day at the museum

Back in Rabat, the beautiful Musée Mohammed VI Art Moderne & Contemporain is holding an exhibition of work by Spanish artists from the time of Goya until the present day. Here are some of my favourites, followed by Baby's:



We are grateful that the museum is so child-friendly— our nerves about taking an infant to see the work finally settled when the smiles kept coming from the gallery guards. Baby loved the bright colours and contrast of some pieces, and we hope that more experiences like this will build a future appreciation for art!



Francisco de Goya. Miguel Fernandez Durán, marquis de Tolosa. 1787. Oil on canvas. 
Joaquín Sorolla y Bastida. José Echegaray. 1905. Oil on canvas. 
Ignacio Zuloaga. Alejandro Fernández de Araoz. 1936. Charcoal and chalk on canvas. 
Rafael Canogar. Untitled. 1973. Silkscreen on paper. 
Rafael Canogar. Estudio para un monumento. 1972. Lithograph on paper. 
Equipo Crónica. El constructor. 1971. Silkscreen on paper.
Equipo Crónica. Guernica. 1971. Silkscreen on paper.
Equipo Crónica. La pincelada con Felipe. 1971. Silkscreen on paper.
Equipo Crónica. Interior de Las meninas. 1971-1972. Silkscreen on paper.
Equipo Crónica. Composición. 1971. Silkscreen on paper.
Ferrán García Sevilla. Poligon 32. 1988. Acrylic on canvas.
Ignasi Aballí. Serie Biografias. 2001. Oil, acrylic, tempera, and vinyl on canvas.

carnettistes

I couldn't think of a better place to be during these strange and sad times, than among people who see the beauty in this world, who are willing to share their stories. I was so inspired by the amount of hard work and skill that was exhibited, and really touched by the warmth I received from both visitors and artists. 



Solune (two above) was one of the first carnettistes I met, who travels the world recording sounds and music, which he then mixes into rich soundscapes— and Kazuya Morimoto (above), who came all the way from New York for the Rendez-vous, quickly became a friend.

It was a lovely reunion with Miguel Herranz (below) and Lapin (not pictured), whom I'd both met on a trip to Barcelona back in 2010— and though I have known Simo Capecchi, Luis Ruiz, and Swasky (not pictured) for ages from Urban Sketchers, this was the first time we'd met in person.



Then there was Santi (above), a beautiful sketcher and life of the party. How lucky I am to have met so many wonderful people! A big, heartfelt thank you to the Rendez-vous.

then, they came

Since it was my first time exhibiting at the Rendez-vous, I had no idea of what to expect, and judging by the queue of visitors that had already formed at the entrance to the Polydôme on Friday morning, I knew this experience was going to exceed anything I could have imagined. After sliding my sketchbooks into their case and making some last minute adjustments to the display, I swung by Solune's stand to say hello, and headed to the coffee bar for a cup.

Then they came.



I don't know how many people I met, or how many portraits I drew on the fly— something that initially made me nervous to have so many eyes on me as I scribbled on sketchbooks and loose leafs of paper. My throat was dry, my cheeks hurt from all the smiling, and I became acutely aware of the different muscles used around the lips when speaking French— or at least trying to. Thank you to all you kind souls who patiently put up with my mangled version of your language!

If any of you happen read this, know that I had such a good time talking to each and every one of you. I enjoyed hearing about your trips to Turkey, your thoughts on art, and I loved drawing you. To the two girls whom I did not manage to capture in pencil so well, if you see this, write to me, and I will replace that sketch with a better one. To the young man pictured on the right below, I realise now that you were waiting to be drawn, and that you were too polite to tell those teenage girls that you were first. Write me, and I will draw you that portrait.

What fun!

setting up

I don't want to talk about Paris. I don't want to talk about Beirut. I don't want to talk about terrible things and terrible people, and death and pain and fear—the media does a great job of that already. What I want to talk about is life and love, and all the wonderful things that exist in the world— kindness, friendship, empathy. I firmly believe that in spite of all the horrors, the world is still a beautiful place, and that the vast majority of people are good. We have to be louder than the anger and the violence, we have to remind ourselves and the people around us that this world is ours, and we will carry on.

So I'm going to talk about the 16th Rendez-vous du Carnet de Voyage in Clermont-Ferrand, one of the most incredible experiences in my life. I didn't know what to expect when I arrived at the Polydôme on Thursday evening to set up my stand— the place was already abuzz with activity as the carnettistes were unwrapping framed art, hanging their colourful backdrops and posters, and searching for hooks.



These are the things I learned from the lead-up to the event:

• Air France charges for all checked bags, but are supportive of artists with long tubes of drawings
• you can do a lot with a few chains, S-hooks, and binder clips
• burlap is amazing
• carnettistes have the best stories!

le rendez-vous

I've fallen behind on blogging, I know. Moving to a new country and starting a new job is really... time consuming. It's wonderful and frustrating, exciting and challenging. I love Morocco so far, but it sure is taking time to settle in— I had forgotten what it feels like to be new to a place. I seem to have gotten into some kind of rhythm with my students, I've got an art store, some favourite hanouts for veggies, and I have a nut guy. This man is truly a master at roasting nuts.

So the big news of late is that I'm participating in the 16th Rendez-vous du Carnet de Voyage in Clermont-Ferrand this weekend! It's a wonderful feeling to be one of the carnettistes at the event, showing my Anatolian and Nepali sketches among some of the finest travel books I've seen. Photos will soon follow, but first, my hotel has a bathtub. It has been a long, long time since I've had a tub available to me, and I plan to take full advantage of it.

Here's the trailer for the Rendez-vous— enjoy!

dear vincent

A lot has changed in twenty-one years, but one thing has remained ever constant— my love for Vincent Van Gogh. I still remember that day as though it were this moment, and though the little details of insignificant things have long since vanished, I remember with great clarity looking upon The Potato Eaters for the very first time. I remember the burnt umber, the brushstrokes, the face of the woman who I needed to sketch into my book beside the ticket stub. I remember the display of canvases that had been painted on both sides, I remember the vivid yellow of the sunflowers.

The night before Pedro and I visited the Van Gogh Museum, I couldn't sleep from the pounding in my chest. The excitement of a reunion was too much, and I wondered what I would feel when enveloped in all those colours and thick paint. I wanted to rush my breakfast, and hit the streets in a sprint.

We arrived just before 9:00 am, and there was already a long line winding outside the entrance to the museum. Anticipating this, I had bought our tickets online to avoid the queue, and when the doors finally opened, joy!



We were the second people to enter the Munch : Van Gogh exhibit that day— this for some reason, gave me tremendous satisfaction. Though I was so very thrilled to see the work of two great artists displayed side-by-side in such an elegant and thoughtful way (truly, the Van Gogh Museum is unparalleled), I was only really there for one thing— one person.



This is my pilgrimage; his palette and letters holy relics, and his artwork, oh his artwork! There is nothing like his artwork. Nothing like the dappled forest floors or weathered faces, or the invisible wind that shakes leaves and wheat— Naples yellow, ultramarine, ochre— nothing. I imagine the movement of his hands, the way he stood, the way he saw. I peer into each painting, my eyes getting wet.



And then, there it was, so much smaller than I remembered it— that wheat field. It had swallowed me whole and I got lost in all the movement. At fifteen, it was the most beautiful thing I had ever seen in my life, and at thirty-six, I was still overcome. The memory of that day and this has entwined into something so marvellous.



So my dear Vincent, thank you.
Thank you for giving us all that such an eccentric has in his heart.

All photos were taken at the Van Gogh Museum in Amsterdam.

more sketches of anatolia

From the giant heads of Mount Nemrut, to the Mesopotamian plains of Mardin.

sketches of anatolia

And at last, here are some of the sketches from my adventure on The Great Anatolian Road Trip this summer, which were shared at the Carnets de Voyages exhibition in Toulouse. These drawings take you from Mevlana's final resting place in Konya to the ongoing archaeological dig at Çatalhöyük— from the quiet hills of Akseki, to Gaziantep's sun-bleached pistachio orchards.

vernissage

And suddenly, it came— those thousands of dots of ink, the lines frantically scratched with pencil under a cloud of tear gas, the washes of colour laid onto paper in the heat of a Mesopotamian sun— the opening night of the Carnets de Voyages exhibition. I was overwhelmed by a funny mix of joy, excitement, nerves, and disbelief. The crowd came in, and I struggled to find the words to explain my drawings, but fortunately I was introduced to a lovely translator who freed me from jumbling everything up with my clumsy French.

You can see my ink drawings on the walls above, with both my sketchbooks and Pedro's in the plexiglass cases on the tables below. There was even an iPad rigged to one of the tables for swiping through our books...



And how wonderful to show our sketches beside the beautiful work of Christophe Pons, Frédéric Rudant, and Maya Andersson:



The last three photos were taken by Pierre— merci Pierre.
Et merci Martine!