Tag Archives: Pilot/Namiki Falcon

Mini-Sketchcrawl At The Morrin Center

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Hubert, a member of our Tuesdays group, arranged for us to sketch at the Morrin Center.  This is an anglophone service center that holds lots of wine-drinking soirees and has a wonderful old library, with leather-covered tables, beautiful old railings and stairs, and an ambiance that can’t be beat.  The building itself used to be a women’s prison and they’ve retained a couple cells in the basement in their original form.  I think you could fit all the anglophones who live in Quebec City into this building and still have room for the wine (grin).

I decided to draw a bust that was sitting in front of one of the windows.  It wasn’t a particularly good cast but I liked the guy’s beard and mustache, which gave me ample opportunity to drive my Pilot Falcon around in my Stillman & Birn Beta (8×10) softcover book.  I’ve thought about adding some watercolor shading and may do that but I haven’t found the time.  Sorry.

Another Trip To The Hunting And Fishing Museum

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Oh my goodness.  It’s been ten days since I’ve posted.  I’m running as fast as I can but it just isn’t fast enough.  I’ve done some more extreme sketching, went to a gathering at the Morrin Center in Quebec City, my daughter came home for “reading week” and we just got back from Montreal where I got to spend the day with Marc Taro Holmes.  I’ll try to get blog posts written on all these things in the next couple days, but today I want to show you a couple more sketches that I did when several of us went back to the Quebec hunting and fishing museum.

I was struck by this duck because I had never seen one before and I didn’t know what it was.  There was no label on it.   I drew it because of its atypical orientation but it wasn’t until I got home and talked with Mr. Google that I found out that this is a a Eurasian duck called the Ruddy Shelduck and that it’s very common in India.

Stillman & Birn Beta (8×10), Pilot Falcon, DeAtramentis Document Black

With so many beautiful animal subjects at the museum it’s easy to ignore the multitude of antique and modern fishing and hunting equipment on display.  But on this day I was struck by a long row of antique fishing bobbers, or floats if you prefer that term.  While they did have an example of modern, red/white plastic bobbers, most of them were very old, wooden bobbers.  Rather than drawing them in a row, I created this composition and liked the result.  Hope you do too.

Stillman & Birn Beta (8×10)

Winter Chill Means Sketching At The Museum

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It’s winter and so my feet move me, without thought, to the local museum for sketching sessions.  This day was no different and I found myself in the tiny “attic” display of all sorts of stuff, including this shelf.  I probably drew it smaller than I should have but what the heck – I use less ink this way (grin).

Stillman & Birn Alpha (8.5×5.5), Pilot Falcon, DeAtramentis Document Black

Sketching With The Jesuits

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Last Sunday we met at the Maison des Jésuites de Sillery as our monthly Croquistes de Québec sketchcrawl.  Our time window was short because these small museums that are scattered around Quebec don’t open until 1PM during the winter but they are warm and they do have stuff to draw.   This particular place is a large two-story house, associated chapel, and the foundations of the original church that was across the street.  Contained within it are a bunch of artifacts that tell the story of this 18th Century missionary settlement.

While most were drawn to displays on the second floor, I couldn’t resist the golden eagle that was on display.  Halfway through the drawing I was wishing I’d chosen something else.  Did you realize that eagles have a lot of feathers?   I did like this view, however, as it’s a little different than the typical sideways, head up of most eagle photos/drawings.  Anyways, here’s what resulted from my interaction with this beautiful bird.

Stillman & Birn Beta softcover (8×10), Pilot Falcon, Diluted DeAtramentis Document Black

Old-Time Kitchen Sketching

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In recent weeks I’ve had to forsake urban sketching because it’s just too darn cold outside and so I’ve started doing domestic sketching (my name for studio sketching as the opposite of urban sketching) and historic sketching (drawing from old photos).  Seems there is jargon-ese convergence in what I present today – historic, domestic, urban sketching.

Yvan and I braved the cold and took the ferry to Levis, where we climbed the hill and made our way to Maison Alphonse-Dejardins.  Dejardins is the guy who started the Quebec banking system and his home is now a museum in his honor.  I was on location and sketching and thus, I was an urban sketcher again.  But this time my target was the sink and counter in the smallish kitchen in this home.  Next time I’ll do the coal-fired stove cuz it’s a dandy.  And in one swoop, this sketch is both historic and domestic.  Voila, I did historic, domestic, urban sketching (grin).

I know, I’m being silly, but then the labels we put on everything, and worse, the debates over what qualifies as fitting a label are pretty silly too.  Anyways, here’s the sketch I did in a Stillman & Birn Beta (8×10) softcover sketchbook.  I kinda let the perspective get away from me but what the heck, if they were all perfect there’d be no reason to continue trying.

Maison Alphonse-Dejardins