Selfie to distract from the madness. Water-soluble graphite pencil and brush.

This is the university from which I retired a few years back. What is wrong with young men? dailyillini.com/news-stories...

Sketches in hotel room waiting for the temple tour. Trying to stave off the madness.

I think the WSJ editorial critical of ICE is a calculation that when the Nuremberg moment comes, they want to be in the witness stand and not in the defendant dock.

I am out of the country. Is there any coverage of LaGarde walking out on Lutnick in US media? www.reuters.com/world/us/lut...

As a needed diversion, the fruit arrangement in our hotel and my watercolor version (Mumbai, India)

Currently transiting through Europe. Don't know if this has hit US media yet, or if they will cover it. www.france24.com/en/trump-thr...

Tufted Titmouse. Ref photo from Jocelyn Anderson Photography, used with permission. Watercolor pencil and watercolor.

Bird art. Red Headed woodpecker, watercolor. Ref photo from Jocelyn Anderson Photography, used with permission

Is NYT ignoring the Jack Smith depositions, or did I miss something?

Northern Cardinal. Watercolor. Ref photo by Jocelyn Anderson.

To put off the madness, some bird art. Refernce photos from Jocelyn Anderson Photography, used with permission. Bluejay (watercolor) and Blackburnian Warbler (colored pencil). Hopefully no connection to Marsha Blackburn.

Epstein files don't incriminate Trump. Quelle surprise. CNN notes they are heavily redacted, with Tapper scrolling thru a 100+ page document that is all blacked out. You have to read deep into the NYT coverage to even find the word "redacted". I guess NYT mostly redacted the redaction.

#BlueSkyArtShow #FavoriteThings

Portrait, sanguine

In a weird watercolor mood tonight to fight the madness

Now that Trump has said to go ahead and release the files, remember Bondi and Patel have had 10 months to scrub them. If "not much" is revealed, I will judge Trump by his actions and statements, and beleive the preponderance of evidence supports that he is as bad as we suspect, if not worse.

Non-political. Pine cones in WC. Wife says they look too elongated, but they really were.

So with all the analysis and celebration on the Dem's big win, I am surprised that it has gone un-noticed that the markets had a pretty good day. So much for financial panic if Dems win.

Conté pierre noir and white Conté on toned paper

Non-political. Pear, dry brush watercolor

With redeploying major naval resources to Latin American countries that pose no threat to us, what I don't see discussed is that these resources are no longer deployed against threats that knowledgeable people thought we should guard against. Putin and Xi are happy.

Had a good time at the Chicago demo. Even the Chicago cops(!) were friendly. So non-political post, experimenting with a new watercolor procedure starting with a grisaille in water-soluble graphire then layering color.

Chicago no-kings banner of vets against Trump. Huge crowd, no idea how many. There are helicopter shots on line.

In Chicago for No Kings. Wish a safe return for me.

Non-political. The mill at Lower Slaughter in the Cotswolds. Watercolor.

To escape the madness, my second ever gouache painting.

Much we don't know about Kirk shooter Tyler Robinson. Let me be the first to predict an Epstein end in jail before trial.

Bordeaux, France is a major stop on the Medieval pilgrimage route to the shrine of St. James (Santiago de Compostela in Spanish, St. Jacques de Compostelle in French). Bordeaux has two medieval gates along the route. This is Porte St. Jacques in watercolor from my reference photo last year.

Roughly based on a head study from Vanderpoel.

FIgure after Van Der Poel #art #figure

Non-political post. Scottland Highland Hairy Cow (pronounced "Koo") Water-soluble pastel and drybrush watercolor.

Non-poliitcal. My first gouache art.

Single kill shot from 200 yds? Trained sharpshooter, maybe military bkgd Shooter escaped? Maybe pre-arranged? MAGA can use a martyr and Trump can use a distraction. Inside hit? At least as plausible as pizzagate or the trope about school shooting victims being crisis actors.

#BlueSkyArtShow #Shiny

#BlueSkyArtShow #Skyline

Do we now have to come to the defense of John Bolton?

Whoa.

Vintage Sfumato. Pastel on sanded paper.

This piece is an extraordinary deep dive into mRNA vaccine technology, why it is critical, and the damage caused by RFK Jr. torpedoing funding for it. Incredible work by @funsizeimmuninja.bsky.social and Dr. Jess Steier. mRNA is indeed, as the authors say, a molecule of hope.

If you are an academic or a retired one as I am, you know of portals that track citations of your pubs. I have not gone to the premium service on these, which gives more about who and where. What amuses me is when I am notified that someone cited one of my papers from thirty years ago. Legacy.

Two new watercolors. The pitcher was torn when I tried to get it out of the watercolor paper pad. I tried to repair it with white glue and white acrylic paint.

NYT reports Trump is firing the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics bc he did not like the dismal employment numbers. Krugman and others had predicted this sort of thing. With RFK suppressing population health data and government statisticians silenced, we keep sliding to N. Korea norms.

Pastel on sanded paper, building on the concept of the study I posted earlier.

Compositional study for a planned larger work on the more expen$ive sanded pastel paper. But I kind of like this 5x8 quick study. Pastel pencil and pastel on toned paper. Gotta clean up the perspective lines on the vase. Drawing 101.

Has the media sought out victims of Epstein, some of whom have come forward, to get first hand accounts? Otherwise, Trump and his lackeys will make this go away by "pardon for perjury" with Maxwell and Bondi scrubbing the files, which has already been reported. But that would be "journalism."

"Still life under tornado watch" bc it was done under a tornado watch. With the Trump circus, it was hard to resist drinking my setup.

I regularly check forecast.weather.gov which gives the official forecast and a lot of detail for any zip code. Lately, I am seeing "NA" for current observations, which was rare before cuts to the agency. Bad bc we have been in severe weather and tornado watch the last couple of days.

I play period music (15 strings, bc 6 trings is for babies). "Port" (pronounced like the German car) from the Straloch MS, National Library of Scotland. I think it would be great for the opening curtain in a production of "MacBeth". youtu.be/F-vVNPxwfxg?...

#BueSkyArtShow #Smooth