GraveArt Blog

  Now, there is some of my work on ebay. After a year of finding all the reasons not to use ebay, I ended up with a store there anyway. The biggest reason I did not want a relation with them is the fees the site has in place. Yes, they do charge you a lot to sell an item. However, the other storefront venues have so many hidden fees and constant, in your face come-on to buy, upgrade.. more more more, that you are only giving them a bunch of your money, and you still need to do all the work. Turns out that ebay is not so bad after all. So, here is the first batch of artworks to go up over there.  A short on one of these pieces: My wife and I were on a hike high in the  Colorado mountains. I saw this one type of plant and it caught my attention. Without my camera, it became a game of trying to recall how the plant looked later on while sitting at my art table. I had only a blurred impression left in my mind. I drew this piece from that. I am sure the real plant...

  After leaving Twitter some years ago, I have got back in the game by opening a new account on BlueSky . Why create an account there? It seems to have a very receptive group of people without the baggage Twitter/X has. You might say... Much more fun. A cat drawing that was inspired by another piece I saw online at one time.

  4x6" Rabbit card : This is the time of year for rabbits. I lived in Ohio at one time. There is a town called Richfield that I used to visit in the fall. Every year, A friend and I would go to the Turkey-Shoot events held in that general area. No --- ! We did not shoot turkeys off fence posts 😀😀😀 If you are not from a place that has these events then, click here , and ( Richfield Ohio Amvets ) to read up on the fun you can have competing with others to win a Thanksgiving ham or Turkey among other things. It's yet another way to enjoy an activity on the weekend with the family.  This area also grew the best apples I've ever had. We would buy them by the big baskets in the fall. So, what does rabbits have to do with a turkey shoot? Not much. But, this time of year was when we would take our Beagle dog out in the fields and turn it loose. It loved to track rabbits. It never caught one, but that's not the point. These dogs are born to hunt.  Did you know that the femal...

(Tempered by time)      This ink and watercolor tree was made right after New Years Day. It was raining and put me in the mood for a sketch like this. I'll be glad when spring comes back. With all this central Texas rain, it will be an early and green spring.

(Rough old tree #2)        The crop is not so good, but I'm still getting used to this phone.  This is a 5x7 ink sketch on 140 lb watercolor paper.  It may get a color wash later, but haven't decided yet. Use the Contact page if you want to buy this as it is now, for 29.00, comes with Mat.

  (Sold)      This is one of the music sheets that was mentioned earlier. Thought I'd try a flower on this one.     (Sold)      The sheet above is painted with black ink, and a little moss green watercolor added.        (Sold)   (Sold)      A horn painted on a music sheet seems fitting. 

(Organics) (Sold)      A new series going on now. It's called Organics because of the methods I'm using. I don't know what it is, or what is up, down or sideways. You'll have to figure that out... and if you do, let me know.  

  (New Tools)        This is what happens when you get a new tool. I go thru these episodes of glorious exploration, only to toss it in a drawer after a couple of days, and only to find it again years later and do the same thing all over. Does it ever end? Anyway, this is s scribble sheet from playing around with two new/old brushes I have. At some point, I'll do some real work with the liner brush. I have an old Windsor Newton that has lost the fine line it once had. I've been searching for a new one, and discovered I already had it!

(Tree and vine) (Sold)      I've been slow posting new art here on this blog. Instagram has my attention for right now. That's because I'm still trying to get a handle on that app, and how to use their service. At any rate, the plan is to get some pieces up on my store soon, and make all these venues work together. Those works will be posted here as well when I do. For the most part they'll be ink and watercolor, with color pencil touches on a few. The tree above is in ink and some watercolor.

(studies of ink and watercolor)        These are small drawings from my sketchbook. They look a little better here than on Instagram. My phone is old, and the camera isn't all that. Got my eye on a Galaxy s3 note.

(Inker Moon) (sold)    This moon drawing was made with ink. I thought about adding color to it, but changed my mind... at least for now. I admit that it's ugly to my eyes. But... the very nice person that bought it really likes it ! I must adjust my view of things.

(Stackin' Heads) (Sold)   One of my glyph drawings. Ink and watercolor.

(Ink with watercolor) (watercolor)   From my art cache. Never know what I'll find in there. Things get painted and sketched, and go into the dark corners of the studio.

(Tree with watercolor)   Some kind of Conifer I suppose. The piece looks much better than the scan you see here. I really want a new scanner that can reproduce images as they are, maybe Christmas ???

(Cat eye, ink watercolor)   A sketch using ink and watercolor. I like dry-brush techniques while using watercolors for detail. The wet methods are better for suggestive work. You can also use both in the same painting. If you are using ink for your drawing, any watercolor technique works over the sketch, provided it's one of the waterproof inks, like ' India' . It should also be allowed to completely dry before paint is applied. If you use pencil, many wet and dry methods work well over light sketch marks. However; if you use dense pencil with shading, your work can become muddy from the loose graphite flowing thru your colors. To reduce this, I use a kneaded eraser to press down on the pencil strokes. This removes the loose graphite particles. Then use dry brush watercolor techniques. I try not to rub these areas too much with the brush. If the lines are over-worked, the graphite will lift and cause the muddy effect we want to avoid. Doing the above still may ...

(Bamboo)   Bamboo is green... most of the time. (Bird Banner)   This was a concept for a framed banner. I never used it though. (Scared Ghost)   Who wouldn't be scared of their own grave?

(Artist's Mask)   This piece went on my business card. It's not evil, as it looks. It's just that I like dark humor sometimes. Yet, I do have a boundaries for that. (Fence Post)    I like to do old things such as this, because it reminds me of my mom's work.

(Sold)  Merry Christmas to all...(oh, I forgot to be politically correct), "Seasons Greetings". I don't think anybody likes this drawing except my good friend Liz. So I made her a Christmas card of the grumpy ole' pyro-snowman. She understands my twisted view of life/dark humor.

(old man Froginstein)    Ink drawing from a sketchbook. I may do a watercolor wash over this? There's a story to go along with this character, you can read it here: "Not in my back yard" .

 (Frazzle Bird 2)     "I know there must be some way to get in that house".