Covid Chronicles Shop Update:

Art Sales, Covid-19 Art, Sketchbooks
The prints on offer during the July Pre-sale Hi all! So in July I let you all know in a blog post that not all of the Covid Chronicles products being offered on pre-sale would be on offer after the pre-sale. The pre-sale might have been the only opportunity to purchase some items. So following from that, a few items (greeting and post cards, some of the print images) offered then will not be offered for sale again in the near future. Kudos to you if you did manage to scoop an item not currently on offer, and thank you all for your support of art and artists! The Covid Chronicles Hardcover Book: 99 CAD + Shipping Covid Chronicles Zines: 29 CAD each + shippingCovid Chronicles Portfolios: 15 CAD each…
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Covid-19 Sketchbook Tour 2

Art Sales, Covid-19 Art, Events & Announcements, Sketchbooks, The Sunflower Project, Youtube Channel
It has been over a month since my last blog post and even while the world whirs on with Covid-19 and police brutality protests I have been playing studio catch-up and still don't feel like I have had time to catch my breath. https://youtu.be/AOE3WJaJ_qw So I am really happy that I finally got the second sketchbook tour together for you and uploaded this week. I think you will find some of the images a bit darker, maybe a bit resigned to the craziness that is the human response to a crisis of this nature. Others are clearly looking forward to sunny summer days ahead. Please enjoy! Below you can see the final four drawings in the second series of Covid-19 drawings, which I completed on May 18th (a full 3…
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Studio Life & Covid-19 Part 7

Art Sales, Covid-19 Art, Sketchbooks, The Story Behind the Painting, The Sunflower Project, What's the Big Idea?
As social (physical) distancing drags on people are dreaming of getting their lives back. I have three more drawings in the Covid-19 series, this first is inspired by a study which surveyed how the pandemic was manifesting in peoples dreams. The second is about the realities of parents, grandparents and volunteer caregivers who are now juggling the responsibilities of full time child care and full time remote work. It is a blessing of communications technology that many are able to do this and maintain income security. Some telecommuters are able to help family members who are considered front line essential services, but without child care, to maintain their income security by pulling double duty. However it needs to be recognized that of necessity neither job is going to get the…
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Studio Life & Covid-19 Part 6

Art Sales, Covid-19 Art, Sketchbooks, The Story Behind the Painting, The Sunflower Project, What's the Big Idea?, Working Artist, Youtube Channel
So I feel like we have settled into a little routine or a new normal, as they are saying now, although we are all looking forward to (if not quite certain about) plans to ease restrictions and re-open businesses. There was a lot of questions about herd immunity, and whether this can be relied upon to protect us as we start going out in public again. How many would need to be immune and how long does immunity last? My thoughts are that if you are in a high risk category you should probably play it safe for a while yet, while if you are healthy you can probably have a little more faith in the ability of the medical system to take care of you should your case be…
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Studio Life & Covid-19: Part 4

Events & Announcements, Sketchbooks, Uncategorized, Working Artist, Youtube Channel
While the weather and the news had its ups and downs in the outside world, it was another busy week in the studio. As an artist who is perpetually in isolation, there is never a shortage of things to get done, even while others post about not knowing how to fill the hours suddenly vacated by their jobs. However, it can be difficult to motivate myself to actually get things done as some projects seem to be futile when their fate is currently unknown due to all the uncertainties of the Covid-19 pandemic. Such is the case with my preparations for The Calgary Exhibition and Stampede Art Show. Currently we have no news one way or the other on the fate of the Calgary Exhibition and Stampede this year, so…
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Studio Life During Covid-19 Part 3

Sketchbooks, The Story Behind the Painting, The Sunflower Project, What's the Big Idea?, Youtube Channel
We finally started getting some projections on the severity and length of the pandemic this week and have had to think about the idea that this is going to be a marathon, not a sprint. With that in mind, I moved to a schedule of doing the Covid-19 Sketchbook drawings three days per week and posting them on Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday mornings. I was interviewed on the CBC Homestretch April 2nd about the drawings however I don't see any links on their website for the segment so unfortunately I can't share that with you. However CBC Calgary shared 8 more images on their instagram account. And Ellie McIntosh also featured one of the images in her latest Vlog post on the importance of creativity in times like these. https://youtu.be/Dz0cVGRl3zQ…
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Studio Life During Covid-19 Part 2

100 Rejections, Events & Announcements, Sketchbooks, The Sunflower Project, Uncategorized, Working Artist, Youtube Channel
So it is another interesting week as we see the progress of the Covid-19 crisis on the global stage and I have continued to document it in my Covid 19 series of drawings I uploaded the final instalment of Kathleen and Quinnton's Wedding Painting to Youtube last week, so here together for the first time are all three videos so you can see the process from start to finish! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UAvrhEIE4vA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yXvYwDDWsyw https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WmUOiHw0x5k Each video represents one day of work on the painting. So why are the lengths so different? I'm recording the time-lapse video's using my iPhone, so I need to press stop periodically to adjust the number of dropped frames per session. In the shorter ones I stopped recording less frequently. So it appears I am a super fast…
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Studio Life During Covid-19

100 Rejections, Commissions, Events & Announcements, Sketchbooks, The Sunflower Project, Youtube Channel
This week has been intense and uncertain for a lot of people. We are all watching the news on a daily basis, and surfing social media for the interaction that we are prohibited from getting in person. In the studio, in addition to the new Covid-19 drawings I am sharing with you in this post, I had a contract cancellation as their offices are shut down for Covid-19. Kathleen & Quinnton, 16 x 20 Acrylic on Canvas I finished Kathleen and Quinton's wedding painting, and edited and uploaded the final video in the series, which will go live on Youtube this Friday (watch for it). I am still planning on doing a sketchbook tour video this week which I should upload to Youtube for next Friday. This almost couldn't happen…
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The Timely Sketchbook

Sketchbooks, What's the Big Idea?, Youtube Channel
I have always loved the beautiful sketchbooks of other artists, but they have never been a regular thing for me. Mine are usually decades old and half full of loose composition ideas, shopping lists, reading notes, budgets, business ideas and the odd nice drawing of a landscape or portrait. But a proper visual diary of my thoughts, observations and inspirations? Nope, I've never had much luck with those. Maybe it is because my thought process is long, but I usually respond to circumstance through my paintings, rather than in bound books of daily sketches. Covid-19 Sketchbook Drawing 1, Ink on paper, Debbie.lee Miszaniec However there is something about the need to respond quickly to the realities of the Covid-19 crisis, that has me revisiting the sketchbook as a way to…
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