West coast

Started a doodle that turned into this speculative drawing: how would west coast First Nation draw an elephant?

Book for Anna

I am almost finished this; I was advised to waterproof it ( it is water colours) and unfortunately, that has caused some of the colours to run,etc.

I am also not happy with the painting, but next one will be better.

The book is bound using the coptic binding technique so that the book will more or less lay flat. However, because of the small size and thick paper, it is a struggle. It will work better with a larger format.

Here are scans of the book pages. The finished size is 2 X 3 inches

Back after long time

I have challenged myself to do more blogging of drawing which, I hope, will force me to do more drawing!..... I'm still struggling with 'drawing block'. However, I am just finishing up a project for my granddaughter Anna. She loves books, loves small books, and loves owls. I've tried to combine all of that into a book I've written for her and illustrated, it is called "Hanna Looks for Books". Of course, Hanna is an owl.

Stay tuned; once I have bound it, I will post the results such as they are.

In the meantime, here is a drawing that Anna did of me; she whipped this off in about 15 seconds; she does have great hand-eye coordination; she routinely draws a circle very quickly and comes back to her starting point with minimum overlap.

She was careful to point out my eyes, moustache and smile.


Many art instruction books try to get adults back to being a child , who are not self-conscious or self-critical and draw spontaneously. One author recalled explaining to a 4 year old that her job was an art teacher at school, and the 4 year old said "You mean they forget how?"

I will take inspiration from Anna....