26th Worldwide Sketchcrawl: New Haven, CT

Sunday, February 28, 2010

Four of us met up at New Haven Green for Sketchcrawl yesterday There wasn't much snow on the ground anymore, but it was still a bit chilly so we headed to the Yale Center for British Art to start things off.

I began with a pencil drawing of a Yale University archway, drawn from one of the windows in the Center. I colored it later with watercolors and Pitt Artists markers.

SketchCrawl 26_NewHaven1

Next, I sketched some of the objects (as well as a fellow SketchCrawler drawing) in the Center's exhibit "Promiscuous Assemblage, Friendship, & The Order of Things." It's an eclectic collection of skeletons, butterflies, curios and art -- it's what might inspire a store like Anthropologie's decor.
Apparently there's a sister exhibit at the Sir John Soanes Museum in London, which I hope to see when I'm there in a few months. (These were drawn in a Muji kraft paper notebook with a Lamy Safari pen/Noodler's ink in Lexington Grey, highlighted with a white Sakura Gelly Roll gel pen and colored with Pitt Artists markers and Caran d'Ache Neocolor II water-soluble crayons.)

SketchCrawl 26_NewHaven2

Two of us then stopped to get some tea and then headed to the Yale University Art Gallery across the street. I drew a late 19th/early 20th century Suku mask from Congo, which is in the Laura + James J. Ross Gallery of African Art, and then a view of the gallery space.

SketchCrawl 26_NewHaven3

Since the gallery was closing at 5, we headed over to Geronimo, a favorite restaurant on Crown St., and sketched while we waited for the other members of our party to join us for dinner. We watched the bartenders and staff preparing for the evening rush of customers, and then I sketched some of the customers at the bar.

SketchCrawl 26_NewHaven4

SketchCrawl 26_NewHaven6

SketchCrawl 26_NewHaven5

Sketching the Olympics from TV

Monday, February 22, 2010

I was inspired by Jennifer Lawson's EDM challenge sketches of Olympic athletes, so I decided to try some myself while watching the games.

First up was ski cross. Since I had recorded the afternoon's broadcast to watch at night, I paused the action and sketched the athlete on the left as he was doing some stretches to warm up. The sketch on the right was done "live" without the pause on -- much harder since these people absolutely zoom down the slopes!

skicross

Here are more ski cross sketches done from "live action":

skicross2

Next I tried my hand at biathlon -- again, all done from the action except the one on the far right, where I paused the recording to get a good look at his shooting stance.

biathlon

I then switched media and took out the dip pen and ink, for some quick studies of the downhill portion of the super combined:

supercombined_downhill

And finally, an impression of U.S. ice dancers Emily Samuelson and Evan Bates skating their original dance program:

orig_dance

Island Time: Bahamas Sketches and Paintings

Wednesday, February 03, 2010

Just got back from a six-day painting workshop trip to Elbow Cay, one of the "out islands" in the Bahamas. The workshop was taught by Susan Abbott, a wonderful artist and teacher whose sketchbooking workshop I had taken last year at the Art League in Alexandria, VA. We stayed at the Hope Town Harbour Lodge, and spent hours each day ogling the Atlantic, painting the lovely pastel-colored houses en plein air, and just watching the fronds of palm trees sway back and forth. I went snorkeling at the coral reef just off the hotel's beach, rode a golf cart to Tahiti Beach at the other end of the island, and climbed up the stairs of the island's iconic mechanically operated lighthouse. While the food options were a bit limited (there are only a handful of restaurants on the island, and anything stocked in the small "grocery" stores has to be ferried in), the views and weather more than made up for it.

We started off with a few quick sketches as we took a walk through Hope Town:

A peek at the sea

Street shadows in Hope Town

Color study in Hope Town

Boats in Hope Town Harbour

Then I set up my easel on the beach and did this larger painting:

View of beach from the lodge

As I walked through town, I'd spotted a bright red shutter on the firehouse and decided to paint that:

Hope Town Fire & Rescue

Here's a quick sketch of the water as seen from a bench on a bluff overlooking the beach:

Beach view from the high bench

And here's an alley in town, sketched at twilight:

Hope Town alley

When we went to Tahiti Beach, we came upon a group of kiteboarders with their colorful equipment. I had to work fast to capture them:

Kiteboarders at Tahiti Beach

And here's a quick sketch of that beach:

Near Tahiti Beach

A color study of a wall in town:

Colorful wall in Hope Town

On our last day of painting, the weather wasn't very cooperative. I started this painting on the beach as the sun rose, but finished it under the hotel's awning as a torrential rain set in.

Cottage at Hope Town Harbour Lodge

We did a color study exercise; I worked on this while waiting for the paint on my other work to dry:

Poster-style color study

The rain eventually subsided, and we sat at the Harbor's Edge restaurant and painted after lunch. It's not quite clear what time of day it is in this painting, as I made the sky rather too dramatic!

A view of the lighthouse