And then there are sketches where I don’t have the luxury of time. I did this sketch from a (however slowly) moving train, so I frantically blocked out the drawing in pen, and then approximated the color based on whatever was currently passing by my window. It’s maybe not the most precise or accurate way to work, but it gets the job done in a pinch.
The Olympic Athletic Club diving girl isn’t vintage, but she sure looks like a throwback to me. Every time I find myself in Ballard—or even that general end of the city—I make sure my route takes me past her. I can definitely see her being a Seattle icon fifty years from now—our own Little Mermaid.
Friday’s post reminded me of the time I stood on the the opposite edge of the continent—that time at the northwesternmost point of the contiguous United States. Cape Flattery isn’t just lonely, it really does feel like the edge of the earth. The northern Pacific coast generally isn’t dotted with quaint cottages or resort spots the way the Atlantic shore is—huge swaths of it are uninhabited and downright inaccessible. But it’s that emptiness that makes it so wild, so beautiful, so perfect.
There are restoration success stories like Lucy…and then there are others without the happy ending. In my part of the world right now, a floating rust bucket is the talk of the town. That’s because at long last, an odyssey spanning nearly 90 years, thousands of miles and a whole lot of folly is about to come to an end.
From the 1930s through the 60s, the M.V. Kalakala was a swingin’ Art Deco ferry in Seattle’s Black Ball fleet. Her unusual (and flawed) design made her either a shining star or a laughing stock, depending on whom you asked—but either way, she enjoyed a fair amount of fame. She was the recipient of the first-ever commercial on-board radar system (FCC license #001!), and even made a cameo in the popular “Black Ball Ferry Line” song by Bing Crosby and the Andrews Sisters.
Once she was retired from ferry service, though, she went into a long, slow decline—beached and converted into a cannery in Alaska, then later towed back to Washington as the unfortunate victim of restoration projects that never made it off the ground. I’ll spare you all the twists and turns of the Kalakala story—a quick Google search will give you a whole host of written words, photographs, and even sketches by other folks who can tell the tale better.
Normally this is just the sort of story that would get me up in arms, ready to send a donation to the save-it fund and spread the word far and wide. But this time, I think I’d prefer to see the Kalakala sail off into the proverbial sunset. She deserves a better end than rusting through and sinking in a swirl of toxic chemicals, in a town that bears no real connection to her history.
Still, I’m glad I’ve had a chance to catch glimpses of her over the years. And I didn’t want to miss the chance to sketch her, even if only from a distance. She’s slated for demolition at the end of this month—I’m glad the weather held out long enough to give me a couple of good views of her.
Wishing you fair winds and following seas, Kalakala.
I’m sad to report that one of my favorite holiday traditions came to an end this weekend. For the past thirty-plus years, the Pacific Northwest Ballet has staged a unique version of The Nutcracker—complete with unusual choreography, nontraditional storytelling, and incredible kinetic theatre sets by one of my illustration heroes, Maurice Sendak. I’ve seen the performance several times since I’ve lived here, and have even sketched from the audience before—but when I found out this would be the last season, I had to go one more time, pencil in hand.
As you can imagine, it’s pretty dim in there during the performance, so I sat there doing blind contour pencil drawings in the dark (hey! All those art school exercises had a purpose!). Then, as soon as the house lights came up for intermission, I looked at the (often hilarious) results and cleaned up the drawing in ink, from memory. Then when I got home, I filled in the color as best I could.
Sketching this way is never exactly ideal, but I have a feeling it’s going to help me remember that last performance for many years. And it’ll remind me of how grateful I am that the PNB has given Seattle such a wonderful Christmas gift for so long.
Bookstores are a big part of our annual holiday shopping rounds, and my two most sketch-able favorites are Powell’s in Portland—
—and Elliott Bay in Seattle. Of course I’m probably going to love any indie bookstore, but both of these places have such inviting spaces that I could stay and sketch for a year. If I weren’t so distracted by all those zillions of books, that is…
Every year the Tailor and I go to the mountains with our friends to pick out and cut our own Christmas trees. Some people, when I tell them this, look at me like I have three heads and ask, “Why don’t you just go to a tree farm?”
Well, sure, it’s more work (and a much longer trip), and wild trees are not nearly so “perfect” or full as farmed ones. But by doing things this way, our Christmas tree comes with a story every year—as well as a favorite tradition with our good friends. And there’s something wonderful about searching for a wild Northwest tree in the most beautiful and wild part of the Northwest. Somehow it feels like a quest to catch Christmas and carry it home.
When we head to the mountains on Sunday to get our tree, the holiday decorating will officially begin. At our old house, most of our decorating focused on the mantel—since we don’t tend to go overboard with that sort of thing anyway, sometimes it was the only place that hinted at anything festive. At our new house, the fireplace is even more central to our lives and the rhythm of our home. I’m excited to see what the season brings, and how the mantel will rise to the occasion.
Speaking of indigo, I think I go through more blue paint when I’m in the San Juans than I do anywhere else. I don’t think I’ve been anywhere that has so many different shades and hues of blue in one place. Capturing anything that comes remotely close to what I see there is a big challenge.
Good thing there are plenty of rainy days up there—which makes the landscape flatten out a little, and give my brain a break.
It’s on my list today to refill the pans in my paintbox—starting with indigo, which is most in need of it. Before I moved to Washington, I didn’t use indigo—it just wasn’t a color I needed often, and if I did, I could mix a reasonable facsimile. But now that I live here, and the hillsides in the distance look like the above sketch for so much of the year… Well, indigo might just be the color I use most often.
(When I travel in the desert, though, I stock up on my reds and ochres…)