Scent-sational Skunks!

—Art Class Recap, Part 2

Ever since I was a Wee Lass, I’ve been interested in wild animals. My favorites when I was young were Bobcats, Lynxes, and Skunks!

Here’s a Striped Skunk I drew in the 2nd grade. I’m sure you agree it’s uncanny how spot-on my rendering of the Skunk was, even at such a tender age!

Striped Skunk (my 2nd grade art using colored pencil)

Fast forward a few years to the art class I recently took at the Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum. Just as in a previous class session (when we were treated to a visit by one of ASDM’s birds—Quincy the Gambel’s Quail), this time we were treated to a visit by an ASDM animal: Primrose the Striped Skunk! Yes, Primrose had been descented, in case you’re wondering!

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❓ Did You Know?

The Skunk family is composed of 12 species, 4 of which are found here in the Sonoran Desert: Striped, Spotted, Hooded and Hog-nosed.

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The staff member who brought Primrose to our classroom laid out a long piece of cloth on a couple of art tables, sprinkled the cloth with Skunk treats, and then let Primrose out of her carrying cage. For the next ten minutes we watched Primrose walk back and forth along the length of cloth, exploring and discovering the Skunk treats.

Here’s my photo of Primrose looking for the Skunk treats.

Primrose the Striped Skunk discovering Skunk treats laid out for her by Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum staff

This time in my allotted 10ish minutes I completed a whopping four pages of quick gesture sketches of Primrose, as she walked back and forth looking for treats.

Primrose the Striped Skunk, page 1 (charcoal)

Note that in one of the sketches above on page 1, I only got Primrose’s head drawn, before she turned around to face a different direction! Ha! 😆

Primrose the Striped Skunk, page 2 (charcoal)

With these sketches I was trying to capture what to me were three distinctive Striped Skunk characteristics of Primrose:

1. Pointy head

2. Tail that was often fanned out

3. A white stripe on each side of her body.

Primrose the Striped Skunk, page 3 (charcoal)

I was happy that in the above page 3 sketches I was able to capture hints that the white stripes extend to both sides of Primrose’s body!

Primrose the Striped Skunk, page 4 (charcoal)

So, yeah, I feel I managed to, in some of these sketches, capture the essence of Primrose’s Skunkness!

I want to mention how completely and totally radical it is for me to not only do quick gesture sketches like these, but to create them using charcoal! This is only the second time ever that I’ve used charcoal; the first time was a few weeks earlier, in the same class.

To geek out on art supplies for a moment…I found that drawing with charcoal felt completely different than drawing with my usual pencils, pens and watercolor brushes. Drawing with a stick of charcoal felt very sensual to me—and I don’t mean in any X-rated sort of way. I mean from the standpoint of the sense of touch. To me, using charcoal felt very soft, like rubbing velvet on velvet.

That said, am I now going to embrace charcoal in my home studio? Heck, no! I’m not interested in using any chalky smeary art mediums like this, especially inside my home (but I was game to try it out somewhere else!). 😊

Hey—how about a skunk-related quote to wrap this up? 🦨

“A skunk is a reminder that uniqueness is a source of strength.”

- Anonymous

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