Ethiopian Sketchbook

Hello, friends. I’m delighted to bring to you September’s blog. This month I want to share with you a little bit about my recent trip to Ethiopia and my efforts to create my first travel sketchbook.

I have never been to Ethiopia before or created a travel sketchbook. I was excited to get to adventure to Ethiopia. Sketching about your journey while journeying was something elusive to me. I have always been too excited about the travel, nose pressed against the glass, to ever tear myself away to sketch; but I’ve seen a lot of beautiful art journals that people have created and was intrigued.

What I want to share with you today is not one of those beautiful journals. LOL. I was still way too involved with the experience of traveling. I didn’t want to miss a moment of this amazing experience. Plus I was too tired, usually, to have the energy to be creative. I was determined, however, to do something, to make a start, to at least show up on a page.

For those of you who may not already know, a year ago Madeline, my daughter, decided to volunteer as an emergency nurse in Gimbe, Ethiopia. She has always been adventurous. She also has a heart as big as the sky. Being intrigued by the stories of her childhood, she wanted to explore more of the world while caring for mankind at the same time.

When the opportunity came to follow in the footsteps of her family to explore Ethiopia, she bravely set off on her adventure. After a year of serving at the hospital in Gimbe, Madeline had the desire to see more of the country. She was curious to see some of the places her father had lived in as a child, as well as experiencing more of the exotic places she had read and heard about.

Madeline’s dream led to our journey to Africa. Next thing we knew, we were winging our way over the United States, the Arctic, the Arabian desert, the Red Sea, and stepping in places called Istanbul and Addis Ababa. It was truly heart-stopping to look out the window of the plane and watch these places I’d only read about disappear beneath us.

So here is my feeble attempt to record a little bit of that journey. My hope is that with this start, my sketchbooks will continue to improve with each journey. I can’t make any promises, but I am delighted to report that I did succeed in recording a few things in both pencil and watercolor. My hope, as always, is that my efforts will inspire your own.

“I knew how far below in the swelling heat the birds were an orchestra in the trees about the villages of mud huts; how the long grass was straightening while dangling locks of dewdrops dwindled and dried; how the people were moving out into the fields about the business of herding and hoeing.”

— Doris Lessing

I want to share with you just a little bit about the tools I took with me to create art. I knew that I would need the basics. For me this meant a sketchbook, pencils, eraser, paint, and brushes. For the sketchbook, I was a little uncertain what to choose. I haven’t found my perfect watercolor sketchbook, and I usually don’t like the results I end up with on the paper they contain. I ended up choosing a Strathmore sketchbook.

While I still don’t like the paper, and wouldn’t necessarily “recommend” a Strathmore sketchbook, I chose this one because of its size, price, and availability. I found myself needing to make a choice. These sketchbooks are readily available universally, the size was perfect, and the price unbeatable.

I really like the horizontal shape and the petite size of the book. I also like that it opens almost flat, making it possible to sketch across two pages, the entire length of the book.

For the pencils, eraser, and brushes, I turned to my trusty French pencil case. I’ve had this leather case for many years, and I love that it has traveled with me, serving as my faithful servant. It’s the perfect size to slip into my backpack, and the buttery softness of the leather soothes me in moments of creative distress and angst.

I also wanted to share with you the watercolor box I carried with me. I would most definitely recommend that you acquire one of these. I found my watercolor travel sketch box on eBay. It was made by Windsor & Newton, one of my favorite companies and the company I usually turn to for all things watercolor paint-related.

This amazing little box is so compact that it literally filts into your hand.

When you open up the box, it includes multiple palettes, a sponge, water bottle, brush, watercolor paint pans, and a box to hold your water. Amazing and perfect.

This was the perfect combination for my travel needs.

Everything about Ethiopia was foreign. The culture shock was total and complete. Everywhere you looked there were visually stimulating images. Madeline had told me before I came, that while I may not find my usual subjects of creative interest, she was sure that there would be many characters that would capture my imagination.

This gentleman was one of the first such characters to catch the lens of my camera. Not an atypical personality to many we have in the state, but yet so completely otherworldly at the same time.

I sketched this noble lady while at Madeline’s home in Gimbe. She was someone I had seen walking alongside the road while we flew by in our car. I was struck by her confidence and determination. What a female example of grace under pressure. I simply had to record her.

This gentleman farmer and his trusty steed of burden were intriguing characters. This duo will never know that their presence that day in the fields would inspire my little sketch below:

As you can see, the quality of the painting is definitely not the same as I can get in a studio. This has always been frustrating for me, but I have gotten used to the idea of watercolor sketching. Really, I barely had time during my travels to do anything more than create just a simple sketch, and I guess I have to admit there is charm in that creation as well.

No record of my Ethiopian experience would be complete without talking about the transportation and the animals — and the mixture of the two. Ethiopia is very different from the U.S. in this regard. It is very common to find cows, goats, mules, donkeys, chickens, children, and adults all in the road you are attempting to navigate. I like to think of it as a social phenomenon. Everyone meets everyone on the road and quite happily share in its joys together.

The Bajaj is the name for a three-wheeled vehicle that is ubiquitous in the cities of Ethiopia. They seem to have complete right-of-way and, along with the animals and people, quickly turn a two-lane road into a five-lane road or more. We often laughed about the video-game nature of the roadway, as you never knew what you would encounter or where.

I came to delight in this mode of transportation. It was fun, fast, and efficient. People decorated their Bajaj to compliment their personality and bravely drove friends, family, and paying customers about with much enthusiasm. It was an irresistible watercolor subject, and one that got me safely back to the Gimbe hospital compound one day, for which I am eternally grateful.

The stork sketch is from Hawassa in central Ethiopia. Amazing for how comfortable it was with humans, but how completely it defied the cloying sweetness of the bird entrusted with bringing babies to their mothers’ breasts.

The window was in our room in Addis Ababa, the first sketch I attempted in Ethiopia. I think it is a perfect conclusion for this month’s blog. My trip to Ethiopia was definitely a window on another world. I hope that by sharing my sketchbook that you will be encouraged to create your own. It’s not a time to worry about perfection, symmetry, perspective. It’s a time to record your emotions and experiences in another dimension.