My workplace:

Manor House (BlackBerry camera)

For three years I’ve been working here in this old mansion in a small town on the North Shore of Massachusetts, and now the company is moving to Boston. In two weeks I start commuting on the train to a city office building and working at a desk without even cubicle partitions, instead of an office with this view:

Office View (6B pencil)

This is the first drawing in the little sketchbook I bought a few months ago and have been too scared to use. When I started an oil-painting class last June, the teacher had us work from photographs and that’s all I’ve done ever since. Recently a painter acquaintance pointed out what a disservice this is to new students, because there’s so much more to learn by working from life. I’m not quite ready to paint from life, so I decided to start with sketching.

I happened upon a podcast, “An Illustrated Life,” by Danny Gregory, in which he interviews artists and illustrators about their sketchbooks. He’s just published a book of the same name that features these people’s work. (See http://dannygregory.libsyn.com.) I’ve been inspired by some of these interviews and I’m going to try using my sketchbook while working on my painting.

Harbor Lowtide (charcoal pencil)

The second sketch in my little book, low tide at the side of the harbor.