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.

Enjoying holidays in Western Australia.

We often look forward to visiting family interstate in December and this year we made our way to Margaret River, Western Australia. It's situated 3 hours drive south of Perth.  Away from the bustle of cities but close to beautiful beaches and surrounded by wonderful huge Karri Tree forests.

 

We stayed at the lovely home above known as "Ithaca". When building the home from scratch they felt it may take as long as Homer's return voyage home to Ithaca to complete (20 years!). They say it's still unfinished but in its ideal bush setting and beautiful collections of old treasures inside, in my eyes it is a stunning home.

 

On several days I chose to draw from the various items framed upon the wall or displayed around the home. Very relaxing!

 

We took a day trip to Busselton and whilst the rest of the family had lunch I attempted to sketch the Courthouse Gallery. The building was used as a Courthouse for 120 years before ceasing its service in the 1970's. The sun was burning hot, and the wind also dried the pigments on the palette so I wasn't overly happy at the time but a local watercolour artist did stop to chat whilst I drew which cheered me.

 

 

For the last evening of our stay we drove back up to Perth and stayed at the grand Esplanade Hotel in Fremantle. Fremantle is an old portside suburb that's be given a facelift and retains some fantastic buildings full of character. I hope I make it back with more time to sketch there another time. I have to give credit to my own family and in laws for tolerating my sketching at almost every opportunity on this trip! This sketch above was very rushed but in reality it was probably the speed I need to get back to after such a lazy holiday!

Sketching Architecture - Weeks 3 and 4

 

Week 3 of Liz Steel's Sketching Architecture course was on perspective. I took a page full of notes and great tips during the theory session which were all things I'd like to recall easily when I'm sketching on site. Depicted above is The Union Bond Store. A single bay sandstone warehouse at 47 George St, The Rocks, Sydney. Constructed in 1841. It still features its gantry beam and paired warehouse doors on each floor. To the left is the “First Impressions” Sandstone relief sculpture symbolising the origins and settlement of the colony.

 

 

Our final class was on developing contrast and textures. As the sun was having a hard time shining there was little in the way of cast shadow. We focussed on textures using a variety of methods such as wet on wet watercolour, splashing, using watercolour pencils under and over the watercolour washes, as well as scraping pencil lead over sandpaper to create fine specks of colour.

 

The last sketch session was at Susannah Place - a terrace of four small brick houses built in 1844. It’s remained largely unchanged from its original layout and features through to the 21st century and so shows us how some of the working families of this area have lived for many generations. It’s another of those places that always catches my attention when I’m walking through the Rocks (always tempted to take the little laneways instead of noisy George St).

 

I've been grateful for the opportunity to attend Liz's classes in Sydney this year. It's been rewarding to learn from her and see her demonstrate first hand so much that I have never managed to learn elsewhere. I have great hopes that she'll run more architecture course in 2014 and that I'll be in the position to take them.

 

 

 

Store Espresso, Camperdown

During this sketch I was determined to add a person as a part of a record of my experience in the café. The staff were attentive, courteous and also happy for me to draw and paint. Much appreciated! 

 

Baristas seem to be a good place to start introducing figures because they are so often only viewed in parts - rarely the whole - and even if they move, there is a very good chance they will return to the same position soon after. Plus, in my view,  anyone who has the ability to make a great coffee deserves some kind of immortalization. 

Who doesn't like a good tea party?

A very girly morning tea with sketching friends at home. An excellent excuse to buy flowers for the house, play some classical music, use grandma's fine bone china tea cups and eat sweet pastries.

 

 

 

I warmed up the day before by sketching this tea cup from my grandmother.

 

 

 The pastries we forgot to paint (but didn't forget to eat)

Luna Park Sydney

Before the craziness of the September school holidays hit, Ethna, Suzi and I made a dash to Luna Park Sydney for some colourful sketching. The park was originally built in the 1930s and although it has gone through various rebuilds it still holds an old day charm. The concept of the front gate face was taken from the Melbourne Luna Park and the old Steeplechase Park of Brooklyn, New York. The current face is based on the 1950s Sydney version.

 

 Luna Park is situated near the North end of the Sydney Harbour Bridge. It felt a little surreal on this super windy Spring day to sit with our backs to such landmarks as the Opera House and Bridge in order to paint the garish face.

 

 

I had left my watercolours at home in a hasty departure, so used pastel pencils instead to add colour to my sketches. The second sketch of Coney Island was much faster and easier to do after the detailed front gate. The world's only remaining functional funhouse of its era, Coney Island remains mostly unchanged in concept, games and décor style since being built in 1935.

 

 

 

My biggest annoyance of the day was not using watercolours as this was the first two pages of the Stillman and Birn A4 Beta Series I had decided to break open. So on returning home I bumped up the colours with watercolour... and watercolour pencils.. and white gel pen. The 270 gsm paper held up well to all of  this abuse and it was good to work in this large portrait size.

More pics here on Urban Sketchers Australia

Returning to classes with Liz Steel

Liz Steel is running classes to revisit fundamentals touched on in the first course.  But even in that month or so off from focusing on learning, not just sketching for the sake of it, my mind had rusted. So for the first week, apart from the planned lesson itself, through my own frustration I received another about slowing down, really looking hard and not just making assumptions about the subject.. and then finally to live with it, get over it and move on (very helpful to have a teacher who reminds us to not let stress or worry over a result ruin the joy of creating it in the first place).

 

This weeks class had a much happier outcome. We focussed on studies firstly with line work and hatching and then repeated the same subject using watercolour for form, tone and shadows.

 

 

This was a really good way of firstly understanding the subject with the lines and then shaking off the confines of that first sketch and being able to let that go and relax more with the paints. Added to this we had the most beautiful weather and spent the whole class outside at Balmoral Beach under the shade of the Rotunda and then the huge fig trees. A great upside of sketching on location when the weather is nice!

 

Our class is having a lot of fun discussing the expressive lines and work of talent such as Veronica Lawler and Nathalie Ramirez . Their use of colour and line is so full of life. I've started to experiment a little this weekend with coloured linework and brighter pigment mixes. Referring to a black and white photo of Frida Kahlo I first sketched her in  pale blue fineliner (happy to find my pack of Staedtelr Triplus fineliners are fairly water resistant), added the main features in with my Lamy and then celebrated with lots more fineliner and watercolour. Loved the effects of bright pigments mixing in puddles of water.

Queen Victoria Building Sydney - from the inside

A quick venture into the city on Friday gave me time for a 30 mins shot at onsite sketching inside the beautiful old Queen Victoria Building in George Street, Sydney. The building in its current state is a shopping complex but has had various purposes in the past and was first built in 1898. I'm keen to sketch the outside but finding a good spot to view the building from where I won't be trampled by the busy street traffic (both car and pedestrian) will be a challenge. On this day I settled on the comfort of a café inside. The decorative arches and pretty coloured glass above the shop windows offered a good start.

 

 

The initial foundation lines are watercolour pencil which I don't erase but wash away when I introduce the watercolour paint later. Then with my extra fine nib in my fountain pen I add the black lines with a waterproof ink which once dried can withstand the wash of watercolour paint. Often, as I have done here I tend to add more pencil work than necessary (I should be leaving much of the details like the coat jacket and tie for just ink to save time).

 

 

I finished the colour and much of the ink details at home afterwards.

Urban Sketching - The Boat House at Balmoral.

This week I headed to the recently opened Boat House at Balmoral Beach, Sydney

Ideally I would have grabbed a seat outside with water views but the café was so busy that my only option was inside. Fortunately the décor all around is beautifully styled so its not hard to find an entertaining angle.

All of the drawing and most of the watercolour was completed onsite in about an hour and a half. I added a little more shading and colour intensity when I arrived home. I took a photo of two fishing buoys and found a postcard by The Boat House for inspiration on the opposing page in my sketchbook. Completed with watercolour pencils for foundation lines, waterproof ink, chinagraph pencil and Daniel Smith watercolours.

 

On another note, I sketched for the first time in the dentist waiting room today and it really helped me stay calm and distracted. Definitely worth trying again in the future.

Gargoyles and Bell Tower

Spurred on by the excitement of many sketchers making their way to the Urban Sketchers Symposium in Barcelona next week, it was time to challenge myself with some old and beautiful local architecture in Manly. Nothing quite like Gaudi's  La Sagrada Familia but very special for our area.



Watercolour pencil (for foundation lines), black waterproof ink,
white chinagraph pencil and Daniel Smith Watercolours.

 

St Andrew's PresbyTerian Church, built from local white sandstone, was completed in 1890 and is considered one of the finest examples of Romanesque revival architecture in Australia. As I was choosing a spot to set up my sketch, a kind elderly couple offered me a look inside. Such luck! I'd not been inside before and was very impressed with the condition of the church's interior.

 

 

 

During my quick guided tour the gentleman pointed out this old framed photo (excuse my snap with the reflection of the stained glass window from behind). It is a pic of the church taken last century before its renovation. I love that it had high backed cane chairs instead of hard wooden pews. Looks very tropical and relaxed. Slow turning ceiling fans, a good book and a waiter serving Singapore Slings wouldn't have looked out of place. 

 

 

 

I also love a good gargoyle on old buildings and this one has four on the bell tower. Unfortunately as they were way up there, and I was way down below (and a tad short sighted) I couldn't get much detail from a live sketch. I'm considering adding field glasses to my sketching kit.

Play time. Week 8 of Liz Steel's sketch course.

Another fun day, but tinged with a little sadness that it was our last class. What a term we've had. Liz has taught us so much and continued to encourage us constantly throughout the duration of the course. There's been a shift in my sketching and the intensity of colour used , but I also recognise a change in confidence and my willingness to tackle things I would not previously try.

  

 

 

 

For our cafe sketch this week we went to Chica Bonita - a lively little restaurant in Manly with wonderful decor, music, vibe, food, drink, lighting. Everything just right for getting us to play. I ordered a watermelon margarita to further aid the loosening of the lines and decided to draw it against the backdrop of the tiles from the table and next to a feature from the wall. This sketch incorporates every bit of play technique I could remember from the earlier studio discussion - sketching with watercolour pencils, using a white chinagraph pencil (it resists the watercolour paint), salt (from my margarita glass), scraping wet paint with the credit card, white gel pen, wet on wet colours, splashing and most of all remembering not to be too serious about the outcome.

 

Thanks once more to Liz, its been a great learning experience. You can read more about this weeks class here on her blog.

 

Links to my posts on the earlier classes:

Week 1

Weeks 2 & 3

Weeks 4 & 5

Weeks 6 & 7

 

More lessons with Liz Steel - context and composition.

Having earlier touched on some fundamental drawing lessons for buildings, Weeks 6 and 7 of Liz Steel's Urban Sketching course was focussed on context and composition.

The aim of week 6 was creating life around an object (often a building). Placing the main object into context. This assists with the concept of creating a story for urban sketching. It's also an area I tend to neglect. Partly because I'm chicken.

Liz had us warm up in the studio with sketching from photos of models from art reference books.

 

These two faces were finished later from black and white photos.

We also drew trees and cars. Palms, Pines and Gums are the trees I associate the most with Sydney. My greens need a bit more oomph here - a bit more summer to them.  

Once finished in the studio, we were then off to Manly Wharf where we gathered at the traffic lights. Here we sketched people as they waited in the rain for the lights to change. Sketching people within a such a short time frame is all very new to me. I learnt quite a lot and know that I would have continued to bypass sketching people if it weren't part of this course. Having the direction of an accomplished sketcher who is encouraging and enthusiastic made a huge difference.

 

 

Week 7 was about Composition. Balancing a blend of text, headings and images around the page to again help tell a story about the location and also communicate the feeling and atmostphere of the moment.




My studio cup and saucer sketch.. without my unbalanced composition!

 

Liz challenged with randomly selected layouts. We had to sketch a cup and saucer onto the page in the assigned area and then build a balanced composition around it. My composition for this one was messy when I added the words. I painted it later at home, once I regained some confidence! Filling in text to balance composition with an image, whilst maintaing a flow of seemingly effortless prose  is due for a bit of development.

 

It came together a bit better when we then set out to sketch at one of my favourite cafes in Manly, Foundry Fiftythree: huge tables allowing plenty of room to sketch, unique items decorating the walls, cool teapots, good coffee and good food.

Sadly, we're nearing the end of our course with Liz. Just one more class and then we will be left to our own devices. Fortunately, Liz has taught us plenty, she shares a great deal of her ideas online and she is considering teaching more courses. If you'd like to read more about her classes Liz shares her ideas here, and you can also find reviews of Liz's course on class mate Suzi Poland's blog.

Colour.

I've been heavily reliant on a technical knowledge of watercolours, colour mixing, colour wheels etc that was learnt in about grade 4 (about 10 years old?) and not greatly developed since then. It's been a wonderful way to work and play. Frankly, I have enjoyed being naive about certain things because there is a level of freedom to it. As if I can't be held responsible for creating better watercolour work due to my ignorance of how to do it. But now I want to move on. 

 

Thankfully, surrounding this (slightly embarrassing) realisation has been the course I'm taking with Liz Steel and her fantastic knowledge, experience and ethusiasm. Liz's passion for watercolour pigments is evident in her work as well as commentary.

 

In our class we covered hue, value, intensity, cool vs warm, use of complementary colours for shadows, mixing colours, wet/damp/dry technique comparison and more. I took many notes and drew pictures and painted colours. But until I start mixing these colours and  using the techniques in sketches, repetitively, none of the newer concepts are easy for me to recall.

 

 

Pittwater Road, Manly

As part of the course we had the option of setting up our travel watercolour palettes with Liz's current favourite colours. Awesome. Now I can at least go forth with my own changes knowing I have a good platform to work from.  With a handy selection of Daniel Smith colours set into half pans, the above was my first outdoors/onsite trial of the new paints.

 

 

 

The following class focussed on buildings. Here we recalled some of what we did early on in the course in relation to form, structure, detail as well as more discussion on perspective.

 

 

 

 

We completed a few very simplified line drawings of incredible, historic, beautiful archtiecture such as Notre Dame from photos (totally gullibe to Liz's clever strategy of boosting our confidence in sketching buildings) and then headed down the Corso, to St Matthews Church. There I became engrossed in detail,  forgetting most of what she'd just taught us about keeping it simple. In order to complete the full picture - both lines and colour on site I still need to work faster. This one was coloured at home.  

 

 I've also created a colour mixing chart from my new palette.  I then set about to further absorb how my colours mix by sketching a Classic Rover from one of my photos, using predominantly just French Ultramine Blue and Burnt Umber. I snuck in some Moonglow because it looked pretty comfortable with the other two. This was really helpful for me to understand how the colours work together.

 

A Week of Coffee

A week of coffee. In order to overcome my fear of filling the panoramic shape of my new watercolour notebook I set out to draw a coffee an hour a day this week (yes, the hardship). Gastronomic rewards aside, it actually looks like I learnt something! By the end of the week I'm filling more of the page, playing with reflections, shadows and instensity of colours.

 

I watched Danny Gregory's interview with Tommy Kane this week. Tommy draws amazing, detailed sketches with pen from the start and accomodates any errors on the way. I agree accepting the errors this way builds confidence of just getting stuck into what's in front. I wouldn't always do this but when I'm trying to get results from short sittings it seems to help.

Little Paper Lane

 

If you love fabulous stationery shops jam packed with awesome goodies (I do!) this place is like heaven. I had been hoping to draw Jayde Leeder's Little Paper Lane for a few weeks and to catch the lovely Christmas themed windows but things have been a little crazy (really, why am I surprised by this?!).  As luck would have it, my little girl had a birthday part in Mona Vale on Saturday so I had a chance to sketch the cute facade with fluro trees and Santa letterbox between party drop off and pick up.

 

I particularly liked the woven hanging baskets out the front and will have to head back when we move house to scout out some wonderful items for my new home.

 

Litte Paper Lane can be found at Shop 5/1 Waratah Street, Mona Vale (Northern Beaches, Sydney) or you can buy online at http://littlepaperlane.com.au/

 

Hemmingway's Manly - Cafe Sketching

 

 

Another recent rainy day, another cafe sketch. This time sketching at Hemingway's Manly. I attempted for the first time to include as much of my surroundings as possible. In retrospect the effect may have been better in landscape than portrait. The masters of this style of urban sketching also manage to round the field of view a little as well - much like a fish eye, wide angle lens. Something I will have to train myself to do! Am yet to get my head around it...

Sketching - the good and the bad.

Continuing on with my sketching in the last few weeks I've noticed a change in how I feel about my "failed" drawings. In the past when I made a drawing I didn't like, it would often result in me packing my pens away for weeks or months until I was ready to try again. However, drawing now most days has taken the pressure off my expectations. If I make a blunder I'm marking it down as one step closer to a better sketch, and just try not to repeat that mistake the next day. 

 

There are still improvements I'd like to make in the following pics but its been a good feeling to produce these sketches of places I enjoy visiting.

 

 

The Secret Closet in Narraweena

 

 

 

Rope & Anchor Cafe in Manly

 

 

 

John & Ginger in Freshwater

Urban Sketching - Finding a spot of quiet

Each day I have drawn, since first starting my sketchbook last week. With it comes new lessons, be it in composition, colour, timing or even from just observing people or buildings in a way I usually don't stop for.

 

Today I positioned myself in a beachside cafe. I've not really tried to "rough" it yet. I still find a nice spot with good coffee as a priority over a great angle or subject.

I settled to draw this lady studying/working in the sunshine across the road. Her minimal surroundings meant I could draw just a few things and as she was focused on her work she wasn't constantly shifting about like the other people all around me chatting in the cafe.

 

I drew her figure first, and then her surroundings which paid off when she got up and left 10 mins after I started the drawing. Now to start reading more blogs and books on the art of Urban Sketching as I am sure there are many tricks to learn about maximising the short time of observation we may have to complete a drawing. 

Urban Sketching - on the path to Shelly Beach

With life's changes I'm becoming time poor for creative play, but I also realise its an integral part to me staying happy. So I'm resolving to combine a variety of trips outdoors or breaks during the day with some quick sketching.

I've invested in a handy little travel kit of watercolour paints, a refillable water pen and a permanent marker (no.3). Today was my first trip out to trial my new kit. I made my way to a spot by the beach to grab a coffee and start drawing and painting.

This one took me an hour all up which I really can't afford just yet. My next ones will have to have less detail and be completed closer to sunrise so that I can fit in everything else for the day!