GRUBuation

Amidst multi-colored batik banners under a canvas tent, Garden Raised bounty (GRUB) held it’s annual “Grubuation” honoring students for their social, scholarly and agricultural accomplishments. The class, a diverse collection of students representing various high schools in Thurston County told their stories of their year-long learning 

GRUB is a garden-based non-profit that fosters several programs related to growing healthy food. You can read more about the event on my personal blog.

Old Stove

We rode our bikes from North Seattle to the Howard Hanson Dam on Green River, near Enumclaw. I intentionally left my sketchbook and pens at home, thinking I'd take a break from my compulsive sketching, but this morning I found some scratch paper and a ballpoint pen on the old cabin shelves.

Vacation with a twist

Our vacation started at the annual state Audubon campout at Wenas "up canyon" from Selah where it was hot and dusty on mixed use DNR land with campers, horse campers and ATV riders.

Then we drove the International Selkirk Loop from NE Washington, through the Idaho Panhandle and up into BC.  All my trip sketches are done real time in the field recording what I see and hear.

Vacation ended abruptly with a medical emergency.  Thanks to my son, I used my sketchbook to find the silver lining in this crisis. I sketched what I saw and felt and found some humor and a happy ending (no pun intended).

Portal to another summer adventure...

Wow...two weeks from this moment, I'll be wedged into a coach seat on a plane...heading to Rome.

With the Civita Institute's Astra Zarina fellowship, I'll be spending 2 months in the teeny Etruscan/Roman/Medieval/Renaissance (and it pretty much stops there) hill town of Civita di Bagnoregio ITALY, literally following the footsteps of other Seattle sketchers like Anita Lehmann and Dave Boyd who were there last summer.  The project:  to create an illustrated walking guide to the town, as tons of tourists show up and quickly walk from one end to the other, never knowing that they are in a really amazing, historic place.

I'll also be teaching the second annual DRAW CIVITA-- 5 day sketching workshop in July (and yes, there will be a DRAW CIVITA 2015)...
 http://www.stephaniebower.com/DRAW_CIVITA_2014Info.pdf  as well as joining the Urban Sketchers in Rome for sketchcrawls.  It will be great to see the Good Bones 2 sketchers Ben and Francesca who work for Rick Steves and are based in Rome--they are really good, brand new sketchers!  The plan is to also visit a few of the gardens that predate those I studied in France last year, the Villa Lante and Villa d'Este...lots of perspective there...

Then in late August, I'll board a plane again to join the Urban Sketchers community at the symposium in Brazil to teach a workshop called "180 Degrees", which will include lots of how-to information on basic perspective. I love these wide angle views, as they really put you in the space!  And if Paraty is anything like Barcelona last year, it will be amazing--so very, very well organized, an incredibly fun opportunity for any and all sketchers.

Look for a few posts to the Seattle Urban Sketchers blog, but if you are interested in following the daily posts, go to:
blog: www.stephaniebower.blogspot.com
flickr:  https://www.flickr.com/photos/83075812@N07/
or through Google+ (and I have no idea how to post a link to that site...)

It appears that lightening can strike the same place twice, I am so very, very grateful for these utterly amazing opportunities and adventures. My gosh, it honestly seems too good to be true.

180 degree view of Civita's Piazza in front of the Chiesa San Donato 2013

180 degree view of the Interior of Civita's Chiesa San Donato 2013

Walking through this portal into Civita is like entering a time machine,
as it throws you back many hundreds of years...and a
spell comes over you. It is such an amazing ancient place, perched
like an island high above the valley below.

Radish season!

Piles and piles of radishes stack the stands at the Olympia Farmer's Market. I sketched these, organic Easter egg radishes, at the Calliope Farms stand. The proprietor, Jacob Wilson, told me about his farm near Evergreen where he and Megan Marina tend "about six acres of cultivated ground, pasture, greenhouses, orchard and nettle patch."  Check them out to add a little colorful spice to your palate. 

Beware of the Lavender

I saw that the tide had made the Cruise Ship taller than usual so I went up the street to the P Patch for this vantage point.   While walking in I saw a couple of Rats running about.  The lavender bushes were shaking from all sorts of rodent activity.

Ignorance is Bliss

6/5/14 Buskers at Queen Anne Farmers Market

The ukulele player wearing a Hawaiian shirt, a thin waxed mustache and a tiny ponytail is colorful enough, and I’ve sketched him at farmers markets more than once. But yesterday at Queen Anne Farmers Market, his co-busker stole the show, at least in terms of attire: A tuba player in a top hat, large earrings and a kilt. I regret that my sketch doesn’t capture the best part of his outfit: On his feet were the kind of running shoes with individual toes. Together they performed jazz standards in the warm afternoon sunshine at my first farmers market of the season. As I sketched them, I felt I had endured eight months of rain and cold for that moment. I had earned such bliss.

Little did I know that on the other side of Queen Anne Hill, maybe only a mile or two away, a gunman had opened fire inside Seattle Pacific University, killing one student and injuring others. I would learn about the incident in the car on the way home, a trip that took three times longer than it should have because a major thoroughfare had to be closed due to yet another crazy, senseless act of violence on an otherwise beautiful day.

But for the moment, I was basking in sheer pleasure: The beginning of summer with my sketchbook, my bag heavy with the weight of local strawberries.

Just One More Power Pole

Revisiting Columbia City

Last Monday, the day after my wet sketching at Folklife, I meandered over to Columbia City,  plunked myself on a stool and made another attempt at the center of Columbia City. I really had to stick with it to come to any point of satisfaction. And here's a record of the day-- two sketches from the same vantage point.

I worked this one with color, since that's what attracted me to the scene.

This black and white is another attempt at twig drawing. Mastery is a ways away.

University of Idaho Graduation

I was unable to attend this month's sketch outing because I was attending my brother's graduation from the University of Idaho. Fortunately, the University of Idaho is located in the middle of the Palouse hills and features a wonderful selection of historic buildings.

 Kiva theater on the University of Idaho quad.

 University of Idaho Administration Building

 University of Idaho Arboretum

 Undergraduates receiving their diplomas

 Inside the Kibbie Dome before graduation

  Last weekend, I also ended up at Folklife. I particularly enjoyed sketching the international fountain and all of the people enjoying it.

43rd Annual Northwest

I love Folklife. It's such a colorful and culturally diverse event. I managed to pick the weekend's rainiest day, Sunday, to get there. As I sat for my first sketch I figured out I needed to find a covered space and surprisingly there are plenty of them in Seattle Center --trees, outcropping roofs, covered walkways. Had I not forgotten my extra layer I would have stuck around and watched my hometown heros - Samba Olywa.

I've been wanting to try twig-sketching for a while and finally got my materials gathered, a good sized twig (or in my case a bamboo shaft), Chinese ink and some decently absorbant paper. It's not an easy tool; the pen dries quickly. I persisted and will keep experimenting. I like the rough quality and variable line quality. 

Rain City Burgers, Roosevelt and 65th, Seattle.

Folklife Festival 2014

We went on the last day and really lucked out with the weather. Here are some of my sketches.

 Almost all of these hats where from one venue.  It's almost like the Kentucky Derby and it's focus on Fancy Hats.

Pioneer Square, Seattle.

Old Volvo

I've noticed this nice older Volvo Wagon in my neighborhood 

and was sad to see that it got clobbered by another car.   

Slowly but surely it is being repaired by its owner

.  

NW Folklife festival

I haven't attended a Folklife Festival since the early 90's, but the Ad Hoc group of Sketchers planned to meet there so I joined them on what became a very pleasant, partly sunny Friday afternoon.  Adding to the pleasure of sketching outside was the nice mix of live music.
Before I did this watercolor, I indulged in my love of trees, and pencil sketching.  These graceful deodar cedars were in a small grove just outside the west-facing door of the Armory Building.  Strange how often I've walked around the Seattle Center, and NOT noticed these trees.