Jocelyn Curry

Once September rolled around here in Seattle, I determined that the three girls could now begin to venture out into the yard. I had always intended to let the chickens roam as soon as they had enough mass to be less interesting to Tyler, the neighborhood mouser. It will come as no surprise that they LOVE being free range chickens!

Vita, Cinnamon and Bess relish a patch of tender grass.

The coop as viewed from my studio window. I can keep a close eye on the little condo & its inhabitants.
Last month I posted a detail of a watercolor and sumi painting I had started. As promised, I am posting "the final" version, although I'm not sure it is truly, finally complete. I think it needs something more, but I remember the cautionary words: If it looks like it needs something more, take something away.

Here is the text I have written:

In the golden throat of the lily, and in the crimson folds of the hollyhock, lie the mystery of pigments – how from soil and water come such colors? A leafhopper, slim as a sliver – a green blade of a bug – leaps away. The garden in August sings and it simmers in color. The eye of the dahlia is a tiny sun, its gilded points lying in lavender waves. At this time, blossoms fade too quickly. The air is dry. September looms. But there are other pleasures: zephyrs scented with jasmine & honeysuckle. August so vivid, August so fragrant!

The painting is done on a full sheet of Arches 140 lb. cold press watercolor paper, with Winsor & Newton paints and Yasutomo sumi ink.
Several years ago I designed a logo for a start-up bakery business in NYC. Earlier this week I heard from Janine Frank, my client, after her long, labor-intensive business development period. The result: an online and in-store product line with an up and running website! Currently, she has a mouthwatering line of cookies with plans to expand her specialty bakery offerings.

I thought it would be of interest to show some of the rough initial studies (these four were not chosen) I submitted to Janine when we first started the design process. Here are four approaches I took using both positive and reversed images
and lettering:

Naive-style, very legible lettering was roughed in and combined with line drawings for the bakery images. It was important to keep in mind that the artwork would be applied to labels, a website, and all advertising materials. A handmade character was essential for the identity of the company.

A photo of the baker when she was a girl was referred to for making a pen and ink illustration of her holding a shoebox of baked goods.

The final lettering is shown below, outlined in lavender. There is an image that was completed but it is not currently being used. To visit the bakery and order some premium, homebaked cookies, click on the logo!
Hello loyal followers of My Chicken Saga,

One morning a couple of weeks ago I heard a new bird call coming from the back yard. "It must be a migrating bird," I thought, "as it is an unfamiliar call." I went out the back door, and the call stopped. I let the four chicks out of their loft, and went on with the day. Two days later, I heard it again. This time I stealthily went outside, not wanting to startle away the bird. Alarmingly, the sound was coming from the chicken coop! I opened the door, and Ming repeated "her" whole-hearted, juvenile crow right at my face!

Yes, another rooster.

The next morning, I took Ming back to Lattin's Cider Mill and Farm in Olympia. They graciously accepted him back into one of their spacious pens, where he'll have lots of chicken friends to scratch around with. After the two-month adventure with the ups and downs of trying to gather up a few nice hens, now there are three, and I'm banking that neither Cinnamon, Vita, nor Bess will begin crowing. I'm ready for the excitement to end and the eggs to begin!

Above left: Ming before she began to crow. Above right, the coop with the "vacation extension" for the chix to flutter and dig in while trips and vacations take place for their chief caretaker. Rick did a great job looking after the trio while I was visiting family in California last week.
After a summer of being focused more on learning about chickens than on doing artwork, I have once again picked up my writing tools and paintbrushes. The August colors and fragrances of the garden have inspired me. The piece I'm working on isn't finished, but in looking at the sequential photos I've taken of the progression of it, I found myself enjoying the detail photo below of the floral bouquet part of the composition. The colors of daylilies and dahlias together in a vase struck me as so beautiful. The watercolor was first painted on Arches cold press watercolor paper, then the sumi ink was applied from a very fine-tipped bottle. The full piece will be posted at a later date.
As a professional illustrator, I've completed numerous assignments that include bird images. It's rare to be able to draw birds without the aid of photographs. Not so with the plentiful gulls of the Pacific Northwest! My drawing group trio met at Brackett's Landing in Edmonds, WA one perfect summer morning a couple of weeks ago. A low tide, sunshine and calm winds made it comfy to sit on driftwood logs and sketch. And who should be waiting to serve as our models? The gulls!

After doing the pencil and watercolor studies above, I thought I might use them for personal notecards. Then I decided that there is something kind of grumpy and a little grim about the group. So, here they will remain in all of their varied poses.

My drawing group buddies are new to drawing birds, so the pensive gulls made for ideal subjects. Soft pencil was used on the resting seagull, and pen and ink for the standing bird.
When I teach an art course, I try not to spend too much time doing demonstrations for the students. It’s helpful, to a degree, but wearying for them to stand around, watching, rather than doing it themselves. During the June 28-30 drawing course I taught at the North Cascades Institute Learning Center, I did do some quick demonstrations of drawing techniques which are posted and described below.

Here is a demo sketch of a deer skull drawn with graphite and charcoal pencil. To the right is the start of a stippled drawing of a beetle. The pencil sketch is used as a guide to adding fine ink dots to create a distinctly scientific-style illustration.

After working on more time-consuming drawings, the students were introduced to the more impressionistic gesture drawing technique. I demonstrated this by looking out the classroom window and sketching what I saw (rocky peaks and slender evergreen trees) in about one minute’s time. I then sketched Justin, one of my assistants, to show the approach to a gesture drawing of a figure.

Finally, I did two quick sketches with different tools, using sumi ink as the drawing fluid. On the left is a forest and mountain impression made by dipping a weathered piece of wood into the ink and freely drawing. On the right is a sumi painting “sketch” made with a traditional Asian brush. After their time-consuming, disciplined work with pencils and pens, the group really enjoyed trying out these looser techniques.
The chicks I sketched a few weeks ago have developed into young pullets now (well, two of them were boys so they went back to the farm and were replaced by Bess and Ming). The four hens-to-be have distinctly different personalities and appearances. I sketched them this morning, using as few lines as possible, selecting poses that expressed their characters. I used a pointed pen nib and India ink, then added a few strokes of digital color in PhotoShop:

The poultry profiles are thus: Bess is a Barred Plymouth Rock. She's rather formal & staid, one might say, while being at the top of the peck order. Cinnamon is a Welsummer, a master forager with a wild bird quickness and restlessness. She's the youngest and the smallest, and is at the bottom of the peck order but doesn't seem too phased by this station in her life. Vita is a Speckled Sussex, and is very industrious and equanimous, usually with her beak to the ground. Ming is a Golden-Laced Cochin who looks like a toy chicken with a perfect little face and feathered legs. She's keenly watchful, imagining shapes to be threatening prey. She is playful with the others (sounds like a report card), and gentle. To read more about my chicken-tending story, click here.
On Saturday morning, after a final midnight oil push on my part to complete the "condo" as my neighbor Bob calls it (a few things remain to be finished up), the chicks moved into their new digs. Celebration peeps, bright eyes and happy foraging in the grass ensued! The Barred Plymouth Rock made life hard for Cinnamon and Vita, but as they are quick & undaunted, they are surviving just fine. The beak chomps are now mere pecks – so I'm hopeful that the order of things will settle into place without wounds inflicted!

Cinnamon and Vita check out the pop door threshold vantage point, while Ming and the Barred Rock (the right name will come soon) check out the waterer and what's peckable in the grass. Below, Ming's bright & watchful eyes help her navigate the ramp for the first time.

Ming, a golden-laced Cochin, gits along with everyone.
"You'uns jest hafta git along" is what Rick's Grandma Maggie told us after we got married. Today, I reminded my four little pullets that the same applies to them. Yes, two newcomers have joined Vita and Cinnamon. They came from Lattin's Cider Mill and Farm in southeast Olympia, WA. Energetic and pretty, and a little older than the two remaining original chicks, they are as yet unnamed. Any suggestions?

Update!! The Cochin, being of Chinese ethnicity, is now called Ming. Thanks to my neighbor Sue who came over to visit the new chicks today. It's the ideal name for this soft, elegant little bird.

Perhaps it was the indignity of being lodged in a kiddie wading pool decorated with be-goggled duckies and plump fishies. Or maybe they really had not wanted to leave their nice airy pens out in the country. I don't know. But, after I took these photos, it was suddenly Bold & Tough Newcomers vs.The Innocents. See the posture and glint in the eye of the black and white Barred Plymouth Rock pullet? Not to mention her well-developed beak?? Poor Vita got a big beak pinch in the neck, which stunned her – and then there was a crowd-mentality chasing rush toward Cinnamon (seen in the photo on the left, looking young and innocent indeed), who is good at dodging, fortunately. I whisked the younger ones out of the kiddie pool and into their cardboard box, their haven. Thus ended playgroup attempt #1.

The second new pullet, seen on the left, above Cinnamon, is a golden-laced Cochin. This breed is known for being gentle and friendly, but not particularly prolific in the egg-laying department. They are irresistibly soft and fluffy with extraordinary coats and feathered legs.
I will take a portrait of "the girls" when the stresses of habitat changes are smoothed over, OK? The chicken tractor is nearly ready for the foursome to move into. My plan was to place them in it simultaneously, so that there was no established territory for any of them. Maybe my novice chicken psychology will work, and they'll all git along.

(On the right, Vita the Speckled Sussex treads lightly behind the Barred Rock. The golden-laced Cochin is in the foreground.)

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