Greetings from the Metro

Two from my trip downtown this morning.

60 and 90 second gesture sketches

The point of these is to quickly capture movement or flow within a figure.  I do them on newsprint with china marker, limiting myself to 10, 30, 60 or 90 seconds per figure.  No erasing, no thinking really, and usually the only person who ever sees them is me.

Metro - Conversation about Contemporary Chinese Portrait Artists

"Silence is so Accurate"

I skipped out of work this afternoon to check out the Rothko exhibit "In the Tower," which ends tomorrow.  http://www.nga.gov/exhibitions/rothkotowerinfo.shtm
I went at around 3:30pm in the hopes that as few people would be there as possible, and it worked out pretty well.  For a few brief minutes I was the only one in the room with nine of his canvases that he did in 1964. 

Civil War Nurses Memorial

This is a sketch I was working on this summer of one of the statues on the Civil War Nurses Memorial, which is in DC near my office.  It was "Erected by the Ladies Auxiliary to the Ancient Order of  Hibernians of America" in "A.D. 1924," so there you have it.  I worked on this at around noon over the course of a couple of lunch hours, but never finished it.  Now the sun is in a different place, so the shadows are too, so I'll have to wait until next summer when the sun is back in the correct place to finish it.  On second thought, its done.

Words to Live By

I don't want to sell anything, buy anything, or process anything as a career. I don't want to sell anything bought or processed, or buy anything sold or processed, or process anything sold, bought, or processed, or repair anything sold, bought, or processed. You know, as a career, I don't want to do that.

- Lloyd Dobler

Leonidas

The King with half the East at heel is marched from land of morning;
Their fighters drink the rivers up, their shafts benight the air.
And he that stands will die for nought, and home there's no returning.
The Spartans on the sea-wet rock sat down and combed their hair.