in pencil and ink

I'm soon heading off to a part of the country I've never been to— but before I do, I thought I'd share some of the sketches from my recent adventure in Northeastern Turkey.
Stay tuned—there's still more to come!

naturhistorisches museum wien

I could have easily spent every hour of every day of my trip to Vienna sketching in the Naturhistorisches Museum. Oh what a marvellous place! If you need photographic proof of its wondrousness, click here.

summer in sketches, part one

Part one of my summer sketchbook:
Brussels, Kathmandu and Dhulikhel.

corazón

Sketching seems to have absorbed my hands and mind for the past year and a half, keeping me from using my imagination or drawing in a stream of consciousness, which I loved to do. I think it sort of unlocks parts of the brain and taps into something you can't find or use when drawing from life. It's drawing from a different side of life; an inner life unseen until it's on paper. A dear friend just gave me the most wonderful gift— two lovely sketchbooks that I have decided will be dedicated to the random and the unseen. Thank you, Lisa!

And away we go.

bye bye 2009!

These are all the sketchbooks I've filled in 2009— that's 928 pages front and back, full of scribbles and sketches— not including the work I've done in the International Moleskine Exchange! I wonder if I can beat that next year...

I'm not big on resolutions. I, like most people, rarely stick to them, and end up with that December guilt of never having reached the goals I had set for myself twelve months earlier. 2009 has been a year full of change— I moved halfway across the world, discovered a new career path, met all sorts of wonderful people, visited two cities I've always dreamed of seeing— Prague and Budapest— and I bought a fish from a fishmonger in Turkish.

So what do I have planned for 2010? I've decided to tackle this new year's goals in four ways: art, language, travel and sport. Regarding art, I will continue to work on my drawings and paintings, hopefully getting an exhibition and finishing the comic I've been working on. Language— I want to improve my Turkish. If I have time, I'd like to get back my German. In travel, I will spend a month volunteering in Kathmandu this summer, and I hope to make it to Barcelona and Athens or Oslo. Finally, sport: since I have found nowhere to trapeze in Istanbul, I will take up fencing.

As usual, I want to floss more regularly and read more. I'd love to take up the accordion, but with all the painting, travelling and fencing in Turkish I've got planned, I'm not sure if I can realistically fit it in. We'll see. It's a skill I've been longing to collect.

What are your plans for 2010?