Sea Otter In Love - new painting

Happy Valentine's Day, everyone!

This watercolor, measuring 8"x10", was painted as a Valentine's gift for my fiance. This is the first chance I've had to paint something non-work related in a while and I really had a lot of fun with it.

Prints of this painting are available in my print shop.

New Blog - Pictures and Print!

I've started a new blog called Pictures and Print! For some time now, I have been sharing vintage books from my own collection here on my sketch blog to show where some of my inspirations come from. I enjoy sharing my books so much that I decided to create a spin-off blog specifically for that purpose. My collection is always growing, so I will always have new books to share as well as other vintage items of interests, such as magazines, comics, and more.

Check it out for more information and all sorts of vintage book goodness!

...I also often post on Instagram, vintage related and not, as jackieocean. Feel free to follow along!

Poppa Sullivan

I painted this portrait recently as a birthday gift for my Dad. It's based on a photo of my grandfather, John Sullivan, in his World War II uniform. I snuck a quick photo of the original photo last time I was at my grandmother's house to use it for reference for this. The painting was done with acrylic paint and measures 9" x 12".

West Tisbury Tractor - new watercolor painting

This is a new watercolor painting of a tractor in a farm field in West Tisbury, on Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts. Completed in August of 2011. Some in progress pictures of the painting can be viewed here.

Prints are available through my print shop.

Inspirations: Vintage Books no.12

It's been a while since I shared a vintage book that I find inspiring, so tonight I pulled one from my collection and scanned some pages. I picked this up at my favorite local used book store because I loved the simplicity and quirkiness of the interior illustrations. My favorite is the page where a duck is sporting a top hat, jacket, glasses, and a walking cane.

The book is titled Morning Noises and is written and illustrated by Alain Grée, and published by Wonder Books, Inc. in 1962.

All previous posts featuring books from my collection can be viewed by clicking here.

Philbin Beach Rocks - watercolor sketches

I was able to do a little bit of painting while I was on Martha's Vineyard last week visiting my family and working on planning my wedding for next summer. I took two of my watercolor sketchbooks to Philbin Beach in Aquinnah so that I could paint in one while the other was drying. It was pretty hot and sunny, so the paint was drying faster than I would have liked, but I did my best to just work with it and not get too hung up on precise details. These three watercolor sketches are the result.

I'm hoping to do more painting here at home over the next few weeks, using some of the photos I took last week as reference. Later in August I'll be returning to the island for another visit/wedding planning session.

To see more of my Martha's Vineyard drawings and paintings, just click here.

Lighthouse - sketchbook

Here's another page from my sketchbook, featuring the Gay Head Lighthouse in Aquinnah on Martha's Vineyard. Drawn with pen in my moleskine sketchbook.

To see more of my Martha's Vineyard drawings and paintings, just click here.

Sketchbook Pages

This morning I scanned a couple of recent pages out of my sketchbook. I had to keep myself busy while monitoring student exams last week.