Theatro municipal

This is an architectural gem - and a nightmare to sketch. Forgot to mention it is in Rio ...

 In the first one, I started with the cylinder and the dome, then worked my way from there to the sides. I used Pentel Hybrid Technica 0.3. I bought a set of 4 to try out. I am always short of black pens. I like the line, it flows smoothly. I think they will be my main sketching tool in Brazil.

The second one was just brush - this would be the fastest way to capture something. I wanted to see how much - or how little - information that meant.

In the last one, I applied the analytical sketching method - I started with the big shapes: the box for the left side of the building, the cylinder of the front dome, the box connecting these two parts, the box for the right side of the building.Then I started adding details.

Leaves

I picked up a couple of branches with dried leaves and sketched them multiple times. It is a relatively new habit - to sketch the same subject more than once. I don;t do it often enough and mostly it ie because lack of time. I am happy to find time to do something, anything on a given day...

 I bought a set of cheap guache - Reeves. I wanted to try them without spending a fortune. I was under the impression that they would be more matte. I guess they are, but the coverage is not uniform and that might be because of their quality.

Watercolor and water-soluble graphite in the other two. The sketchbook is Canson multimedia. Not a great paper I must say, good for dry media only. I bought it for the dynamic drawing class and it is a bigger size than i would normally use - 9x12. Turns out that so far I like the size.

Atwater market

Determined to use the divider in spite of what Mother Nature might have in store, I went to Atwater market.
The first attempt was using the divider for the main lines, the rest I eyeballed. I wanted a building that holds together, not a photographic rendering. I am interested in the feel of the sketch than in the accuracy of every detail. I can take a picture for that purpose.

It took a while I must say... almost 1 hr. I realized that I will simply not have enough to sketch during my trip to Brazil if I take one hour for a not-very-complicated sketch. Not to mention the workshops at the symposium where the time is even more limited.

For the next attempt I used a caligraphy pen and no divider - I had to work fast and skip details.

I am not a big fan of sketching with instruments that produce a thick, heavy, black line, but I think it would be good to practice sketching with a thicker line - maybe charcoal, graphite sticks, crayons. Ideally, only the essence of the subject would make it on paper...

Coffee in the rain

Few days ago I went out to sketch at the Loyola campus. There are some older buildings with a lot of character and I wanted to practice the use of the proportional divider. As soon as I sat down to sketch, it started raining...oh well... I ws not about to cut my morning short because of that, but instead of architecture, I drew coffee and muffin - in pencil. It was the only thing I had. I added some gouache later.

The cherries, not the cake ...

I am unabashedly indulging my second addiction - cherries ....

The page was pre-painted. I used sepia acrylic ink spread with a straw. I then squeezed cherry juice and spread it on the page, then I used colored pencils for the fruit. The juice remains sticky, so using pen is probably not a good option.

Analytical sketching

The class is over, but I hope the teachings remain...

Perspective studies

I spent the day in Vieux Ste-Rose yesterday trying to get the hang of the proportional divider and other tricks to make perspective drawing more manageable. Some people are good at guesstimating angles, volumes etc. I am a spatial dyslexic. What I see and what is on paper sometimes have very little in common. Hence the use of tools. I had t he proportional divider for a while, but I obtained mixed results with it. I figured out why yesterday.

Before lunch we went outside for about an hour to practice measuring angles and distances. I chose to draw the Centre d'art.

It came out relatively ok - it holdes together. There was a lot of measuring and erasing that's for sure and I kept thinking about the popular advice of drawing everything directly in ink. Great advice for those who are not spatially challenged ...

After lunch we went behind the church to find a spot and draw the church itself. I used a view finder to draw a border on the page (9x12 schetchbook used for the dynamic drawing class). I also determined how much space there was between the building and the frame. I then took out the divider and started placing the vertical lines and determining the width of the building.

Somehow, my church did not fit on paper the same way it did when I looked through the viewfinder... hmmm...interesting ..... I finally clicked. I kept changing the position of the divider - sometimes it was vertical and sometimes horizontal. Ha!!! Once I figured that one out, the church fit better on the page.

It took a good two hours to come up with this:

of 

The great thing about it is that it holds and that is what I want. I am not interesting in photographic rendition of whatever it is I am drawing, but a building has to hold together. When it does not, it hurts to look at it, it is that bad.

I am in the middle of packing to move so time is becoming an issue. I hope to be able to draw at the Loyola campus before I move.  It has a variety of architectural styles to choose from.

Blackout poetry

I read "Steal like an artist" and re-discovered found poetry. I used to have two sets of magnetic words on my fridge - one Italian and one English. Every know and then I rearranged them, individually or combined, and come up with bilingual poetry.

This time, I played with newspapers - blacked out with marker all the words, except the ones I liked. I glued the paper in the sketchbook and doodled with a Galaxy pen. Fun ...

Here, there are three columns of an article glued next to each other. 

Here are the results:

The Wall

the virtues and vices

vaccinated me 

against the 

blockbuster.

Earlier assumptions

freedom

benevolence

disenchantment

with deep impact on

right to explain

justice and fairness.

Fiercely,

the inequalities

"I belong" temptations

reopen 

with a fresh eye.

Listen

teach 

intervene 

guide 

deal with reason

The theory taught

reading

the happy story

spikes

simply urges

role playing more intense than realistic scenarios

A minimum of involvement is required. 

Ask

that seed 

to take note.

Drink

look

think

sculptural

versatility

beautiful and 

noble

Create 

light magnet

love illuminated

real.

Peony

When I reached this prepainted page in the journal, I was not sure what to draw on it. In the end I decided to use my hair clip as inspiration - it has a peony in the same pinkish shades that were already on the page. I drew three views of the flower.

Matcha latte

I was at the Second Cup the other day with only a ballpoint pen sampling their matcha latte.

Added colored pencils at home many days later ...