In the Chinese Zodiac, this is the Year of the Rabbit, beginning on January 22, 2023. The Rabbit embodies a quiet kindness with a strong and confident personality. Those born under this sign are said to be gentle and compassionate, with artistic sensibilities and steadfastness toward achieving their goals. Famous people born in the Year of the Ox include Julius Caesar, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Albert Einstein, George Orwell, Orson Welles, Frank Sinatra, Bing Crosby, and Bob Hope. Kung Hee Fat Choy ..read more

Best wishes for a peaceful, joyous, and productive 2023 ..read more

In the Chinese Zodiac, this is the Year of the Tiger, beginning on February 1, 2022. The Tiger is an animal valued for its courage, boldness, and confidence. Those born under this sign are said to be ambitious, optimistic, and enthusiastic by nature and possess strong self-esteem and high energy, especially at work. Some say tigers can also be stubborn and brash. Famous people born in the Year of the Ox include Marilyn Monroe, Fidel Castro, Jonas Salk, Ansel Adams, Lady Gaga, and Stevie Wonder. Kung Hee Fat Choy ..read more

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As some may have noticed, the time between postings has grown lately. While the cooler, wetter weather discourages me from going out to draw, I also need time to work on two book revisions. And so I will be taking a break from posting for a while, leaving you with this ink sketch I did of a bicyclist relaxing on The Mall in DC in 1973 ..read more

The Northgate Extension added three new stations to Sound Transit’s Link Light Rail system—the underground U-District and Roosevelt stations as well as an elevated station at Northgate, where the Seattle Urban Sketchers met this past Sunday. It was a cold, breezy day with rain showers and so I chose this view looking south from under a covered entrance to the station. The Northgate station is located near a park-and-ride, has frequent bus connections to the greater Seattle region, and is connected via a bicycle/pedestrian bridge across I-5 to the North Seattle College campus to the west. It a ..read more

Above is a site plan for the INA–Casa Tiburtino project in Rome, designed by Mario Ridolfi & Ludovico Quaroni in the 1950s. It shows how one can think with a free hand holding a pen or pencil while exploring possibilities, looking at alternatives, working out problems, even doodling on a sheet of paper. Below is another, more personal example of similarly exploring design alternatives, by hand, on paper ..read more

A few two-page spreads of the small sketchbook I am using while teaching a short-term course on drawing on location at the UW. Quick sketches, freely drawn, to illustrate selecting viewpoints, outlining process, roughing out structure, gauging proportion, and establishing scale ..read more

Almost all drawing is memory drawing—drawing from memory. Even when drawing on location, as soon as we turn our gaze from the subject of our drawing to the page, we rely on our visual memory of what we have seen to be able to project this image onto the page and to draw it. Nurturing this ability to see, scan, visualize, project, and draw takes time and practice. But once we are comfortable with the process, drawing from observation will become that much more fluid ..read more

Before the advent of computer graphics, meeting lines deliberately at a corner had long been a maxim in the manual drafting of architectural and engineering documents. This may appear to be a minor detail, but in freehand drawing—from direct observation—how lines meet, or not meet, can convey much about the nature of the forms we are capturing. Take, for example, the drawings above, where meeting lines at corners can convey a crispness of planes and edges of volumes. On the other hand, not meeting lines can convey the softness of curves and curvilinear forms, as in the sculpted nature of a ..read more