Here Dane (my son) and I are having really good Mexican food in Pancho Villas in Banos Tungurahua.  This restaurant is right next door to the Swiss Bistro who are also good but it was a Mexican kind of feeling night.... At this point they make the best fajitas that I have had in Ecuador so far.

Yeah I know time to visit the doctor again about feeding the helio pyloria bug in my guts, but you have to have a beer with fajitas.  

Yes I do chat and doodle during dinner sometimes.... it makes the drawings so much more interesting and I find that the conversation can really wander into interesting territory.

This wee bird was done on cartolina paper, with faber castell colored pencils, and peerless water color.  It was an artistic amble.

I keep forgetting to do this.....www.robinmoulynart.com if you want to see more.... 

I have to make some confessions here.  I am shamelessly addicted to art supplies.  My son does not call it art supplies he calls it my art porn.....and it kind of is.... I love playing with new art materials.  I love the process of discovering new and interesting stuff to work with and then working with it and exploring.  I think it is the allowing myself to artistically play that draws me. 

 For a long time I couldn't afford anything but the cheap or recycled stuff and then when I found out that Pablo Picasso had painted his genius works with house paint and that Matisse had used cut up colored paper, I felt off the hook.  I learned so much about how to work with these materials, I grew as an artist in leaps and bound, and became more resourceful!  When I came to Ecuador, I could only get really top quality stuff on-line and then I had to wait for it to be shipped here and would it even get here.  Oh, That painful wait......then I found canvas but then I couldn't find archival water color paper so that I could play with the colored pencils and had to make the paper by hand.  It seemed like such a process just so that I could express myself in art.  I guess that I had to stop, learn more about the entire process and material of what I was working with rather than taking it for granted and having instant gratification and spontaneously working on a whim.  That lesson learned, I thank god a new and wonderful company here in town saved me and found pure white water color paper and other things art wise to play with......  (Shameless plug "Illusions biblioteca and paperaria" here in Banos, Tungurahua, Ecuador!!!)  Though I still love the banana paper nothing seems sweeter to me than that pure crispy white water color paper or canvas and the first slide of the paint or colored pencil.... ahhh.  I also LOVE the smells of a good loved art studio.... ahhh. anyway, yeah I am a shameless art addict .....

So now you know why I got into the colored pencils.  Yes, initially my excuse was travel and art and that the colored pencils are so much more portable etc, but really it was about exploring something new.  So that said I have been playing with the idea of when I go back to Canada going rampant in the art stores... and that may still happen but with restraint. The thought of seeing myself in the video court documents of frothing at the mouth out of control and playing with all this wonderful stuff makes my uptight conversationalist scream in embarrassment, so no, that scenario will not happen.....

 I was thinking for sure of buying the Derwent graphitint set but then I played with my colored pencils and look what I did, the lady in the sun.... down below. So my faber castell colored pencils are not necessary, and the amazement of what this wonderful stuff has the capability of doing.  I just used my faber castel colored pencils in the darkest purple, brown and paynes grey and Yes, score.  Love it, love this effect!!! There is an interesting tension between the brown purple and blue grey....

I met this lady in the park here in Banos and click, beautiful.  The first step was graphite pencil layout, then dark purple for initial color and definition, controlling the coldness of the purple with the dark brown, and in the evening when the light was bad I came in with the Paynes grey to capture large shapes and definite shadows.  Then this morning it was like Christmas better than I thought.  

Again, I never thought of myself as a portrait artist but these people here are so inspiring that I consider myself blessed to have the opportunity to be able do work with them.  

I also have set up the first inspirations for the poster of frogs of Ecuador.  The final poster will be normal poster sized.  There will be a maze of frogs.  I wasn't sure if I would like it being a collage of frogs and so busy so I had to do a small maquette of it.   What do you think, can you see a large poster covered with about 40 or more different colored frogs?  Let me know if you took a risk and played with colors you never thought you would use together and did if make you stretch your limitations.