

In this quick little painting in acrylic, I set out to paint a city sunset, without the sunset. I wanted to challenge myself to think more about positive and negative space, rather than than true colours and a black outline. In keeping with orange hues, it basically reduces the image to a series of layered silhouettes, while dropping the late evening-sun going down on the city vibe. And of course a romantic couple is the perfect subject to include in such a painting. This was based on a series of reference photos taken in Toronto.