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.

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.

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!

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.

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 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.