Small Sketch Series Continued

I’m continuing to fill my small Moleskine watercolor book with sketches.  Doing a bit of experimenting, having a lot of fun.  I do enjoy this format, though I wish the Moleskine was in portrait format.  As you’ll see, most of the sketches I’ve done are in portrait format.  Personally, I’m still waiting for Stillman & Birn to do a 3×5, small sketchbook with their great papers, preferably their Beta or Zeta papers.

Until then, here’s a few more small sketches.

2013-07-28MoulinOven

This young woman was stoking the fire of an outdoor oven associated with a historic Jesuit mill in the Quebec area. Most of the time she was chopping wood but I did this quick sketch of her tending the fire.

2013-07-28TraitCarreLibrary

Part of the Charlesbourg library roof is grass covered and you can walk up there. From there you can see another wing of the building which sports this tower. I sat, on a very windy day trying to keep my sketchbook from blowing away as I made this sketch.

2013-07-28TraitCarreLamp

A somewhat different lamp that I found in Charlesbourg. Just a quick ink sketch that took only a few minutes.

2013-07-30QuickBuildings

Part of the Quebec skyline. This was an experiment in quick-sketching using J.Herbin 1670 ink, followed up with a waterbrush to spread the ink a bit. In spite of my typical penchant for straight lines and detail, I liked this one a lot.

2013-07-30FerryPassengers

For some reason, ferry passengers seem in constant motion during the 10 minute trip from one side of the St. Lawrence to the other. These two actually stood still for a couple minutes as I sketched them.

2013-07-31LevisHouseC

The people who get to sit on this terrace are lucky indeed as the house is high on a cliff overlooking the St. Lawrence.

2013-08-05Chimney

I’m a big fan of the complex chimneys on many of the downtown buildings. I couldn’t resist trying to capture the detail of this one.

2013-08-08BouyC

This is one of three navigational bouys that sit in the Canadian Coast Guard park associated with their Quebec City installation.

2013-08-16EntreeBoisDuCoulonge

This is one of a brace of entry markers at the entrance to one of the local parks.

 

Sketching In A Target-Rich Environment

Every year Quebec City holds the Festivale de Nouvelle France.  It is a celebration of the French landing here and setting up shop.  It’s a celebration of French culture.  It’s a celebration of traditional foods.  And it’s a heck of a good excuse for adults to dress up in costumes and roam the streets of old Quebec.

It’s also a great opportunity for sketchers who want to sketch people dressed as peasants, royalty, pirates, military, indians, and vendors.  I was a peasant myself – a peasant with a pen and a sketchbook.

I’m not very good at this kind of sketching.  Generally your subject is in a crowd of people and you have only a very short time to capture their geometry.  Once done, you’ve got a variable, though always short period of time, to fill in the details from a subject that’s moving constantly, often away from, blending back into the crowd.  Here are a few of my attempts; it sure was fun.

2013-08-10QS2 2013-08-10QS3 2013-08-11QS1 2013-08-11QS3 2013-08-11QS4 2013-08-11QS6 2013-08-11QS7

This Is The Back Of The Building?

I was downtown Sunday, waiting for the Festivale de Nouvelle France events to spool up.  I was sitting in the courtyard in front of the Trinity Anglican Church and from there I could see this view of the back of large government building.  I think it’s the finance building.  I decided to sketch it.

I took a somewhat different approach, experimenting a bit.  I spent more time with a pencil, adding more than just layout lines.  I used my typical 3H pencil, but from these light lines, I laid in light color washes before I added any ink to the sketch.  This allowed me, or so I think, to use a lighter hand with the ink lines, which I followed up with more watercolor.  I think, if I knew anything about watercolors, this would be a good approach.  I know it works well for many other sketchers and I’ll continue to pursue it.

I did it in my Stillman & Birn Zeta (5×8) sketchbook, with a Pilot Prera and Noodler’s Lexington Gray ink.

2013-08-11Finance

New Restaurant In Quebec

I don’t have an official count but I think Quebec City has more restaurants per capita than most cities on the planet.   I pass no less than 9 of them on my way to a new one that has just opened and I don’t live in what one might call a dining hotspot.

But open it has, a new Vietnamese restaurant named Ubong.  If the outside is any reflection of the inside, though, I’m sure it will be successful as they’ve completely remodeled the building and painted it with this stunning yellow and green paint and trim.

It’s on a well-traveled street and every once in a while I’d have to stop as a truck or bus blocked my view and there was a steady stream of pedestrians, some of whom stopped to say hello.  I really enjoy this part of street sketching.  It was sketched in my Stillman & Birn Zeta (5×8) and I used a Uniball Signo UM-151 (.38) in black, followed by drawing the window and door frames using a brown-black version of the same pen.  W&N artist watercolors added a bit of shadow and color.

2013-08-06UBONGC

The Thrill Of The Chase

I’m a sketcher… a street sketcher.  What excites me about sketching is the process, not the results.  I love the feeling I have as I sit, studying a subject, drawing lines – oblivious to everything around me.  I love people who stop and ask questions.  Often they’re the same questions (eg – Do you sell these?  Did you go to art school?  How long have you been doing this?) but there’s always a smile attached and some simple chit-chat that connects me to my fellow humans.

And part of the process, for me, is finding something to sketch… the thrill of the hunt.  It’s pretty rare that I plan to go some particular place to sketch some particular thing.  That takes half the fun out of it for me.  I like to just strike out, in any direction, looking for something that catches my attention.

The other day I did just that.  I walked to a main intersection near my house.  There were metro buses that head east/west/north/south and I decided to hop the first one that came along.  I found myself heading east and, once I had passed areas I knew well, I got off the bus.  I continued, walking east until I came across a small park.

I walked into it and sat on a bench.  I looked around.  There were ravens in one end of the park and I thought about sketching them.  There were swings, slides, and what looked like a hamburger that kids could ride.  It sat on a large spring.  These would make a nice sketch, too.

Then I noticed a small mechanics shop stuffed between two larger buildings.  I walked to that corner of the park, picked out a shady area, plunked myself down on my tripod stool, and started this sketch.

My hunt was a success.  I spent a blissful hour while my pen entertained me as no television ever could.  Life is good.

2013-08-02MechaniqueC

Stillman & Birn Zeta (5×8) sketchbook; Pilot Prera pen; Platinum Carbon Black ink; W&N artist watercolors