Making Room For Carriage Wheels

Posted on April 19, 2015 by Larry Marshall

Our weather is marginal for sketching outdoors but the long winter has me pressing the limits of my cold tolerance. I’m also motivated by the knowledge that at this time of year, there are areas in the old city that are more conducive to sketching (ie – you can see what you want to sketch) than they are later in the year when the tourists are here.

So, I put on a couple layers and headed downtown, to an area near the port area called Place Royale. The most important feature there is a gorgeous church but I was after smaller game.

I was going to draw the corner of a wall – a special corner of a wall. Streets in Quebec City during the 18th Century were narrow. Carriage wheels, on the other hand, were very large and protruded out from the carriage, making it difficult to negotiate a carriage around the corners.

The solution was to inset the corners of the buildings for the first eight feet of so, creating an odd-shaped corner with no explanation if you wander the streets in the 21st Century. But now, when you come to Quebec, you’ll know why some of the corners look like this:

Stillman & BIrn Beta (6×8), Sailor Profit calligraphy pen, DeAtramentis Document Black, Daniel Smith watercolors

Sketching The Musee De La Francophonie

Posted on April 16, 2015 by Larry Marshall

I’m just giddy with excitement that I’m getting some days that are warm enough for me to get out sketching on the street. It’s a good time too as tourists aren’t yet filling the old city streets so I’m able to sketch some things in that area that are normally difficult because of all the people.

One such place is the Musée de l’Amérique francophonie. It’s part of a complex of structures that used to be a seminary and Université Laval. The university moved, long ago, from the downtown area but its Department of Architecture still resides in one of the buildings. These buildings have a rich history and I’ve sketched several of them but never the Museum entrance because it faces the town square and is next to a huge cathedral that is a tourist attraction.

But tourists won’t show up until it’s a bit warmer so I sat and sketched this grand structure. Nothing better than sitting in the sun, coat zipped up, and sketching. Hmm…no, it’s better without needing the coat zipped up.

Stillman & Birn Gamma (10x7), Sailor Fude pen, De Atramentis Document Black

Stillman & Birn Gamma (10×7), Sailor Profit calligraphy pen, De Atramentis Document Black

Field Notes As A Sketching Medium

Posted on April 16, 2015 by Larry Marshall

I’ve written several blog posts talking about my experiments with various small (3×5) notebooks as a medium for quick-sketching. I’ve tried the Moleskine Cahier, the Baron Fig Apprentice and most recently Field Notes. I even made a small binder for Field Notes to provide some support backing while sketching. I think I’m about to bring that quest to an end and thought I report on what I’ve seen and what I’ve concluded from the experiments. I wonder if Ponce-de-Leon and Coronado felt the way I do when they figured out that the fountain of youth and the city of gold were myths.

If I were quick-sketching with pencil, or ballpoint, this approach would work quite well. But for fountain pens and certainly light watercolor washes, the paper is simply too cheap and too thin to handle the task. Anything but the finest fountain pens will bleed through, causing the back side of the paper to be unusable. I’m actually ok with that, though this reduces these notebooks to 24 pages making one (me) wonder why I’m not simply using better paper even if it costs a couple cents more. Watercolor washes fail on two counts. The paper buckles and the watercolor soaks in immediately and none of the techniques one (me) wants to use are possible. Here are a few examples:

Bronze head — Pilot Falcon – some bleedthrough when I attempted to darken some areas

Pilot Falcon — this produces some ghosting but no bleedthrough except where I darkened shadow in lower section

I love Tootsie-Pops. This was interesting as I used the Pilot Falcon but a Pentel brush pen for shading. No bleedthrough at all.

Large bronze leaf/boat statue in front of the market area. Pilot Falcon and some light watercolor. All watercolor work buckled the papers considerably, though they sort of flattened once dried

So, in the end I’ve learned a few things. Mostly I’ve learned that what I said a long time ago remains true. To get good results you have to use good paper, at least I do. Another thing remains true. There isn’t any in a thin, small format. The closest I’ve gotten to that was a small sketchbook I made by cutting up several sheets from one of my Stillman & Birn sketchbooks but I’m trying hard not to go down the road of making sketchbooks.

We’re Having A Heat Wave

Posted on April 14, 2015 by Larry Marshall

They say it’s not going to last but right now it’s warm, or rather what those of us who have been freezing for the last five months call warm. Heck, it was 14C (57F) when I went out sketching on Monday. Most important, though, there was no wind, which makes all the difference in the world.

It seems I”m out of fighting form, however. I walked a lot and ended up with blisters on both feet. Too much couch potato time this winter, I guess. Anyways, I found myself downtown and when I saw this little convenience market (we call them depanneurs here) I had to sit down and sketch it. What a thrill. Absence makes the heart grow fonder even if you’re talking about street sketching.

At one point the guy who owned the store came across the street to see what I was up to and I was somewhat embarrassed as I wasn’t far enough along to give him much indication of the final result. He didn’t seem to mind though, and the encounter underscored that I was back – sketching on the street. Yippee!!!!

Stillman & Birn Gamma (10x7), Pilot Falcon, De Atramentis Document Black

Stillman & Birn Gamma (10×7), Pilot Falcon, De Atramentis Document Black

Spring Has Sprung – Almost

Posted on April 12, 2015 by Larry Marshall

It’s been rainy and windy for the past couple days but it was sunny today, though we still had 30 km/h winds. It had reached 5C as I headed out for a walk, but the wind made it feel much colder. As I walked I talked to the trees, asking them why they hadn’t started to bud since it was already mid-April. They just shook their heads in the wind and said, “Are you kidding me?”

But I was determined to do some walking and, the optimist in me thought about sketching. I walked for over an hour and was on my way home when I saw a possibility. I tucked myself into the entrance of a building and out of the wind. I was still in the sun though giving me the best shot at not freezing to death. I started sketching a church steeple that’s associated with the hospital near my house. I worked as quickly as I could and this is the result. Hope you like it. Hope it gets warmer sometime soon.

Stillman & Birn Gamma (10×7), Pilot Falcon, De Atramentis Document Black