Quick Stop At The Coffee Shop

Posted on December 27, 2015 by Larry Marshall

I was out for a walk today and stopped into a coffee shop for a quick cup of coffee. In a time when everyone is paying $5 for their fancy, five-word named coffees, it must seem odd to the barista when I just say cafe noir when I’m asked what I want. But they give it to me anyway and I don’t even have to stand in line with everyone else who are waiting for the steam machine to produce their orders. Then again, they get fancy stuff drawn in the foam of their drink and I don’t.

I sat down, drank some coffee and looked out the window. I decided to draw an old guy who was sitting on the opposite side of the room but before I was very far along he got up and left. One must pick targets wisely and I hadn’t. I continued, trying to complete his shape as best I could but eventually I gave up when it came to his extremities. Instead I drew the lamp over his head and then, back to looking outside, I drew the street light. A bit of fun and a bit of coffee. It was time to walk some more.

Hitting The Streets On Christmas

Posted on December 25, 2015 by Larry Marshall

I had an exciting experience today. It’s Christmas, December 25th, and I’m in Quebec City. Our average December high temperatures are 15-16F. But I got a spiffy new pair of gloves for Christmas and I decided to give them a test drive. There is no snow on the ground here, which is almost a miracle. but what definitely is a miracle is that it’s over 40F here today, or 25-degrees above normal. It was warmer yesterday 🙂

And so, though my purpose was to take a walk, I couldn’t resist the thrill of doing a street sketch on Christmas day. I sat on a bench at the edge of a park and drew this little sketch of a gate across the street. The sketch is trivial and yet incredibly significant to me at the same time. Outdoor sketching on Christmas; who’da thunk it?

Stillman & Birn Alpha softcover, Namiki Falcon, DeAtramentis Document Black

Sketchcrawl at Pavilion Laurentienne

Posted on December 20, 2015 by Larry Marshall

In what seems a recurrent theme, I’m way behind in blogging. Maybe it’s the season, or maybe I’m just slowing down. It was a week ago that we held our monthly sketchcrawl, this time at Pavilion Laurentienne, which is a building on the Université Laval campus. They have a series of statues and they were our targets. I missed them entirely, but I’m getting ahead of myself.

I arrived about 15 minutes ahead of schedule and since it wasn’t bitter cold (probably 38F) I decided to try to do a quick sketch of the building entrance. While probably not the right format, I decided to do it in my new, 3×5 softcover Stillman & Birn sketchbook. I sketched it quickly but even so, I was pretty cold by the time I finished so I didn’t add any color until I got warmed up inside.

Stillman & Birn Alpha 3x5, Namiki Falcon, DeAtramentis Document Black

Stillman & Birn Alpha 3×5, Namiki Falcon, DeAtramentis Document Black

Once inside there was the normal meet and greet that starts most of our sketchcrawls. We ended up with eight people and the day was really fun. Everybody but me was sketching statues but I was into ‘testing’ my new sketchbook so I continued with the tiny format. Instead of statue sketching, I began to draw fellow sketchers.

Andre Gagnon was my first subject. He’s not only a really fun guy, he’s a wonderful artist. This day he was doing some fantastic work with a white pencil on black paper.

As I did this sketch I thought about testing something I thought of after I did the review of the Stillman & Birn softcovers. Since the Alpha paper buckles slightly if you use a lot of water, I wondered how not having a hardcover would affect how the book would close. With the hardcovers the buckling isn’t a problem as it happens as the sketch dries and once the cover is closed, the paper tends to flatten out. So, as I added color to Andre, I really dumped a lot of water onto the paper. In fact, it was too much for me to manage as I’m mostly ignorant of wet-n-wet techniques.

I continued these little sketches, avoiding the statues for the day. Here’s one I did of Yvan Breton, artist extraordinaire, who I consider both mentor and friend. Note the “easel” he’s using. It’s hung around his neck, very portable, and it can be used whether standing or sitting. We’ve sort of jointly been improving the design and I’ll do a blog post about it “real soon” (which means I have no idea when I’ll get to it). Again, I went heavy on the water as I wanted several pages that had been abused badly.

There’s one thing I noticed from my sketches that day. I made everyone much fatter than they really are. I wonder if they’re going to speak to me after I post these. We’ll see.

After lunch Yvan started drawing a fig tree that was in the atrium. He said it was hard to capture without adding all the details and I quipped (it’s easy to advise if you don’t have to take the advise), “Just draw it in two minutes and you’ll figure out how to do it.”

Unfortunately, my brain was listening and it decided that I was going to draw the tree quickly. I exceeded “two minutes” by an order of magnitude but I did draw it fairly quickly, leaving out much of the detail. I used watercolor pencils to color this one.

At this point we wrapped up the sketchcrawl and some of us headed for the bus stop. Yvan and I ended up on the same bus and he started drawing a woman he could see in front of him. She had a bright red hat that was an eye-catcher but I couldn’t really see her face because of a “thingie” that blocked my view. I drew her anyway, or at least her hat. This was done in a Field Notes book and thus the gridded paper.

Oh yeah…my watercolor/softcover experiment. The paper holds up better than it should for a 100lb paper, but those of us who use S&B Alpha paper have come to expect that. And I think I’m correct to be a bit more concerned about these softcovers staying closed after soaking pages with watercolor. It’s not a big deal but as there’s no weight to the cover, it simply won’t squish the paper flat. But, I now carry it with a rubber band wrapped around it and all is well. I may even install a more typical closure band if I can ever get caught up on the blogging (grin).

Drawing From Photos

Posted on December 16, 2015 by Larry Marshall

A lot of people draw from photos. In fact, a lot of people think the very idea of drawing on location to be too scary to consider. Some say that drawing from photos is easier than drawing from life because the camera has reduced the image to two dimensions.

So what’s wrong with me? I love sketching on the street, drawing from life, and interacting with those very people that scare others. I sort of understand this part because mostly it’s a fear of the unknown that causes others to avoid this form of sketching. But what about photos? Why do I find it soooooooo hard to draw from photos.

Not only does drawing photos seem hard for me, it’s also not very much fun. Instead of drawing and enjoying the process, I feel as though I’m just copying someone else’s vision of the universe, even if I took the photo. I almost feel numb while doing it, as opposed to the fully-engaged feeling I have when sketching from life.

So I repeat, what’s wrong with me and how do I fix it? I spend five months of the year where it’s hard (impossible?) to work outdoors. Drawing from photographs would go a long way towards making the long dark winters of Quebec more bearable. Is there a pill I can take?

Anyway, I felt the need to draw a building and it’s too cold to do so on location. I turned to photos, in this case a photo I took this summer of Le Petit Hotel, one of the cutest little hotels in Quebec City. Done on Stillman & Birn Beta paper with a Namiki Falcon and DeAtramentis Document Black ink. Then I added some dabs of Daniel Smith watercolors. I didn’t do it justice.

A Morning At The Museum

Posted on December 2, 2015 by Larry Marshall

I realized that I never posted sketches from my last trip to the museum. My only excuse was that I was still dealing with the flu and wasn’t much in a blog-writing mood. But as I looked at them I realized they told a story of the day in a way that only sketches can.

When I arrived at the museum I was feeling ok. Not great but not good enough that I hadn’t cancelled the trip. There were five of us and we all headed to the Egypt exhibition. I realized two things. I’d forgotten my stool and I’d forgotten my light.

The exhibit is pretty dark so it was hard to find a subject where I could get enough light on the paper to see what I was doing. I found this little statue (about 40cm high) and if I stood close enough to its glass case, the spotlight that was on it illuminated my paper, sort of, and so I drew. I remember noting how hard it was to draw something when you stand that close to it. I used a watercolor pencil to add the color.

By the time I finished this sketch, though, I felt like I’d been run over by a truck. I went sat down and stared into the dark for a while, interrupted only by a couple short conversations with students about the drawing above. Mostly I was waiting for the others to finish as I just wasn’t up to standing and sketching.

Eventually I got up and walked to where Claudette was sketching and sat down to watch her. She was mostly in the dark but I decided to do a quick-sketch of her. Mostly I was making it up as it really was hard to see her. In fact, I completely missed the fact that she had a sweater laid over her shoulders. We need more light in our museum exhibits (grin).

When the others were done we headed to the museum cafe for coffee and to share sketches and to talk sketching. This must have revitalized me a bit as while we typically leave after coffee, I decided to stop and do a quick sketch of a fishing creel that’s part of a small historic fishing exhibition going on right now. I guess I felt guilty that I hadn’t accomplished more.

I remember thinking how stupid itwas to be drawing in a museum while feeling the way I do. I also remember thinking that the dedication to drawing that drew me to the museum was why I can’t understand people who say they don’t have time to draw.