Big News!

I officially have a website now!
I am very excited to finally be launching a website. I'm not sure why I delayed it so long, but now you can view my art in and easy to view, clean and organized website format. Head on over to sarahpeschell.com to see for yourself. Also with the website comes my new blog, from now on I will be posting at  sarahpeschell.com or you can follow me on twitter @SarahPeschell and instagram @sarah_peschell to see what I'm currently working on (or distracted by).
 

April's Projects

This is a work in progress that is coming along slowly. At one point I had thought I had finished it. If you follow me on instagram you may have seen a post questioning that. However, I decided it was not done and so I started experimenting with it. I like the direction it is going so far. Thank you my husband for the suggestion to add colour.
I have also been doing research on a long overdue project, setting up a website. A blog just doesn't cut it, (especially when I don't update it frequently). That project is moving along too.
So stay tuned for details

Recap of February

What did I do in February? Despite my lack of posting to my blog, I have actually been making art. During the month of February I participated in (and tried to keep up with) the Daily Practice Challenge by Opus Art Supplies. I managed to do over half of them, but I realized off the bat that I was going to miss some and I gave myself permission to do so, no catch up necessary. I posted the finished drawings to instagram (@sarah_peschell) and here are a couple collages of them. It was just practicing and playing.

Creative Prompt Week 14

I have had the drawing finished and waiting to be photographed and posted since early last week. So this post is a little late, but here it is now. The prompt was My Favourite Weather.
My favorite weather is the crisp, clear and cool days of autumn. I used soft pastels on printmaking paper for this little drawing.

Creative Prompt Week 13

Well I guess I'm not exactly sticking to one drawing a week. I have been grabbing a few minutes here and there when I have the chance and they have come a bit more frequently lately. Or maybe it's just the urge to draw coming more frequently. I do feel a bit guilty sitting down to draw rather than sweep all the dust bunnies up or doing some other house tidying. Obviously not too guilty though or I wouldn't be drawing!
The prompt for week 13 was: Scissors. I know I tend to very literally and realistically render the prompts. For now anyway I am practicing at keeping my drawing skills up. I used charcoal and graphite on kraft paper today.

Creative Prompt Week 11

I have finally picked up my drawing utensils after ignoring them for way too long. I'm going to blame Christmas prep and holidaying for the distraction. Now that we are almost heading into the second week of January we have finally gotten back into routine.
Picking up from where I left off, this week's prompt was: Elephant. It was drawn with graphite on a found paper bag.
Over the holidays it was pointed out that I forgot to share a photo of the last prompt. So here is the image from week 10 also.

Creative Prompt Week 10

This week's creative prompt was Moth, Butterfly or Insect. I chose to draw a Luna Moth just because that was what came to mind and I think they are quite pretty. This drawing was done with soft pastels on watercolour paper.

Creative Prompt Week 9

This last week's prompt was Spaceship.  I did this one as a doodle on scrap paper during church last week just for the fun of it. I didn't really intend for it to be my official drawing for the week, but i kind of like it and it was a practice drawing. So here it is: my official doodle.

Creative Prompt Week 8

Week 8's prompt was Robots.
The first thing that came to mind was the newest (and rather charming) robot from star wars, bb-8. He is done with graphite and watercolour pencil on cardstock. I'm staying caught up so far!

Creative Prompt Week 7

I'm caught up! This week's prompt was: Creatures.
Sea creatures are what came to mind when I read that, so here are a few friendly little sea creatures swimming in some words. They were drawn with graphite pencil on a found dictionary page.
Now hopefully I can stay caught up and not succumb to avoidance techniques again.

Creative Prompt Week 6

I will begin this post with sincerest apologies to my subjects of this week's challenge.  The prompt for this week was:Group of People.
Yes, I was working from a photo to do this. People are not the easiest for me to draw, particularly quickly. As I have not alloted myself a large amount of time to work on these creative excercises, I decided to try for a rough and loose representation. They are people and there may be a vague resemblence to whom I was referencing but like I said,  my apologies. It was a practicing exercise and I promised to share the results.
I used soft pastels on printmaking paper.

Creative Prompt Week 5

My apologies, this post is really late. I did get caught up, but now I seem to have fallen behind again. I'm working to catch up and be back on schedule. Apparently the procrastination is hitting hard with the topics for the next challenge. Probably because it is a challenge and not my favourite subject.
Anyway, the creative prompt for week 5 as Unicorn.
Definitely not my normal subject matter. Horses have never been my thing,  I skipped the preteen horse craze, and fantasy animals aren't up there either. So here is my attempt at a Unicorn.

Creative Prompt Week 4

Week 4 was last week, so yes I am playing catch up. But I got last week's done today so I still have a few days to do this week's.
The prompt for week 4 was 'Cat'. It took me a bit to figure out how I wanted to draw 'cat', but I finally just stole a page out of someone elses book (a dictionary) and started that way. I chose to work with charcoal because I thought the soft medium would be perfect to render the softness of the fur.

Week 3 Creative Prompt

This week's prompt was Face. Not my favourite subject, so I spent all week mulling over what I wanted to draw for this challenge. Finally, this morning I knew how I wanted to do it. So here you have a chalkboard inspired white Conte on black paper drawing of my interpretation.

Creative Prompt Week 2

Week #2's prompt was Crow or bird. I chose to tackle drawing a crow. I thought using charcoal as my drawing tool was appropriate to draw a black crow. For my support I chose a piece of pale veneer to work on. I really like how the subtle wood grain shows through and works with the drawing.

Creative Prompt Week 1

The creative prompt for week 1 was Umbrella.
My drawing reflected the weather conditions of the week, when the big wind storm blew through Vancouver.
It was done with soft pastels on black paper.

Personal Art Challenge

Hi from your derelict blogger,
It's September now, our beautiful, hot summer has succumbed to a damp and wet fall. Before the weather turned school supplies started hitting store shelves. Now, I never liked going back to school, but I love school supplies. The selection of pens in an array of colours, the clean pads of notepaper, and all the cool rulers, paperclips and other doodads that may or may not be useful. In alot of ways September is the beginning of a new year (a new school year, yes, but even for those of us not in school). This year as I was perusing the school supplies and sighing over the fact that I didn't have a reason to buy any, I got thinking. I decided that I should splurge on a few supplies for my art, and if I was going to do that I really should use them, and that might require a plan.
That brings us to the personal challenge part. Back in February, Opus Art Supplies facilitated a Daily Art Challenge. I didn't manage to go along with it, but I thought that if I took the prompts they provided that would give me a specific thing to work on when I sat down to create. I tweaked the challenge a bit more to suit me and the time that I can find to work on my art. I decided that my challenge will be to take one prompt a week to do and then to share it here. I think that will be doable but still enough of a challenge.
I officially chose to begin as the first week of September opened its pages. And so, last week I began.

Change is the Constant

The only thing in life you can be sure of is change.
 
For awhile baby and I had a good system going that allowed me to work on my art. He has grown and changed and become mobile and now that system doesn't seem to be working very well anymore.  Now I must adapt and change too. Unfortunaty I haven't quite managed to figure out a new routine that works yet. This weekend, however, I was just reminded, by family and church, of the importance of making room in my life to work on my art. As a result, I have made a resolution to find the time, even if it just in little chunks.

In the meantime, I haven't been completely neglectful. I had the chance to show a few of my recent pieces at the New West CRC re:Create art show and I currently have a new piece in progress (slow progress, yes, but at least it's something).

Momentum

Inspiration and Chain Smoking

No, I don't smoke, let alone chain smoke, but I am borrowing the idea as it applies to my art. I came across the term from the author, Austin Kleon whose work I follow. He describes the process of chain smoking as "instead of taking a break in between projects and worrying about what’s next, use the end of one project to light up the next one." By working in this way "you avoid stalling out in your career by never losing momentum." When I read that I thought it was a great term to describe the process.
This last series of paintings I have been working on is a perfect example of keeping the inspiration flowing and the pieces coming. While working on the first piece I had items that I wanted to use but that just didn't fit. That led to a bit of brainstorming and the beginnings of the second piece, after that I still had things (different ones) leftover. So I continued on to a third painting and now I have a fourth piece percolating (slight logistical stall- I need another support to work on before I can begin). I have quite happily been able to go quite far with just one small dose of inspiration. Hopefully I will be able to use this idea of chain smoking to my advantage and keep my creative momentum going.

 Detail of Piece #3

Wood Veneer Piece #2

Here is my second painting that was inspired by the wood veneer. But don't look too hard for a piece of veneer hidden somewhere in the painting. You won't find it. The veneer was simply the inspiration that got the creative juices flowing and the painting evolved and developed from that inspiration in a slightly different direction.

 Wooden Squirrel

30" x 48"

Found Objects and Mixed Media on Doorskin

 Detail #1 of Wooden Squirrel

 Detail #2 of Wooden Squirrel

I had so much fun making this painting that I started another one almost before I finished this one!