Recent commissioned drawing. 20″x 30″. Charcoal and pastel on toned paper.
Recent Commissioned Drawing of a Couple on Their Wedding Day
Tag: heidi rounds
Video – Young Girl Portrait Drawing – Charcoal/Pastel Pencil on Toned Paper
Black and white charcoal/pastel drawing on toned charcoal paper. Drawn on dark gray Canson Mi-Teintes charcoal paper. Time-lapse drawing video. Forward facing portrait drawing.
Video-3/4 View Eye Study
@heidi_rounds_art Black and white charcoal drawing on toned paper. 3/4 view eye study. #drawing #charcoaldrawing #pencilart #pencildrawing #portraitart #portraitdrawing #eyedrawing #heidirounds ♬ Drake style/HIPHOP beat(1491552) – Burning Man
Black and white charcoal drawing on toned paper. 3/4 view eye study.
Opening Reception – Mini Date, Food and Fun?
Tomorrow night is the opening reception at the Own an Original Art Exhibition in Littleton, CO. The recent drawing I completed (shown below) will be exhibited at the show. Yay and ugh!
Show openings are a perfect excuse for my husband and I to get out of the house without kids for a few hours. This would be even more amazing if we had even a little bit of time once we got to ANY opening. There is, no fail, always something else planned on those evenings. This year? Our daughters choir concert at 6:30 pm. Show opens at 5:30 pm. Half hour drive to get to the school. See the problem? If we’re lucky we’ll have a half hour to peruse the gallery and shove in as many hors d’oeuvres and wine (okay, let’s be honest – lemonade) into our guts as we can hold.
With both my husband and I being artists, you would think at openings we would be “those people” slowly passing between the pieces of art and meticulously gazing at each piece in a desperate attempt to figure out the ‘true meaning’ . Instead, we quickly walk the show and very judgmentally talk about everyone else. We crack jokes and laugh too loud, but try very hard to behave and keep up with the small talk that takes place. Sounding smart is hard for me. If someone asks what materials I used or where I got my inspiration I generally draw a blank and stare at them like I’ve just had a mini-stroke. I try to avoid this problem by repeating the brand of pencils and paper I use on my way to each show. Doesn’t matter. I still make a fool of myself and get laughed at by my husband and God knows who else.
After our short critique and observations, we generally hunker down near my piece and try to eves-drop on what people are saying. We’re like the background actors in a commercial that are pretending to be involved in a very serious conversation but are actually making no sound. We look stupid and don’t care. Well, my husband might care, but he’s nice and doesn’t say anything. I love hearing what people think of my drawings. I love watching their faces when they see it for the first time. The best comments? “How did she do that?” There is no better compliment.
Of all the things I do with my art, shows are my favorite. I love the competition. I love submitting work and waiting to hear if I got in. Below is an image of the first drawing I submitted to a juried show. It was 2009. It’s an pen & ink drawing that was drawn with live models in a open figure class. I drew it in about 20 minutes and never thought about it again. My husband saw it in my portfolio and said he love it. So, that was that. I submitted and got in. I was so nervous about strangers looking at something I had done. I remember driving to the show and wanting to throw up. I am very insecure about my work and it’s hard for me to find satisfaction in anything I have ever painted or drawn. I have learned through the years that most people don’t see what I see. They don’t see the chin that is too low or the eye that’s slanted a little to the left. It’s now become a pleasure to have my work represented at exhibits and I am more than happy to be a part of something that has such amazing artists showing amazing work.
If you’d like to join us tomorrow night, we would love to see you during the three seconds we’ll be there. You’ll find me near the dessert table. Cheers!
Special – 25% Off All Portrait or Custom Art
Happy Summer! From now until August 1st I am offering 25% off any portrait or custom artwork. Please contact me and we can work together to create a piece of art customized for you or your loved one. This is a quick promotion so if you’ve had something in mind don’t hesitate to contact me. As always, free freight will be included in the Continental US. Please visit my ordering/pricing page for information on how to start.
Pablo Picasso – Genius or Arrogant Asshole?
I recently heard a story about Pablo Picasso that has me thinking. The story goes that Picasso, in his eighties at the time, was drinking at a bar in Paris when a woman recognized him and asked if he would sketch something for her on a napkin. He obliged and did a quick sketch (perhaps similar to the one shown below). She was very excited but instead of him handing it back when he was done, he apparently tried to charge her a couple thousand dollars. When she objected and said it only took a moment to sketch, he replied “No, it took me forty years.”
What!? Okay, okay, I get it. He’s world famous. Everyone thinks he’s the shiz. He spent decades mastering his craft. He wouldn’t be where he was in his career without those forty years of work and practice. But really? Could he sound like a bigger dick? Speaking of dick, one of Picasso’s most famous works depicts a woman with a dick on her face. Seriously! A dick on her face. See below.
Now, you may feel that I don’t have a right to talk shit about a “Master Painter”. I probably don’t. Since I can remember, I was told that Picasso was a genius. He broke the boundaries. You can’t go through an Art History or Art Appreciation class without getting more than your fill of all things Picasso. I have yet to be convinced. I tried. I really did.
I relate this same feeling to being a little girl and my mom serving me liver and onions. I would cry and say I didn’t like it and refuse to eat it. She would tell me that if I put ketchup on it, I would never know that it was liver and it would taste good. Now I’m telling you, ketchup or no ketchup. It tasted like shit. You get where I’m going with this…
Picasso was a master. He put ketchup on the world of shitty art and made it taste good to his audience. Kudos to him. However, I can’t bear the thought that he was so conceited to try to charge a woman in a bar an exorbitant amount of money for something so simple. Yes, yes. She probably would have turned around and sold it for a large profit and Picasso was no fool. He would have been aware of this. So, if this story is true, why not just say “no” to this poor woman. Did you want to get her hopes up only to make a fool of her? I have made up my mind.
Pablo Picasso was an asshole.
I would love to hear your thoughts on this matter, but please don’t try to convince me otherwise.
Thank you.
Portrait Drawings – 25% off Holiday Special
With the holidays around the corner, I am offering all clients 25% off list price on any portrait size until December 16th. Please visit my ordering/pricing page to get started. Make sure and mention this ad.
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Self Portrait Complete – Minus the nose hairs
“The First Twenty”
The Pain of Creativity
“The pain of creativity is ingrained and never far from the artists consciousness.” – Leonard Everett Fisher
I wrote this quote in my sketchbook in 1992. I was a junior in high school and having problems coming up with ideas in my Studio Art class. Nearly 25 years later, I am having the same problems I had when I was seventeen, hot and still firm.
As I have stayed busy with commissioned work which I am more than grateful for, I have deadlines fast approaching for juried shows I am interested in being a part of. I work well under pressure, but am racking my brains trying to think of what to do this year. I feel like creativity is either something you have or you don’t. It’s like a sense of humor. You can’t bullshit being funny. Everyone sees right through it. I have accepted that I am not a creative person. I have lived in jeans and tank tops since I was a teenager. Same hair. Same makeup. Same style of music. Same food. I try to be creative in the way I dress or the way I do my hair. When I make attempts to change, I look like an idiot. It’s not me. The same is happening in the creative side of my artwork.
I try to set myself up so that I can clear my mind and focus. I love walking and being in nature. I love big sky and clean air. I love the sun and rain and all things outdoors. I never have as much of this as I need.
Last week I had my daughter home for three days with a stomach flu. Made for a very unaccomplished week. Yesterday, our family packed up to spend a day in the mountains. Our picnic and all things needed for a day out were ready to go. As we were getting in the car to leave, my daughters nose started to bleed. No big deal. We went inside to wait for it to stop. We waited, and waited, and waited. It didn’t stop bleeding. As I have gotten older, I have developed a strong phobia to blood pouring from my children, and this wasn’t a normal nose bleed. It was out of a horror movie. I tried to stay away so I wouldn’t pass out but my husband left me to go to the bathroom – convenient. I did everything I could think of, but the faucet of blood pouring from her nose made us soon realize that she would bleed to death if we didn’t do something. We gathered the family and instead of our day in sun with quiet and clean air, we spent the next 4 hours in the ER while my poor daughter was clamped, cleaned and bleeding all over herself and everyone else in a tiny, depressing room. Needless to say, she made it out just fine, but feeling like complete shit, we spent the rest of the day at home.
Glad for the thought that tomorrow is a new I day, I went to bed last night grateful for time I would have today to walk, get some sun, clear my mind and draw. My daughters stomach flu from last week had a different idea. My son has been throwing up since 1 am. He is laying in a lump next to me in a chair moaning and groaning. No serenity here. My poor kids.
The reason I wasted everyone’s time writing about this is because I feel like I would only ever be able to find and be in touch with my creative side if I built a shack somewhere deep in a forest where I lived off the land and had no contact with anyone. Being creative for me is like trying to think of how a song goes when there is another song playing in the background. There’s always a song playing in the background. Hmm… what to do… what to do…