I forgot to do a sketch last week. Oops.
I used to be pretty good at freehand-drawing people back in my nekkid faerie days. But I’ve let myself get so reliant on reference images, these days I struggle to draw the human form without them. So one of my new art goals is to remember how to draw people completely from imagination.
My first attempt is kind of a scribble. Baby steps.
After Elizabeth and I broke camp Sunday morning we drove back to the public parking lot next to the gondola station. Our plan was to explore downtown Breckenridge on foot and then do some hiking up in the local mountains.
Breckenridge is a beautiful little town with an Old West Gold Rush aesthetic. Not in a dusty or faded or ghost-towny way, but fresh and colorful and vibrant. Elizabeth and I stepped into one charming little shop, bought a couple of pretty (and pricey) trinkets, and didn’t step into any more shops for fear of spending all of our money.
See that mountaintop in the next pic? That’s Peak 8, locally known as Imperial Peak, elevation 12,998′. A few hours after I snapped this pic, Elizabeth and I were standing on its summit.
Breckenridge is full of art, and parks, and parks full of art. Much of downtown is closed to car traffic now to make more room for pedestrians to socially distance.
We walked up Main St, and then returned to the parking lot via the Riverwalk Trail.
And then we climbed a mountain!
To be continued…
This week’s sketch is inspired by a scene I came across recently in a meadow. Something about the quality of the light and the way the deer blended so harmoniously into the grass made it all look like a watercolor. I’ve stepped outside my usual style a bit trying to capture the sense of peace and beauty.
I don’t think I’d ever seen a prairie dog in the wild before we moved to Colorado. They’re all over this area, you can see their little towns in undeveloped suburban fields and see them scampering next to roads. The kids and I took a drive through the Rocky Mountain Arsenal National Wildlife Refuge and parked on the side of the road to watch the lively little guys go about their prairie dog town business.
Back in May, the kids and I took an exploratory road trip to Colorado, in order to make a final decision about whether to move here and to decide which front-range city we preferred. While we were in Denver, up near Genesee Park, we saw a majestic herd of elk walking alongside the highway. A bit farther on, I stopped to let a big graceful doe amble across the road. I was enchanted by the idea of living in a city where elk wander freely amongst the humans.
Alas, I haven’t seen a single elk in the week and a half since we moved here. I suspect it was the Covid shutdown that had emboldened them to roam so near the city.
