I like my large sketchbook because the paper is very high quality and takes the ink very well. I got it at the Kimbell Art Museum in Fort Worth, Texas a couple of years back. While in France this one came out most mornings at breakfast and a few other times when I was alone and/or had plenty of time.
En Attente de Voler Vers la France
I loved this scene because of the juxtaposition between partners. One in a tshirt and shorts, the other in a big puffy winter coat. We all do what we need to do when we fly, right?
En Attendant le Train à Grande Vityesse
We had a long layover at Charles de Gaulle Airport before our bullet train to the Loire Valley. This young woman was also waiting so I took the opportunity to draw her. The space was beautiful, all windows, giant beams and guide wires supporting the roof while in the foreground there was a huge plant taking up the entire left side of my field of vision. It made for a very active background and foreground.
Every morning I got up early and either went for a run or sat and drew during breakfast or in the lobby. Most days there was someone in the restaurant to draw but one morning there was no one so I went into the lounge and drew the hotel employee behind the desk, which also was a coffee bar.
My Brother-in-law Steve and I were on our own after returning the rental car so we took a stroll around Paris. We found a great little cafe for lunch and I was thinking I wish I was alone so I could just sit and draw for as long as I wanted when something surprising occurred. Steve brought out a small sketchbook and said, ‘Marty, teach me to draw.’ He had bought a sketchbook and pencils just to take on the trip. So I gave him some pointers, mostly just about not trying to worry about accuracy and not trying to make it look like a photograph and off we went. We probably spent an hour just eating our lunch and drawing and it was a lot of fun! He did really well and it made my day that he made the effort to connect with me in that way on vacation.
The next day I was on my own in Paris. I was planning to go see the David Hockney exhibition at the Foundation Louis Vuitton but it was sold out so I pivoted to the Pantheon. I wanted all of us to go but I couldn’t convince the others it was worth it so I went solo. It was worth it. An AMAZING space with incredible history, paintings and sculptures. I will post more about it in the future when I continue my ‘Art I Love’ series. While I was there I spent a substantial amount of time doing this drawing. It’s hard to draw a pendulum because it is always moving but besides that it’s pretty much invisible. You have to draw the background to give it some space in which to live. I was able to find a bench facing the monument to Diderot so that became my background so to speak.
While I was drawing I saw a young girl sort of hovering around me. She was obviously watching me draw but was too shy to come up and talk to me. Eventually her mother came alongside her and they moved forward just a bit. I stopped drawing and gestured for them to come over. They were from England and I was able to speak to them. I showed her the drawing, explained to her what I was working on in the drawing and why. I told the young girl she could do the same thing with practice. The mother asked if it was possible to see the other drawing in the sketchbook so I turned a number of pages and showed them the completed drawings from days earlier and some I had done back home. They were very appreciative and left feeling like they had seen a genuine Parisian moment of an artist drawing, even if I wasn’t French!
Melanie à Hôtel Demeure, Paris
The last day we were in Paris there was no one yet in the breakfast area of the hotel so I meandered over to the front desk area and asked the clerk, Melanie, if I could draw her. She was amenable. We had a nice time talking about Paris and I was happy to get one final drawing in before we left for the states.
On this trip I took two sketchbooks to France, one small, one large.
I brought out the small sketchbook for when I felt like I had just a few moments to draw or I had limited room, like on the airplane. Here are the drawings from that sketchbook with any photos I took of the scene I was drawing.
Each morning I tried to get in either a run or a drawing. Our hotels weren’t in urban areas until we were in Paris so I didn’t find little cafes to go and sit at. But each hotel had a breakfast (petit-dejeuner) area so I settled in and drew there.
Concert à Notre Dame
We got tickets to go to a concert in Notre Dame the first evening we were in Paris. It was a selection of sacred music, mostly about Mary, the mother of Jesus. Before it started I drew the scene, including the very large head of a man right in front of me.
Constance en Cour de la Maison de Delacroix
I had a whole day to myself while in Paris. I went to the Pantheon (see the ‘large drawings’ for a drawing I did there) and then to the Delacroix Museum. It is a very small museum located in an apartment he lived in at one point. I thought I was exiting when I discovered I was being led to a beautiful courtyard garden. While I was in the courtyard I noticed a young woman reading. I decided to draw her and luckily she stayed for quite a long time. When I was done I showed the drawing to her and she was very happy about it. It turns out that her name is Constance, which is also the name of one of my daughters. We had a nice conversation about art, books and Paris before I left.
Un Femme de Profil en Paris
As much as Paris is fantastic one thing my wife found was that the tea left something to be desired. So that meant she was very excited to see a Starbucks and went in to get her favorite Matcha tea. I stayed outside and drew this woman who was beside me. She seemed to also be waiting for someone.
Going to the Louvre is always an adventure. So many people, so many ways to get lost in the crowd. I was waiting for my compatriots to come back from the bathrooms and saw this young woman sitting all by herself, deep into her phone with her hair obscuring almost all of her face. I knew I would have to work fast so I did a minimalist portrait that I think captures her perfectly.
Le Coureur Avant la Course en Paris
While up early drinking coffee downstair in the hotel I met a couple from Iowa. They were both dressed as runners so I struck up a conversation with them as they were ready to head out for their first run in Paris. I saw them the next morning as well but both mornings I either didn’t run or ran earlier. It would have been fun to run with them. I drew the woman of the couple as she sat drinking her coffee before the run.
Julie Dans l’avion Pour Londres
We met this woman, Julie, and her family as we were headed home. We had a change over in London and met them at the British Air desk before we checked in. They went on their way and we thought we were about to do the same but there was a hiccup. My ticket had me as ‘Marty’ but my passport had me as ‘Martin’. They would not allow me to board with that egregious infraction, even though I had already made it to Europe, so I had to spend and hour and a half with reps from BA and American Airlines to hassle it out. It took quite a while but it was resolved and we ended up just one seat back from Julie and her family. I drew her as she watched a movie.
Our second leg of the trip home had me in a middle seat. A young woman, Ana, with a healthy bit of sun on her cheeks sat down next to me. We talked for quite a while about her student trip to Greece and our vacation. Because she was right next to me I wasn’t thinking I would draw her but when she nested with a blanket, ear buds, a neck pillow AND a sleep mask I felt like I could safely draw her without bothering anyone.
I only did two drawings in color. Both were started by referencing photos I took and were not drawn live.
Une Femme Dans la Boutique de Souvenirs à Versailles
This drawing started from a photograph I took in the souvenir shop at Versailles. I happen to catch this woman in passing and liked the splash of red on her lips. Later that night in my hotel room I drew and colored her. It was the only time I brought out my markers on the trip. Next time I would leave them at home.
This was another started from a photo. This person I photographed on purpose because of how quintessentially Parisian she looked while browsing in the Louvre bookstore. She had something in her hand that I could not discern so I turned it into an umbrella. The angle of it made me think about her protecting her purchase so that’s the direction I went.
In May of 2025 we spent 10 days traveling around France. We We met up with Linda’s sister and brother-in-law in the town of Amboise in the Loire Valley, drove through Caen, Bayeaux, and Giverny in the Normandy region, then on to Versailles and Paris.
In past travels I carried a DSLR camera but this time I used my iphone exclusively. Sometimes I wished I had a full camera but on balance I felt I got most everything I wanted without the hassle. All the images here were converted to BW from color. The color added a lot to some of the images but overall I like the mood and feel the BW images give so decided to be uniform in imagery.
I have been scanning my sketchbooks of the past 54 years. Some were line drawings I knew I wanted to paint but never got around to them. This is especially true of a large black sketchbook I drew in from 2008-2010.
Here is a selection of the drawings from that sketchbook that I painted this year, 15+ years later.
Here is one of my first loves. I got this image as a postcard so far back I don’t even remember. I think it was in High School but it might have been during college. All I know is I had it taped up on my wall, my computer, my closet door, and every other place I ever lived for decades and decades. I am pretty sure I still have it in a box in the attic.
George Luks, Girl from Madrid, oil on canvas, 1925
I fell in love with the painting, the woman and the artist the moment I saw the image. Something about the painterly style, the red lips, dark eyes, the glass of water, the shadow under her chin, the pose. Every single thing about it mesmerized me and still does to this day. It led me on a journey into George Luks’ work and the work of his fellow artists who formed the Ashcan school, so called because they painted from the real gritty of life with a lot of muted colors. Of course this painting has plenty of color but in spite of that it still feels dark and moody with its intensely dark background and harsh shadows.
For the most part the realism of the Ashcan artists is about more than just a realistic depiction of something or someone. It is about the real world of everyday struggles for the working class inhabitants of New York (and elsewhere). It is also about gritty urban landscapes far removed from the genteel beauty of manicured lawn and tennis parties. The people aren’t overly idealized, even when they are traditionally beautiful or socially high up. There is a tone and mood that tamps down the beauty and ups the emotional complexity of the sitter.
We often think of the Europeans working in Cubism, Fauvism and other isms as being the artistic rebels of the time but the Americans were equally so. The Ashcan artists actually had 16 pieces in the famous 1913 Armory show in New York that exposed the new paintings of Europe and America to an American audience for the first time.
I’ve collected a number of images from each of the 5 members of the Ashcan School; George Luks, Robert Henri, John Sloan, Everett Shinn and William Glackens. Here they are.
George Luks
Luks started his career as a newspaper illustrator in Philadelphia where he met the other men who would come to make up the Ashcan School. Their goals were influenced by Henri, who wanted artists to focus on the real world around them, the people and places dismissed and forgotten by high society and the artists that catered to that class. Luks soon moved to New York, continuing to illustrate for newspapers and adding comic strip artist to his resume. Eventually he started to focus on serious painting and became a chronicler of Manhattan’s lower east side.
George Luks, Mining Village No. 3, watercolor, 1923
George Luks, Lady with a White Hat, oil on canvas, undated
George Luks, A Clown, oil on canvas, 1929
George Luks, Holiday on the Hudson, oil on canvas, 1912
George Luks, Girl from Madrid, oil on canvas, 1925
George Luks, Portrait of a Girl, oil on canvas
George Luks, Girl in Green, oil on canvas, 1925
George Luks – Sketches
George Luks
Robert Henri
Henri was the leader and probably the most famous of the Ashcan artists. Henri was quite a bit older than the other artists in his group and as such was a mentor and artistic leader for them. He focused his artistic attention on everyday life rather than the poised and posh upper society imagery that his contemporaries were creating. His work often depicted gritty and earthy elements of society. Even when he painted society portraits, his colors and mood, as with all the Ashcan School, were muted and subtle. the circle of artists who surrounded him came to believe this emphasis on ‘real life’ was the way forward for American art and followed him down that path.
Robert Henri, Snow in New York, oil on canvas, 1902, National Gallery of Art
Robert Henri, Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney, oil on canvas, 1916, Whitney Museum of American Art
Robert Henri, Storm Tide, 1903, oil on canvas, Whitney Museum of American Art
Robert Henri, Tam Gan (and close up), oil on canvas, 1915, Buffalo AKG Art Museum
Robert Henri, West Coast of Ireland, Oil on canvas, 1913, private collection
Robert Henri, Portrait of Marjorie Henri (wife), oil on canvas, 1914, San Diego Museum of Art
Robert Henri, Reader in the Forest, pastel on paper, 1918, private collection
Robert Henri, Miss Kaji Waki, oil on canvas, 1909, Virginia Museum of Fine Arts
Robert Henri, Irish Lass, oil on canvas, 1913, private collection
Robert Henri, Betalo Nude, oil on canvas, 1916, Milwaukee Art Museum
Robert Henri, George Luks Playing baseball, ink on paper, 1904
Robert Henri, Two Women on a Couch, Pen, Ink and wash, Brooklyn Museum
Robert Henri, photographic portrait
John Sloan
As was many of the Ashcan artists, Sloane was a newspaper illustrator for much of his life and is where most of his income came from. He was a prolific painter and quite well known but he was not commercially successful for quite a while.
John Sloan, McSorley’s Bar, oil on canvas, 1912
John Sloan, Turning Out the Light (from New York City Life series), etching, 1905
John Sloan, Sunday, Women Drying Their Hair, oil on canvas, 1912
John Sloan, Dust Storm, Fifth Avenue, oil on canvas, 1906, Metropolitan Museum of Art
John Sloane, The City from Greenwich Village, oil on canvas, 1922
John Sloan, Chinese Restaurant, oil on canvas, 190, Memorial Art Gallery of the University of Rochester
John Sloan, After the War a Medal and Maybe a Job, drawing, 1914
John Sloan, Sunbathers on the Roof, etching, 1941
John Sloan, Nude, wash and ink on paper, undated
Everett Shinn and William Glackens
Shinn and Glackens are lesser known members of the Ashcan school but their work is no less powerful. Neither exhibited at the 1913 Armory Show but Glackens welcomed the new, innovate art from Europe while Shinn showed nothing but disdain for it then and until the end of his life. If you’ve ever been to the Barnes Collection in Philadelphia, one of the preeminent museums showing modern art from the 20th century, it will be interesting for you to know that it was Glackens who went to Europe on Barne’s behalf to look for a purchase many of the new and exciting paintings of that era for Barnes. Those paintings became the foundation for Barnes’s massive collection.
Everett Shinn, Girl on Stage, oil on canvas, 1906
Everett Shinn, The White Ballet, oil on canvas, 1904, Smithsonian American Art Museum
Everett Shinn, Woman on a Staircase, oil on canvas, 1935, private collection
Everett, Shinn, A Nude, oil on canvas, undated, private collection
William Glackens, Collier’s Cover, 1910
William Glackens, On Broadway Near 8th, crayon and chalk, 1913, Delaware Art Museum
William Glackens, Armenian Girl, oil on canvas, 1916, The Barnes Collection
William Glackens, La Peritif, oil on canvas, 1926, Virginia Museum of Fine Arts
William Glackens, Young Woman in Green, oil on canvas, 1915, St. Louis Art Museum
