Manholes and Memories

Smithsonian Emgagement Calendar sketching the pandemic 2021 week 19 May 2-8 

Manhole Mandalas photocopy of miniature paintings from  accordion album sketchbook

The wonderful side benefit of very late postings from my 2nd and 3rd year of sketching the pandemic days is that it reminds me things I have done and places I have visited that I almost have forgotten about !!  That weekend 2021 I was inspired to pull together different manhole covers from places I had visited ( yes, I notice interesting manhole covers wherever I visit !) I sketched and painted about 20 in a mini Japanese accordion sketchbook.   I photocopied one side and put it in my Smithsonian Engagement Calendar up-cycled to my sketchbook ! Uncannily, it paired  well with Alexandra Agudelo’s ‘Molly bowl’. The bowl embodies her ‘use of pre Colombian metal working techniques of batado in which a sheet of silver is placed between two hard surfaces and struck with a hammer in order to manipulate the material without welding’. For her ‘They evoke vessels used in ancestral rituals.’ 

National Museum of the Marine corps ink and watercolor  2022 week May 1-7 

In 2022, on May 2nd we visited the National Museum of Marine corps in Quantico, Va. We pass it all the time on our trips to and back from Washington DC but never did take that exit. The magnificent building evokes the scene of soldiers raising the flag at Iwo Jima. An exhibition of 50 huge and absolutely stunning watercolors by the artist Mary Whyte of ‘We the people:Portraits of Veterans in America’ drew us to finally take the exit from the highway.  It was a memorable exhibit by an artist I had always admired. 

Smithsonian Engagement Calendar Pandemic year 2022 sketchbook 

The painting the Smithsonian Engagement Calendar is by Elmer Wachtel of California spring landscape c. 1920.