"Autumn Migration, Red-tail Hawks"
pencil drawing - © Bruce A. Morrison
(from a South Dakota private collection)
Here's
the second posting for "Archived Works Friday”...OK, I realize its
Saturday but did post on a couple other social media platforms and
forgot (!) my blog!!! This time its a pencil drawing from 35 years ago.
As I mentioned before - I'll post a painting, drawing or serigraph
(silkscreen print) from the "archive" files of years past...and give a
little back story on the work. I hope you'll find it interesting!
I
had a long, long relationship of just plain awe and admiration for
birds of prey...I built my first (and last) “mew” when I was 12 years
old, behind the garage in the back yard. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mews_(falconry)
My first sidewalk “art fair” drawings were birds of prey, also at age
12. I spent too much time in the timber searching out hawk nests and
never grew tired of lying on my back on a hillside along the Lizard
Creek valley watching birds of prey soaring on a thermal or migrating
through in the fall or spring. While doing so, I did try and squeeze in
some experiments with bal-chatri, or "hair umbrella", an old East
Indian idea – I carried a small home made one and a “volunteer” English
Sparrow (House Sparrow) around in it on my long hikes to watch hawks. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bal-chatri) I also devoured “The Falconer's Handbook” by Howard Smith, as nightly reading before bed...
I
always had trouble drawing things that didn't hold still for extended
periods of time (that just wasn't my gift)...Audubon worked from skins
that he and his parties “shot” - I couldn't do that! (Didn't want to
anyway!). I saved money from my Des Moines Register paper route and
eventually got a camera and lenses to get pictures of the birds to draw
from...this was in 1962...I'll save more of that for another post.
The
posted drawing here was probably my first “serious” try for drawing
hawks (Red-tails in this example)...I never forgot those carefree days
idling on the hillside gazing up and this drawing was prompted by those
memories. And although the scenery was very similar, I drew directly
from the hillsides and valleys I became familiar with after moving back
to NW Iowa, where we've lived for many years now. Hillsides and valleys
along the Little Sioux River just south of our studio a few miles.
Now
we can enjoy the same sort of view here off the studio deck, or a park
bench on one of the hillside pastures...full circle? I haven't indulged
in pencil (graphite) for a few years, but still admire a good pencil
rendering when I see one!
(This drawing and other archived artwork can be viewed at - https://morrisons-studio.com/archived-works/)
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