By Danny Gregory - Art Supplies

A Personal Journey from 6H to 6B

It may seem hard to believe, upon looking at my current bloated form, but there was a time, years ago, when I went to the gym and lifted weights every day. Seven days a week for over a year,...

The Giant Sketchbook

Art-alternatives.com sent me the biggest sketchbook I have ever seen. It is almost 700 pp. long, weighs 8 lbs, and is quite spectacular. We made a little film to show you what an effect it had on my family....

New color

For the past couple of years, I have used a fairly good set of Grumbacher "Deluxe" watercolors in a big plastic box. They have served me well all over the world,and I have grown quite used to their slightly...

Notes to Myself

I've used every sort of journal-book over the past decade, but the one I've returned to the most was the pocket-sized, drawing Moleskine. The paper is a little odd; it has a water resistant treatment designed, I guess, to...

Wisdom

Art supply junkies, take heed: an epiphany from Trevor...

Change of scene

When I was drawing with my pal Roz Stendahl, I was amazed to see that certain pages of her journals were randomly pretreated before she turned to them. She might have a fat, wet brush stroke across a spread...

Danny's not got a brand new bag

Thursday, 8:10 a.m. Getting ready to leave the house and start the frigid, two-and-a-half-mile walk to my office, I suddenly realize I don't have the bag I use to tote my pens, paints, and my journal. I feel my...

Pens of the Moment

These days, I have quite a nice little arsenal of pens (here each presents a self-portrait), and they are influencing how and what I draw more and more. First off is (1) my trusty nib holder. It's a General's...

Going to van Gogh

On Friday, Jack and I headed up to the Met to check out the The van Gogh drawing show.

Mother Nature didn't get the e-mail

When I walked Joe at 8:30, all indicators pointed to 'go' so I threw on a couple of layers, picked up my folding stool and drawing bag and at 9 I was standing under the Washington Square Arch. By this point, not a single cloud was left and the sky was completely, achingly blue. I sat in the park and did a bad drawing, hoping against hope that some one might not have read my cancellation memo and would show up but, no, I was alone.

Drawing fire

I wrote about Steve Mumford last year when his work was only available on Artnet. Now he has published a sumptuous book collecting all of the watercolors and observations he made during his visits to war-torn Iraq. He told...

Slow=Know

Basic advice to someone who draws but wants to do it better.

Box Doodle project

Check it out (Thanks. Tom)....

A new thing

While I have gone on and off moleskines over the years, I had to snap this one up. A journal preprinted with little frames, perfect for sketching out little storyboards or page layouts or comic books or whatever. All...

Inklinations

The only downside to my vacation (and this will give you an indication of what a hopeless nerd I am) were a few pen problems. First of all, though we packed virtually everything in the house into our car...

Just shoot me

For many reasons, I am a big advocate of drawing in one's journal. It is a meditative practice. It helps one to deepen one's appreciation and count one's blessings. It is a good impetus to draw often. It looks...

John Hancock

When you're designing a book that will be entirely handwritten, you have two choices. You can be as patient as Frederick Franck and get a bunch of pens and set to work, writer's cramp be damned. If you are...

Art supply porn

I didn't even know I had a great aunt Greta (twice removed). But I was happy to take the call from her lawyer, the executor of her estate. Now I am the lucky owner of a 5,000 square foot...

Red, yellow and two blues

I'm still amazed at what emerges from my palette as I do my color theory homework. Greens, sure. Purples, of course. But greys and tans and pinks, all from my four original primary colors? (The hyacinth come from my...

Booking a vacation

I dream very intensely on the first few days of a vacation, as my brain reorganizes its hard drive. Weird hallucinogenic dreams feather into each other, dredging up dramas, ancient and new. Old bosses, old addresses, old mistakes, reappear in...

Vive la resistance!

I wrote to Chartpak, the US importer of Rotring, to ask them whether Rotring had stopped manufacturing Rapidoliners. Nancy Kopak replied: Not at this time, but we have been hearing the same rumors. If anything does happen, we plan...

Rotring stampede

LilaO just wrote to me with the news that Rapidoliners were just discontinued last week by Rotring so I bolted out to stock up. Thanks to the brilliant new Froogle, I found the best prices are at Jerry's Artarama...

Pendemonium

An inventory of my current stable of pens. They are all waterproof and under $10. Each drawing was done with the corresponding pen. Dip pen: I love to write with this pen. It’s a little scratchy and there’s something very...

Pigging-out on pigment

One key thing I�ve learned over the past couple of months is that, when it comes to paint, a rose madder isn�t a rose madder isn�t a rose madder. Paints are very variable and there�s a lot of science...

Jammin' good with Weird and Gilly

So I've mentioned here before that Jack, my boy, 9, good, handsome, smart, got into his skull that he just had to become a rock 'n' roll drummer and, despite my attempts to dissuade him, has been taking lessons...

Thinking on paper

My mum taught me to appreciate paper early. To riffle through blank journals and pinch the sheets between my finger pads. To consider pulp and fiber. To notice how a pen flows smoothly here while it bucks and protests...

The Old Bamboo

My passion for my Rotring rapidoliner deepens. Unlike any other technical pen I've used, it is always on the ready, never clogs or sticks or leaks and I've never even had to shake it one time to force ink...

Early inspiration

I woke up at 5:15 this morning for no good reason and yet felt quite rested. Poking around for something quiet to start my day off on the right footing, I sat down with the last few postings on Wild...

Unplugged

I got my first mouse in 1983. It was attached to an Apple IIC, the grooviest PC to come along, a 9" monitor, a carrying handle, white like the current Apple design standard. There was a program called Macpaint...

My Name is Mud

Alfred Hitchcock meticulously planned out every shot in his films long before he set foot on the set. Then he waddled on with precise storyboards, his angles, lenses, lighting directions all completely worked out. Most artists aren�t so controlled....