I have blocked my calendar!

Temple on Baner hill. Baner road, Pune.

I have been drawing but not posting.  Really. There was a lot of travel in the last four months and interspersed with holidays and lethargy I have not posted for a while.

Recently I have been focusing on watercolors and coloring in general.  I found myself describing my blog as drawings with watercolor coloring.  The medium of watercolors for painting is quite challenging.    One cannot correct mistakes and the rule of “Know what you have to do “just cannot be broken because once you have laid the paint down it’s almost impossible to change it.  So while it’s probably the cheapest and most accessible medium for beginners to painting it’s also the most unforgiving.

I plan on painting the Sahyadri mountain ranges, where I go trekking, as my skill level builds up.  They are incredibly beautiful and it would be great to capture that and reflect it in a simple but elegant watercolor.

Right there in black and white

Funeral procession.  Pashan. Pune.

Sugarcane juice stall. Baner, Pune.

Couple in rain, Baner-Sus Road. Pune 

I had planned to do this.  Draw scenes of life in the neighbourhood where I live, from memory, like a visual diary.  I drive a very short distance through Pashan village to my work place on Baner Road. I get to see a lot of village life everyday to and from work. The village is quite "villagey'.  Pashan sits amid all the boom in construction as urban Pune threatens to swallow it.  Kids run around barefoot.  Goats, chicken, and dogs roam freely. At the appointed bathing hour, a herd of water buffalo block my road to work as they lazily wander from the river to their dairy.  I take photographs sometimes but I really had hoped I would be able to draw from life that will very soon be gone. I have been teaching myself figurative drawing and other technical aspects.  Drawing from memory is a lot of fun but frustrating when you cant really construct the scene as you see it in your minds eye.  Hope you like them.

Short story: My father on his way to bed recalled a story from his childhood. He and some others in their childhood used to tease his mother ( "JiJi") that her father used to peddle hooch.  It so happened, the land her father had given on her marriage to my grandfather ( Dowry you think? Of course!) had a number of 'Mahua' trees.(Madhuca Longifolia) These trees bear a sweet and fragrant flower ( and a fruit) that is fermented to brew 'Country liquor'. Jiji's father used to auction off the flowers and fruits of the Mahua trees to manufacturers of country liquor. Hence the young scamps, my father included, would tease their matronly mother.  Well, I had to write it down.  So I did that here.