Colored Pencil Week Eight

This week we were graced with the presence of Guest Artist and Instructor Joan Benotti www.joanbenotti.com. Joan is a protean artist who works in oils, wood, gold leaf, paper, gesso, and colored pencils to name just a few of the materials she processes into compelling and richly annotated works of art.  She generously instructed us in the ways she customizes Nautical Maps. 

Joan told how she began embellishing Nautical Charts with colored Pencils while living on Eleuthera in the Bahamas.

"The first step is to look at your chart to get ideas. Next", she said, "you want to look for shapes." Joan finds shapes of fish, lobsters, and shells in the topography and geography of the land and the depth of the ocean.

Time, then, to go to the beach and gather things, or to the library or nearby book shop for books on native flora and shells, or the internet for reference materials.

Joan had a President Taft stamp for the chart of the Beverly coastline.

 Joan collects old stamps, post cards, and antique books to help inform the iconography of her charts. When working with a client she might incorporate personal effects, like note, letters, or in the case of her brother who was a Chemist, the periodic table of elements.

Her audience at our Garage School was spell bound.

After thinking about the chart, collect your materials.

Next, make drawings on tracing paper to place your information.

The demonstration chart of Salem, Beverly, and Manchester.

Mary Healy gets her bearings.

Time for everyone to work on their own charts.

Mary Vettere explores the Salem of her childhood.

Pam Price working from her preparatory sketches.

Mary Ellen Leekley finds a turtle on Misery Island.

Linda Harvey plants a Rosa Rugosa.

Cathy Ebling starts with a sand dollar. Her birthday bracelet of sea glass and a shell is just the right accessory for the session.


Success! Next week we start our Spring Session with many annotated and embellished charts on the Homework Wall! We are all so grateful to Joan for a terrific class!