Draw What You Love: My New Neighbor

I have fallen in love with my new backyard neighbor:

A big hanging nasturtium. 

(En français, capucine. Po polsku, Nasturcya) 

Each day it grows new buds & blossoms. 

 There are at least 45 at this moment!

 This was not my usual very quick sketching. 

Slower, more left brain consciously accurate. 

I chose only one part of the abundant plant~ a vignette. 

You might call this a study-sketch.

I used pencil, even erasing & re-drawing. 

I was deepening my understanding of individual blossoms & leaves

and how they related to one another. 

My eyes were feasting on the colors.

By the time I finished the sketch, a gentle rain had fallen,

and configurations had changed.

I started with a preliminary contour sketch to help me focus.

I knew I couldn't draw the whole plant. 

The contour in ink was the introduction, a greeting. 

My gaze danced in & around blossoms & leaves, 

getting a feel for rhythms, lines & forms. 

While painting, I absent-mindedly tried out some colors

on this page as it was the nearest paper in sight.

And near the bottom, I seem to have been exploring 
some initial lines of nearby lupines.

The wonderful effect of drawing, 
beside the visual & tactile pleasure, 
is the concentration, the focus, the calm that occurs in me.
I always go back to my early guiding principle,
as presented by Frederick Frank, The Zen of Seeing:
Seeing/Drawing as Meditation, back in the early 70's.