The heatwave has driven us into the parks because we can sit in the shade. But before that happened, I’d drawn a little store on the corner of rue Cremazie and rue Cartier in Quebec City and I’d forgotten about it. I added some color to it this weekend and thought I’d share it as a change of pace from all the trees I’ve been drawing lately (grin).
Jinhao ‘el cheapo’ pen, R&K SketchInk (Lily) and DS watercolors
Last week Yvan told me of a group, the Artistes du Parc, who were meeting at a large park, Domain Maizeret, and that he was going there to sketch with them. They are a watercolor group and I tagged along. We had a great time in spite of the heat wave.
When we arrived there was only one person there. She was painting the large community building that’s the centerpiece of the park. It turned out that she was the organizer, Denise Bujold. Denise is a bubbly, enthusiastic person whose personality says “Join us, we’re about to have fun.” I now have a brochure with a schedule of another half a dozen events that she has planned. If you look up the word organizer in a dictionary you might find her picture. Yippee!
Yvan and I did the sketcher thing, which was to wander around, looking for something to draw and then we proceeded to ignore one another for the next hour or so. I went to the other side of the large building and decided to draw the scene shown below, mostly because there was a good patch of shade where I could plunk my butt on my stool and draw. Here, courtesy of Denise, is a photo of my fat self doing just that, or rather faking that I was painting because by then I had finished. I don’t normally have a big, silly grin on my face when I draw but heck, she was taking my picture. Ya gotta smile for the camera.
I’ve got to do something about that tiny tripod stool though. It’s really hard for me to sit down and even harder to get up. I’m convinced that some day I won’t be able to (grin)
I did get to meet another person who came to the event, Nicole. I suspect that most stayed away because this was in the middle of our heatwave and by then we were all hearing about the people dying because of it. Still, it was a great day and the beginning, I hope, of a new sketching/painting relationship.
I’ve mentioned the heat wave that’s occurring on planet Quebec City and it still rages on. Yvan and I thought that maybe we should sketch in my backyard, which is shady and close to a fridge full of ice cold water. This turned out to be a good idea and we had some fun in spite of the heat. Here’s a sketch I did of part of the perimeter of our yard. Too many leaves.
Fabriano Artistico, Pilot Falcon, DeAtramentis diluted brown/black
I’m still trying to integrate my life as a sketcher with my life as a gimpy old man with a bad wrist but I’m finding the problems managable, which makes me happy as a clam. An arthritic clam for sure, but a happy one.
I just got back from Montreal. Went there with a friend and thus I didn’t get to sketch at all, but when I got back I contacted my buddy Yvan about sketching. We decided to head to what was Quebec City’s zoo. A small portion of it has been turned into a park and we figured we could find some shade there and something to draw.
Shade was more important than subject because we’re in the middle of canicule, the time when we start feeling foolish for having complained so much about the cold. Called the ‘dog days of summer’ in English, or on the streets, ‘hotter-than-hell,’ this is the time of people go to hospitals with heat exhaustion. We went sketching.
Truth is, it hasn’t been horrible for us on planet Quebec City because while temps and humidity are very high, we’ve had a nice breeze which has kept conditions tolerable. Oh, and we had shade, lots of shade. We decided to draw the entry gate to the park. It’s a great subject and I didn’t do it justice.
I have to say that I’m out of practice. While I include my drawing and seeing skills in this mostly I’m talking about my juggling skills. I only have two hands and a mouth that can sometimes provide hand-like assistance, so drawing and painting while sitting on a stool is a practiced skill. On this day I was dropping things constantly. My paper towel blew away several times. The water spilled. I knocked my palette off its perch. But I got to sketch and that’s what was important. Not my best sketch ever but sketching isn’t about what you produce, or it shouldn’t be. Here it is, warts and all.
I’ve mentioned the Collectif before, whose complete name is Collectif des ateliers libres en arts visuels de Québec because people here love long, impossible to remember names. They are mostly a portrait group and like nothing more than to sit around a naked person while they draw in a stuffy room. In recent years, though, they’ve discovered that sketching outdoors is fun, too, and so have started scheduling outdoor events during the summer.
They scheduled an event at a large garden in Ste-Foy, or rather Quebec City. Which name you use depends on whether you acknowledge the aggregation of the small cities into what now makes up metro-Quebec City. For me it will always be Ste-Foy though I realize that people reading this blog might be confused by my using the two names to refer to the same place. Such is life on planet Quebec City.
The garden is a large one but mostly rows and rows of different species of plants, and thus most of it is not the same as a typical botanical garden. If I knew more about gardens I’d probably know why this is the case. In any event, it’s a great place to draw flowers but I didn’t do that on this day. Instead, I drew a small kiosk and the surrounding vegetation. It was a nice day and the sketching was relaxing. When I was done I walked around to talk with everyone and to look at what everyone was drawing. By the time that was done my knee was screaming at me and so I settled for the one sketch for the day. I hope you like it.
Fabriano Artistico (7.5×11), Pilot Cavalier, R&K Sketch Ink (Lily)