I walk a lot which means that I know every park within a couple hours walk of my house because I often take a break in them. One such park is in Limoilou and it has a public pool.
I was sitting in the park, resting my bones when I decided that it was worthy of a sketch. It’s not the best composition ever put to paper and it was done quickly, but it was fun so I share it here.
Stillman & Birn Alpha (5.5×8.5), Platinum 3776, Platinum Carbon Black
This time of year is crazy for me. It’s entirely self-inflicted, though our orbiting world has some play in the matter. You see, we’re hurtling towards the Autumnal Equinox. Now, if you live in Arizona this probably means nothing to you but if you’re a sketcher, living in Quebec City, it means everything.
The Autumnal Equinox means my days as a street sketcher are numbered because it will soon be too cold to sketch outdoors. It’s leaning that way already. And so, each year, without intention, I become frantic to “get out there and sketch.” I can’t help myself. There are also the “We gotta go _fill in the blank_ before it gets too cold to do so” events and this adds short trips to hither and yon in an attempt to keep up with an Earth that’s flying along at 108,000 km/h. How’s a guy to keep up?
So, we’ve been day-tripping and I’ve been sketching and the days have become so full that I don’t have any time to even scan my sketches, let alone write blog posts about them.
So I apologize for my lack of presentation but rest assured, I’ll make up for it as things slow down a bit. In the meantime, here’s a rather quick sketch I did of a cute little storage building (not sure of its orignal purpose) that lives in the Parc des governors in Quebec City.
Stillman & Birn Beta (8×10)
The symbol of Quebec City is the Chateau Frontenac. I call it Hogwarts as that’s what it reminds me of, when I don’t see it as a tourist attraction. There’s a large terrasse that runs along in front of it and Chantal and I were sitting there, taking a break from a long walk we were taking.
We decided to draw. It would have been impossible to draw the entire Frontenac as we were far too close to even see it in it completely, so Chantal drew one of the towers while I drew this portion of it. I did it fast enough that some wonkiness (as Liz Steel calls it) was baked into the result and I confess that I like that. Hope you do too.
Stillman & Birn Beta (8×10), Platinum 3776
While my daughter was visiting we were at Parc Cartier-Brebeuf, a park near my house. It’s on the St. Charles River and was the spot where Cartier overwintered during one of his trips to what is now Quebec City.
While Chantal and Jodie talked, I did this sketch of the information center of the park.
Stillman & Birn Beta (8×10), Platinum 3776
I’ve long thought that I should do a series of sketches of Quebec City doors. We have many stately, carved or otherwise detailed doors and a set of detailed sketches of them would be nice. This is one of those doors, though this was done rather quickly as I leaned against a wall on a windy day. It is the entrance to the Tetu estate home, an 1800s home in the old city.
Stillman & Birn Alpha (5.5×8.5), Esterbrook J9550