Remembering Michigan Places Differently

From the beginning of Stoney Bend Prints, much of my work focused on accurately capturing a place. And the process itself reflected that goal.

Each piece would begin with a light pencil sketch to establish proportion, perspective, and structure. From there, careful ink linework became the foundation. It was deliberate, detailed, and observational, followed by restrained monochromatic shading to define light, depth, and architectural accuracy. It's how I see places through values vs color.

The shape and structure of a building. The proportions and rhythm of windows, rooftops, fences,

SBP Classic illustration of the Mission Point Lighthouse

and tree lines. All of it makes a place, and the Ink and shading became a way of documenting what a place is.

Many of the places I draw throughout Michigan and Northern Michigan carry personal meaning for the people connected to them. Family cottages. Old homes. Churches. Main streets. Places tied to memories and connection. In custom commissions especially, accuracy becomes part of honoring the story of a place.

This has been the SBP Classic approach to place-based art.

Shifting Interpretation of Place-Based Art

Over time, something else began pulling at my attention. Not just what a place looks like, but what it feels like to remember it.

Working on a looser approach in the studio

I found myself working differently. The process still begins with a light pencil sketch, but after that a shift happens. The ink work becomes looser and more interpretive rather than tightly descriptive. Instead of building toward careful shading and precision, the piece moves towards something looser, and something felt as opposed to observed.

Less emphasis on architectural precision. More atmosphere. More suggestion. More space left intentionally unresolved.

The shift wasn’t planned as much as something that gradually evolved.

A Northern Michigan barn where the setting mattered more than the rough wood details. A lighthouse where the surrounding quiet felt more important than the exact number of windows or perfectly capture trees. A downtown street where shadows and atmosphere carried more emotional weight than strict accuracy.

The Drake School in Northern Michigan.

I actually started to notice it when I was working on capturing a small Northern Michigan one-

room schoolhouse. I spent less time worrying about the siding, or windows, and more time thinking about the feeling of the place and the how the structures shaped the atmosphere.

When I finished, it just felt different.

Evolving into the SBP Studio Approach

As I moved towards this approach more and more, I realized I wasn’t moving away from place-based work at all. I was simply approaching place differently.

That evolving approach has slowly become what I think of as SBP Studio style of work.

The foundation remains the same. The work is still rooted in meaningful places. Still restrained and monochromatic. Still deeply focused on light, shadow, balance, and the emotional character of a space. But the thinking behind the work has shifted slightly.

Framed SBP Studio original of Mission Point Lighthouse

SBP Classic often begins with careful planning around what a place is while SBP Studio begins from a different question: how does a place feel? The process becomes more interpretive from the moment the ink touches the page, eventually dissolving into watercolor wash, atmosphere, and emotional suggestion rather than strict documentation.

Some places are remembered sharply. Others atmospherically. But both feel true and both approaches still arrive at the same question: what gives a place lasting meaning?

For me, it rarely comes down to perfect detail alone.

Often, it’s the softer things that stay with us. The way late afternoon light falls across a street in

Traverse City. The quiet openness around an old barn on the Old Mission Peninsula. The feeling of trees closing in around a small Northern Michigan road. The sense of calm attached to a shoreline, chapel, or weathered building you may not have seen in years.

Memory tends to simplify things over time. With edges softening a bit and details disappearing but the atmosphere remains. The feelings connected to a place are what we carry with us.

I think watercolor naturally lends itself to that way of seeing. It's a medium that favors looseness, restraint and interpretation. Certain lines remain intentional while other areas dissolve into wash, shadow, and suggestion. The viewer fills in part of the place themselves, possibly with their memories of the place or it made them feel.

That balance of accuracy and interpretation has become increasingly important to me. Not because accuracy no longer matters, but because emotional truth matters too.

Two Approaches, Same Goal, Michigan Roots

There are still places that call for the precision and structure of SBP Classic. Especially commissions connected to family history or meaningful architecture. Those pieces deserve careful attention to proportion, detail, and recognition.

But there are other places that seem better served by atmosphere and interpretation. Places where a

Autumn Barn, and SBP Studio original

memory or feeling is equally important as the details. The places across Northern Michigan that stay with us long after we've left.

In many ways, both approaches are doing the same thing. Creating thoughtful, emotionally resonant artwork inspired by meaningful places and designed to be lived with.

The tools evolve. The line work changes. The watercolor loosens. But the reason for making it stays remarkably consistent.

At the center, is the belief that every place holds a story worth remembering.

Thanks for reading.

Scott

P.S. Stop by the site and take a look at some of the SBP Classic and SBP Studio originals.