Sketching creative people as they create

As a continuation of a goal to sketch more people on location, I have set myself a task to try and capture the focus of people set about their work. A sketch of the pastry chef at Pana Chocolate in Alexandria, through the glass walled kitchen was the first.

Next was my friend and artist Fiona Verity and her lovely Labrador Sunny in Fiona's Brookvale Studio. Fiona's work is as colourful and energetic as she is, so it was a joy to develop a sketch and at the same time witness an ocean collage emerge on the wall. So much so, that I have resolved to sketch many more creative people at work during the year.

 

 

My third sketch was the result of a morning with glass carver Kathy Elliot. Her husband Ben Edols creates the blown glass vessel and then brings it to their home studio where Kathy carves and creates surface designs.  Kathy has admirable strength and focus in addition to her skill, as she stood carving the heavy vessel at the lathe for the full hour I sketched! You can see more about the process of their beautiful work on this video.

Sketching People in Motion Craftsy class with Marc Taro Holmes

 

A sketch from this week in a café - 6 weeks after starting to use Marc's concepts.

Adding people to my sketches on location has always been a challenge. Particularly when I'd devote an hour or two trying to capture a building and then fear I'd destroy the overall image with distorted out of proportion figures that had nothing of the conviction I might be able to give my building.  However through Sketchbook Skool classes it became more and more clear that in order to communicate all that I want to in my sketches, to tell a story,  I needed people to complete most scenes.  Finally, I seemed to have found what would get me regular sketching people live in Marc Taro Holmes Craftsy class "Sketching People in Motion".

 

Live sketches from a week or two of using Marc's technique.

 Marc's style is I think quite unique to him and at first it seemed foreign and unlike my own work to add such things as a vertical shading/background line. But by having the focus of following a set method I seemed to be sketching without worrying about what people looked like until I'd made my way through all the stages. Only at the end of it did I stop to assess the sketch to realise I'd drawn a couple of people, sufficiently proportioned, telling a bit of a story. That they didn't always look recognisably like the people in front of me ultimately became irrelevant and liberating. I know that will come with further practice if I want it to.

 

3 weeks ago - Having to sit in waiting room became a joy - great time to study people!

I dedicated a sketchbook solely to sketching people live and ensured it was the only one I carried with me. Trying to keep myself honest to my commitment I didn't allow any food, coffee or building sketches in this sketchbook - if I had time to sketch, it had to be from live people. After getting a bit more confidence in doing this I started moving back toward more of what I think is my style and away from Marc's. One particularly huge help for me in Marc's strategy is being able to get the gesture and general shapes down in pencil first. I like sketching straight out in pen first often as it feels quicker but to get proportions right and get my confidence up, the pencil first approach is a great advantage to start with.

 

Last week - Watercolor first (no pencil) then pen after.

In the past week I have also been playing with watercolour first on some occasions (no pencil) which I still lose a bit of proportion on, but I find it fun and relaxing. My aim now is to keep up with the regular people sketching, maintain using Sktchy app once or twice a week (keeping familiar with faces up close helps me when people leave or are moving their head about a lot), move onto Marc's more advanced techniques (much of the above is based only on the first part of the Craftsy course) and learn more about communicating gesture, relationships and actions.

 

I would love to know what has helped you with sketching people live?

Boronia House, Mosman

Today I met with others of the Sydney Sketch Club at Boronia House in Mosman. I often glance in at this grand building when I pass it on Military Road, but had not before ventured through the front gate to sketch it.

 

Boronia House was built in 1885 and is now heritage listed and used as dining rooms for high teas and functions. An example of Victorian Filigree architecture - the iron lacework was quite a challenge.

Sketching in Melbourne

During a family trip to Geelong in December, my sister Suzette, my niece and I squeezed in a day trip to Melbourne. There is an overwhelming number of buildings I'd like to sketch there but many of them would take me 2 hours. So as not to bore my poor companions too much, we settled for a café in Hardware Lane in the morning and sketched this view from the outside tables. Lots of great little places to eat along this street.

 

 

On short notice we were also able to meet with fellow Urban Sketchers, Evelyn and Janice for lunch. I enjoy the fact that Urban Sketchers has created community both online and in real life that it is so easy to catch up with these friends and fill a couple of hours with talk of sketching, materials and travel.

Urban Sketchers Sydney at Mortuary Station

Mortuary Station, Regent Street, Sydney, from yesterday’s Urban Sketchers meet. This Gothic inspired style Sandstone structure was built in 1869. It’s original purpose was to receive the dead of the city, as they began their journey by train (along with mourners) out to Rookwood Cemetery. Such a detailed building that I appreciate so much more having sketched it. It as designed by James Barnet who also worked on the Sydney GPO in Martin Place and several other Sydney Buildings.

Coptic bound Sketchbook

Thanks to the guidance, time and patience - and the sharing of tools and materials - from sketcher Wendy Shortland I have recently completed my first Coptic bound Sketchbook. It took two sittings with Wendy and several hours for the full process from tearing the full size Canaletto 200gsm hot press paper and folding into signatures, making the covers and stitching the binding.

I'm very pleased with the outcome and looking forward to trialling it. The green fern cover paper was from Wendy's stash and I was fortunate that my friend Ethna shared with me more botanical themed paper for the end pages.

I'd like to make more - possibly with fabric covers, but for the moment will start getting used to this paper.

Urban Sketchers Sydney at Millers Point

Many historic buildings to sketch at Millers Point for the USK Sydney meet yesterday. My favourite is this one. The Lord Nelson Hotel was first licensed in 1841 when its landlord was William Wells, a former convict. It s believed to be the oldest existing hotel building in Sydney. (from the green historic plaque on the wall)

Urban Sketchers Sydney - Manly Jazz Festival

Urban Sketchers Sydney were entertained by free live jazz under bright sunshine today at Manly's annual Jazz Festival. We wandered from the ferry wharf along The Corso where some of us stopped to sketch in and around the New Brighton Hotel. Its an oddly shaped building due to its location on a very sharp corner of The Corso and Sydney Road.

How to make a Terrarium

The Storytelling course from Sketchbook Skool is underway. Koosje Koene provides instruction as to drawing a recipe. I slightly tweaked it for indoor gardening.

Sktchy Crowd

In a bid to further develop sketching people I've been trialling a combination of portraits together from my favourite inspiration App 'Sktchy'.

The first try was a page of women. I'm happy with the result but still spend more time than I had hoped on each person. My aim is to be faster and more responsive to shapes and profiles.

 For the Sktchy men, drawing more people smaller worked better. It helped me to simplify the line work and study variations in angles and features between the people.

Urban Sketchers Sydney - Surry Hills

Continued Sydney wet weather made Surry Hills cafes the perfect spot for our latest Urban Sketchers meet. There was the option of some great streetscapes and the more hardy sketchers braved the soggy conditions to sketch them. But the Book Kitchen in Devonshire Street proved too tempting for me.

 

 

 

The choice to stay indoors was rewarded with a nice clear view of fellow sketcher Chris. Followed by another angle of a couple on bar stools with their back to me. Great for a sketcher a little too timid to sketch strangers face to face. This time there was 10 minutes or so to study body language and profiles, and with the benefit of practicing contours lately, the shapes and proportions seemed to draw on my page much quicker and more accurately. There must be a tipping point on this sketching journey that's getting closer. When I will recall faces from photo references I've drawn in the past and have them start to seep into drawing from life. It's still a great challenge to sketch accurately when people are constantly shifting position and turning their heads in conversation. Maybe another thousand or so? I'm fairly sure though that contour drawing is helping me lots.

 

 

 

After my small triumph in the café the sun came out and I joined other sketchers across the road to record the Bourke Street Bakery. Another good spot for people sketching due to the queues! Very popular! This sketch was rushed as time was short and I think I spent as much time adding in the brick texture later  as I did doing the rest of the sketch on site. The day was made the merrier by a little girl Alice who came to chat and watch us sketch whilst her Mum queued. She had a real keenness for what we were up to. She signed my picture quite happily. Hope she went home to sketch!

Sketchbook Skool - Seeing

A second semester of Sketchbook Skool themed "Seeing" was introduced in July this year to follow on from "Beginnings". Urban Sketcher Liz Steel was part of the teaching staff and I was keen to see how her online class would go after the success of her workshops here in Sydney. Danny Gregory, Koosje Koene both returned to teach with the addition of Brenda Swenson, Cathy Johnson and Andrea Joseph.

 

Self portrait challenge - day 7

 

One of the biggest challenges for me came with Koosje's week which focussed on self portraits. This was time and energy consuming and confronting. We needed to complete several and I had barely attempted any self portraits prior to the course. But by my final piece I was pleased with what I'd achieved. The motivation and inspiration that comes from sharing that journey with other students online has a very positive impact.

 

Nature studies with the guidance of Cathy Johnson

 

Cathy Johnson is renown for sharing  valuable tuition and demonstrations online and through her books. Her week was great for revisiting some key watercolour fundamentals as well as looking at nature studies. From this I made studies of the local cranky Common Myna. They are annoying birds but with plenty of character.

 

Ball point pen and watercolour as a result of Andrea Joseph's week.

 

Andrea Joseph shared insights into her unique and distinctive style of illustrating with pens/biros. The result she achieves with the cheapest, or even better, free ball point pens is astonishing. I did enjoy taking a shot at this method, but I know I don't have the sufficient patience required to pursue it much further. The aspect of trying such a diverse range of ideas each week throughout the course is a good way to learn what does (or doesn't) suit your own capabilities and character.

 

Sketching in The Rocks, Sydney.

 

From an afternoon at the Tea Cosy in The Rocks, Sydney.

 

Finally, it was Liz's week and time to return to more familiar methods. Liz organised a sketching day in the Rocks and it was a great day to catch up with sketchers I already knew as well as meet a few new ones who I had conversed with online in the groups. We spent the morning sketching buildings and then headed to the Tea Cosy to sketch tea cups and high tea. Fabulous way to round off another semester!

Sketchbook Skool - Beginnings

In April this year I joined the 6 week online sketching course "Sketchbook Skool" (co-founded by Danny Gregory and Koosje Koene). I was familiar with a few of Danny Gregory's books and his blog, and the course featured Prashant Miranda, Roz Stendahl and Tommy Kane as teachers - all sketchbook artists I have admired for some time from an urban sketching perspective.

 

For the last 2 years I have learned sketching skills and concepts mostly from Liz Steel's classes in person, having the great fortune of living in the same city as her. So the idea of learning more from other sketchbook artists seemed like a good one and by the end of the 6 weeks I was very glad I'd signed up.  Following are a few of my homework pieces from the course. We don't get assessed as such but the motivation to make the most of anything these teachers are offering is enough to push me along.

 

Pre-dinner sketching - working on composition with Jane LaFazio

Sketching taxidermy - Understanding sketching animals better from Roz Stendahl's class. Thanks to my friend Olga for taking me to her bar "Honeyrider" in Neutral Bay for my subject!

'Shirley' (Olga's beautiful greyhound). I made this from a photo after sketching Shirley in a variety of poses. This seemed to capture her character. A further developed piece from Roz Stendahl's class.

My kitchen - after week 6 with Tommy Kane.

 

 I have recently completed Sketchbook Skool - Seeing, and will write more about that class in my next post.

Urban Sketchers Sydney meet at QVB.

It's been a busy few months and I'm a little behind with my posts!

The June sketch day for Urban Sketchers was at Queen Victoria Building. I chose to sit at a café outside the beautiful shopping arcade and make a study of 149 York Street which was once the Gresham Hotel, built in 1890.

Then in July we headed down to The Rocks - one of my favourite historical areas of Sydney. We had been offered to participate in the Aroma Festival by sketching on disposable coffee cups. They were surprisingly good to sketch on (once you get used to the curved surface) and took both ink and watercolour quite well. (The image looks a bit weird as we used the panoramic feature on our phones to try and capture the rotated surface of the cup).

Before and after the cup sketch I took the opportunity to sketch The Russell Hotel in George Street. This is one of my favourite hotels in The Rocks area due to that fairy tale like Scots-Baronial Tower. Many of the architectural features have been retained since the hotel was built in 1887.

Historic Sydney - Tempe House and Strickland House

There has been two opportunities to sketch beautiful old Sydney buildings in recent weeks.

Firstly Tempe House in April, where Ethna and I visited on an open day for the local art society. It is set on beautiful grounds and next to a picturesque garden. Once absorbed in sketching it was easier to block out the constant hum of the Princess Hwy not too far away, and the construction of the apartment blocks behind, and imagine a quieter time when there would have been nothing but the flow of the river and swaying trees for company. 

 

The front portico's were a good challenge to sketch and reminded me a little of sketching the rotunda at Balmoral Beach. By the time the line work on the building was finished time was short so the trees of the garden were captured best I could with just paint brush and trying to remember to vary tone, colour and markings so it didn't appear too flat.  

The second historic Sydney property was Strickland House which welcomed visitors last Sunday. No denying that my Tempe House sketch influenced composition here and the similar shape of the portico was less confronting this time. In very strong winds, but brilliant blue sky, I got down the building lines in pen (all but for that fiddly iron work on the verandahs) and mapped out the washes of colour from the distinct shadows. The green foliage was added once home, and here I tried for a looser and less distinct garden than the previous sketch. The shadows also got a boost of colour and darkening.

Beach Sketching

 

 Lately I've been sketching down by the water.

 

There are still many buildings I prefer sketched with closer observation and precision, but sitting on the sand or hillside, overlooking crashing waves and enjoying a sea breeze tends to push the need for accuracy aside and respond more in colour and play.

 

 

Here's the Freshwater Beach Ocean Bath with a view to Manly Beach in the distance. A Pied Cormorant, one of my favourite birds of the area, sits high atop the light pole. Observing all and preparing to dive for its next fish.

 

An IRB (inflatable rescue boat) ready to go out in last week's heavy swell.

Expressive Urban Sketching Workshop - Cockatoo Island.

Last week I attended the wonderful Expressive Urban Sketching Workshop held on Cockatoo Island hosted by Liz Steel and Paul Wang. I've shared some details about my experience on the Urban Sketchers Australia Blog here if you'd like to read more.

Sydney Sketch Club at Cafe Bones

Willow, Rocket and Humphrey

On a sunny weekend morning Sydney Sketch Club met to sketch dogs at Cafe Bones in Leichhardt. Expecting to find a couple of dogs content to sit still or perhaps even asleep was ridiculous of me in hindsight.  Dogs were running, playing, sniffing, barking - but of course never sitting perfectly still for a portrait! Even those kindly held for us by their owners constantly twitched their ears and turned their heads in all directions to the activity around them. But it was loads of fun and the perfect exercise for forcing to sketch fast which is what I  need. Will definitely go again. 

Exploring The Rocks. Week 1.

Sydney Opera House. Tracing contours with expressive lines.

When thinking of The Rocks in Sydney, my mind begins wandering down it's quaint little laneways. Picturing Colonial buildings tucked away in tight spots, hosting cafes and restaurants and its fair share of the upmarket tourist shops. With my thoughts in that space, I often forget that only a few hundred metres away, across Circular Quay, sits the Sydney Opera House in all her glory.

 

So it was an unexpected, but welcome surprise that the Sydney Opera House was the on location sketch subject in our first week of Liz Steel's "Exploring The Rocks" workshop. After a dose of theory in an old Rocks prison cell (roughing it with fabulous coffee and fine French pastries), we left for a grassy park and sat in the shade of a tree, sketching away. A great benefit of a teacher who is also an architect is the added insight into the structure of a building and the tips on what to focus on. Most memorable was that the front part of the podium on which the house sits was designed partly to reflect the shape of the heads at the entrance to Sydney Harbour.

Sydney Urban Sketchers at Town Hall

Hero Pen (bent nib), De Atramentis Archive ink with watercolour wash. 270gsm paper.

Yesterday our local Urban Sketchers group gathered at Sydney Town Hall. It's a fantastic area for interesting architecture with the surrounding buildings of the Town Hall and St Andrew's Cathedral as well as the Queen Victoria Building in the next block.

 

 

I've signed up for Paul Wang and Liz Steels' expressive sketching workshop in March, so my goal was to try to loosen up with watercolour and less line. An A4 Beta Stillman and Birn from Larry Post last year (the thick pages are great for working wet on wet, so I've been saving it for when I'm feeling more courageous) served well for this. Fate also had a hand with my other choices as my favourite Lamy pen and waterbrushes are sadly missing somewhere. However, with the most perfect of timing, Liz brought along a new Hero pen from her Penang/Singapore trip! I've tried a similar pen with a bent tip (Sailor pen) before and it gives a lovely variation in line thickness as you draw.

 

 





A strategy which worked well yesterday was to lay a first layer of wash down on one page for the watercolour only sketch, and then whilst that dried, sketched with the Hero pen in more detail on the other page. Picking up on preferred patterns and shadows from the detailed pen sketch that could then be layered back onto the watercolour sketch as the progressing layers dried.

 

Sydney Town Hall is one of Australia's finest examples of French Second Empire architecture. Designed by architect J H Willson in 1868, it is said to be inspired by Hotel de Ville in Paris. Festoons, finials and Mansard pavilions - lots to learn about this style of architecture that I have not drawn before.

 

These sketching mornings always pass so quickly. With not much time to go I found this carved angel figure at the front door of the St Andrew's Cathedral. So many, many, many more things to sketch in this area. Looking forward to returning.