Charcoal Drawing: Pulag Portraits

Oh blog, I'm sorry if I haven't updated you enough this past month! I was busy having fun that I haven't had time to write about it!

The Cordillera had beckoned me twice this month--to Baguio and Mt. Pulag in Benguet in early and mid Feb respectively. The chill weather is always a welcome change from hot and humid Manila and I'm happy to have spent some quality time with friends and family during these trips. 

At the start of 2014, I included climbing Mt. Pulag to this year's bucket list. The opportunity came up in early February when my cousin from New York visited Manila to spend his 30th birthday in the homeland. We planned to go to Mt. Pulag on the weekend of Feb 15-16 and I am proud to say I conquered one of the tallest mountains in the Philippines! It was a real challenge dealing with the shivers and the fact that we didn't have a proper tent or toilet, but it was really fun bonding with my cousins and seeing the sea of clouds at the summit. More stories in the next post on Mt. Pulag, coz I want to share a bunch of practice drawings using my bright and shiny woodless charcoal pencils given to me by my sister as a gift!

My subjects were these adorable kids hanging out at the Ranger Station in Mt. Pulag. They were staying in an area near the station where climbers can sign up and ask help from porters to carry their bags. I found it weird that some people (even guys) would go hiking and hire someone else to carry their packs then claim that they "conquered the mountains".  I mean, if you can't carry heavy stuff, then learn how to pack light! That's the whole point of camping and going up the mountains, right? I tried to look at the bright side and thought of it as additional livelihood for the locals, but I didn't find the whole thing very cool.

Anyway, back to the kids! They had a distinct look about them that gave away the fact that they were locals in the area. I'm not certain if they were Ibaloys or Kalanguya, but they had very beautiful faces--chinky eyes and flat noses and really rosy cheeks! The kids were adorable and I tried to get to know them for a while before doing our assault to Camp 2. 

I met Gerilyn, Grace and I think the other one is Geraldine (not in drawing). They're cousins. I wasn't able to catch the little boy's name though, but I figured he was related to either of the two girls. They smiled sheepishly at me when they realized I was trying to strike a conversation. Before I knew it, it was time for me to join my group and hike for the next 4 hours, so I excused myself from my new acquaintances and waved goodbye.

Since I was never trained at drawing, I never really had a real method in portraiture that I was fully aware of. Even today, I just basically sketch and draw what I see without being conscious of the light source and the shadows that inevitably came with it. While my weapon of choice has always been ink and watercolor, I decided to go back to basic graphite and charcoal to exercise my understanding of values and tones. As I tried to re-acquaint myself with the medium, I kept my lines light and loose until I got a bit of definition in the drawing. I still find it very difficult to draw the creases on  clothing, people's hands and lips. I can't seem to create a decent likeness to my subjects, which is kinda hella frustrating. :\

I had a bit lot of trouble with Gerilyn (the whispering girl donning a beanie). Her hands still look weird and I couldn't quite capture her expression in the drawing. Good thing these sketches were done on 8x5 index cards for practice, since I can't seem to find a proper sit down time these days for larger scale illustrations. It's my guilt free use of paper for practice!

Anyway, I'm determined to practice figure drawing more so that I can get rid of those awful proportions. Those hands are quite an eyesore, but this is my blog and I have no shame. Haha.

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#YolandaPh

Over the past three days, I've been receiving emails from my colleagues in different countries, asking how my family is and how badly affected I am by the storm. I'm really thankful that Manila was spared, but I didn't realize how bad the damage was until I tuned into CNN on Sunday evening. Apart from the loss of power in B.F. on Friday evening, no damage has been done. I was on weekend mode, doing arts and crafts with my cousins and working on a promo material for the cupcake business on Sunday. After the news had sunk in, I was feeling restless on Monday because I had to go to the office and felt quite guilty that I was breezing through with the same conveniences and privileges of everyday life, while others are going through the worst time of theirs. But guilt won't make things better. The most immediate help that we can provide if we cannot be physically present in repacking goods is monetary assistance. I was spreading links to my onshore counterparts on how they can donate online. For us here in Manila, the easiest way to donate is through SMS. At this day and age, everyone has a cellphone after all. 

You can donate to the Philippine Red Cross through text.

Type in RED and send to:

4143 for SMART

2899 for GLOBE

You can donate the following denominations:

Globe: 5, 25, 100, 300, 500 or 1000

Smart: 10, 25, 50, 100, 300, 500 or 1000

Other ways to help:

  1.     In-Kind Donations

Donations can be dropped off in Accenture offices in Manila and Cebu. Please see the Accenture offices below. If you happen to be in this area, you can drop off your donations to these offices. 

Mckinley Hill, Taguig

Mckinley Bldg A, Campus Ave, Taguig City

Ayala Ave, Makati

MSE Building, Ayala Avenue 1200, Makati City

Pioneer, Mandaluyong

Cybergate Center Tower 1 (Pioneer St), Mandaluyong City

Eastwood, QC

Eastwood City Cyberpark (E-Commerce Ave), Quezon City

LBC Branches also accept donations in kind

 The following items are urgently needed:

·         Rice

·         Canned goods

·         Biscuits

·         Blankets

·         Sleeping mats

·         Over the counter medicines for children and adults (cough, cold, fever, etc.)

·         Water

2.     Cash Donations

You may directly remit your cash donations through bank deposit or wire transfer through any of the following Philippine Red Cross bank accounts: 

Banco De Oro
Peso: 00-453-0018647
Dollar: 10-453-0039482

Swift code: BNORPHMM

Metrobank
Peso: 151-3-041631228
Dollar: 151-2-15100218-2

Swift code: MBTCPHMM

Philippine National Bank
Peso: 3752 8350 0034
Dollar: 3752 8350 0042

Swift code: PNBMPHMM

Unionbank of the Philippines
Peso: 1015 4000 0201
Dollar: 1315 4000 0090

Swift code: UBPHPHMM

3. Relief Goods Pre-packing efforts

You may also volunteer on your own with the following organizations doing relief work.  Please pre-register to ensure your slot in the activity.
 

NAME OF ORGANIZATION	VENUE	PHONE NO.
ABS-CBN Sagip Kapamilya	13 Examiner St., West Triangle, Quezon City	4152272 local 3765, 4114995
DSWD-National Relief Operations Center	Ninoy Aquino Ave., Cor. Chapel Road, Pasay City (behind Air Transporation Office)	852 8081, 851 2681

I've always been proud of Filipino resilience, hospitality and bayanihan. Despite the hardships and trials that our nation is going through, I still believe that we can rise again and recover from the damages of Typhoon Haiyan/Yolanda, all in God's grace.  Bangon Pilipinas! Kaya natin ito!

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Ink Drawing: Lady Sunflower

Hello everyone! Just wanted to quickly share this piece I did yesterday. I was in the mood for some inking and digital coloring after all that watercolor practice. So I digitized one of my drawings and played around with the good ol' Photoshop.

The lyrics were taken from my favorite song by Joni Mitchell coz of the flowers-in-your-hair-hippie-kinda-vibe. 

Have a lovely start of week! :)

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Watercolor Weekend: Mother Gypsy and the Wrinkled Folks

Finally, another painting! It's been a while since I had a proper sit down but things have been looking up with work and life in general, so I have more time for watercolor practice. I spent the entire afternoon yesterday at Cafe Mary Grace to get some sketching done. Whenever I feel like I need serious uninterrupted time for drawing/crafting, I go to a coffee shop and just spend the hours in solitude.

I've always wanted to draw this gypsy lady ever since I came across her in Paris. I've read stories of really aggressive beggars who take advantage of tourists in Paris, but I didn't get that vibe from her. The kindness in her face was just so beautiful, I wanted to draw a portrait of her.

I was walking outside the Notre Dame when I came across her. She was looking at me as I walked past and I just had the urge to drop a coin in her cup. She clasped her hands together as if to give thanks to an answered prayer. I didn't understand what she said but her eyes showed so much gratitude, and were welling up with tears. As I took out my camera, she gave me the warmest smile I've seen from a stranger that day. I took a photo of her and I headed off. That brief moment with her was remarkable.

I tried my best to copy her face and her features, but I always end up straying away from my original subject and just skew some things here and there. Usually when I do the pencil sketch, I  try to be as exact as possible, but when I start coloring, I refrain from looking at the photo reference so that I can make my own changes to the drawing. It's like getting lost in translation, only on paper.

Mother Gypsy
Watercolor on Paper

The most challenging part of this drawing is coloring her jacket. I've learned that mixing black with another dark hue is a good way of putting some dimension to the color. My own technique with watercolor is just really self taught, but I always just start with the skin and the lighter colors the follow with the darker shades. There's still so much to learn and I loved the challenge of doing this painting because of the creases of the subject's face and the draping of her shawl as well as the stitching of her jacket. I've never really mentioned it before, but I love to draw aging people. Their faces are more interesting to paint because their features help me to look into the details and allow me to practice seeing better. 

Here's a collection of past drawings of the beautiful, wrinkled folks:

Hope you had a great weekend!

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Watercolor Weekend: Bukidnon

Together with my goal to discover more about various Filipino ethnic communities,  I'm starting a series of drawings about Filipino Indigenous people to practice my watercolor portrait skills. Jim and I have been talking about going to different Philippine Festivals and immerse ourselves in some cultural education while we travel. Our bucket list includes the Maskara Festival in Bacolod, Sinulog Festival in Cebu, Higantes Festival in Angono Rizal and Kaamulan Festival in Bukidnon among others. 

Kaamulan Festival is an ethnic cultural festival held annually in Malaybalay City, Bukidnon from the second half of February to March 10, the anniversary date of the foundation of Bukidnon as a province in 1917. It is held to celebrate the culture and tradition of the seven ethnic tribal groups—Bukidnon, Higaonon, Talaandig, Manobo, Matigsalug, Tigwahanon and Umayamnon—that originally inhabit the province.^[1][2] It is the only ethnic festival in the Philippines.^{[3] Source: Wikipedia.org}

I used water color, acrylic and ink for this painting. I started with the background first, then working through the underpainting of the skin and the clothes and finally added details for the head piece and accessories. The reason why I selected different media for this painting is because of acrylic's characteristic to be more opaque. It has been useful for adding the little stitches on the dancer's clothes and the beads of her necklace.

"Bukidnon"
5.5 x 8.5 Inches on Strathmore Paper, 118 g/m

I will be selling this painting soon, and will be available in my newly registered Etsy Shop! 

For the meantime, email me at faye.marcos@gmail.com if you're interested :)

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June In A Gist

Because I haven't had any updates for the month of June (eeep!), I will be posting a few creative sparks here via Instagram. Blame it on my laptop going berserk, and the fact that I've been working on the cupcake biz with my sisters, been rolled into a new Project at work and also arranging some paper work for my upcoming business trip to Belgium! Visa application has been a pain because of so many requirements, but I'm really looking forward to the opportunity to learn something new (I won't be working on an Oracle Siebel Project this time!) and of course, see new places!

Anyhoots, here's a few of this month's artsy farts.

Worked on new rubber stamps! I've been super enjoying murdering erasers to make these foliage inspired (as usual) stamps. I can't wait to make pretty stationery out of them!

Remembering the little furballs in Bohol! I made this small drawing at a cafe while I was waiting for the rain to stop. 

Reuniting with my calligraphy tools! Oh how I missed them! This one is of course lyrics from Joni Mitchell's song Case of You

Remembering Gat Jose Rizal on his birthday! June 19, 1861, the coolest most amazing Filipino over achiever slash hero was born. I did this while having lunch. I didn't have a pencil so I went ahead with drawing using my gel pen. Sorry Pepe, if your eyes are not aligned!

This is an accidental artwork a.k.a. mindless doodle on a piece of craft paper! I ended up adding so much details on this diwata that I actually liked the result. Ah, art. It's indeed unexpected sometimes. 

The latest work that I've done for the month of June--this Audrey Kawasaki inspired drawing that was a result of my diwata doodle earlier! I rediscovered the joys of using ink in my drawings, so I made one that required a lot of lines and details. Channeling a bit of art nouveau on this one. Do you like it? :)

There you go! Next post, I will be telling you about my experience at the Fete De La Musique last June 15! Happy Friday all!

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