To Pick Apples Or Sketch – That Was The Question

We apple picking in St. Nicolas on Sunday.  It’s a great place on the south shore of the St. Lawrence.  Very agricultural, very beautiful.  As I always do, I took my sketching stuff with me but didn’t figure I’d get a chance to use it.  We were foraging.

Apple picking is pretty light duty.  We had a large bag and wandered around pulling the red orbs off the tree.  Made me wish that money really did grow on trees as that would really be fun.

We’d filled a bag of McIntosh apples and had started on a new bag, to be filled with Lobos, when I saw this old, three-legged ladder.  I couldn’t resist and handed the bag to my wife, saying “I’ll do it quickly.”  She continued picking and I sat down, pulling out a small sketchbook of brown paper and my TWSBI Mini.

I became a kid magnet and a bunch of kids surrounded me to watch.  It was fun.  They were all very young (less than 10) and very shy but curious of this big person doing what they do all the time.  None of them were art critics.  Wanting to put on a show, I guess, I sort of cut short my actual sketching and got out some watercolor pencils.  I showed them around and then added a bit of color to the sketch.  In the end, I had an incomplete sketch but a fond memory.  Location sketching at its best.

3-legged ladder

TWSBI Mini, Platinum Carbon Black, watercolor pencils

 

Sketching Landscapes At The Quebec Aquarium

The grounds of the Quebec Aquarium are great for a sketcher.  Whoever designed them had esthetics in mind as well as the ability to accommodate families with kids running all over the place.  And so it’s a fun place to do small landscape sketches.  With winter looming in front of us, I’ve spent most of my aquarium time doing those kinds of sketches.

rocks at Quebec aquarium

Monologue sketchbook (4×5), Pilot Falcon, Platinum Carbon ink

Claudette and I were at the aquarium this week (last week?).  While waiting for it to open I quickly sketched a grouping of large rocks that sit near the entrance.  I’m still trying to get a handle on drawing rocks.

trees at aquarium

Monologue sketchbook (4×5), Hero 578, Platinum Carbon Black

Later I made this little sketch out the window of the cafeteria.  I was drawing trees but more, I was playing with my Hero 578 “fude” pen.  I still haven’t tapped the expressiveness of this pen and should use it a lot more.

But I spent most of my time drawing this scene.  It took me the best part of two hours to complete it.  This included a chat with the security guard, another with a grounds-keeper and a couple visitors stopped to comment.  The weather was ideal, as were the social interactions.

main waterfall at the aquarium

Stillman & Birn Alpha (10×7), Pilot Falcon, Platinum Carbon Black

A Summer’s Day At Berthier, Quebec

It’s been three days since I went out sketching with the gang.  It didn’t make it to 60F that day so, of course, as we headed out for a road trip to Berthier, Quebec the prediction was for temps in the mid-80s with a humidex pushed to over 90F.  Mr. Jetstream is oscillating like crazy these days.

This trip was timed perfectly as we would be sketching next to the St. Lawrence River, where there’s always a breeze to cool things down.  Claudette, Fernande, Yvan and I headed over the bridge with Fernande at the helm.  Once on the south shore we turned east along the river on our way to pick up Louise in St. Vallier, half an hour away.

Monologue 9x12, Pilot Falcon, Platinum Carbon Black

Monologue 9×12, Pilot Falcon, Platinum Carbon Black

Berthier is just down the road from St. Vallier and I’d never been there before.  I’ll be going back ‘real soon’, though.  It’s a sketcher paradise.  There is a small marina with lots of sailboats to sketch.  There is a quay with benches so you can sit and sketch either passing boats or the other side of the St. Lawrence, which features Mount Tremblant.  There is a large park area with lots of picnic-partaking folks to draw.  There are rocks along the coastline and farm buildings if you look in the other direction.  And if that ain’t enough, there’s a place to get coffee and restrooms to cycle it.

The five of us headed for the marina to sketch boats.  I wanted to capture the height of the masts and  chose a scene and vertical format to emphasize their extraordinary height.  I probably worked too fast but that’s always the case when I’m with a group.

Moleskine watercolor 3x5, Pilot Falcon, Platinum Carbon Black

Moleskine watercolor 3×5, Pilot Falcon, Platinum Carbon Black

Monologue 9x12, Pilot Falcon, Platinum Carbon Black

Monologue 9×12, Pilot Falcon, Platinum Carbon Black

Once finished there we sketched a bit more, up in the park area and then set up at a table overlooking the marina for lunch.  We’d collaborated and brought cheeses, baguettes, grapes, and wine for lunch.  Claudette made some fantastic roasted peppers that were great along side cucumber slices.  We were living high.  I ate too much.

To be honest, by the time lunch was over I needed a siesta.  I sketched some but decided that a coffee might perk me up.  I think it did and I sketched some more but the sun and food had slowed me to a crawl.

Monologue A6 sketchbook, Pilot Falcon, Platinum Carbon Black

Monologue A6 sketchbook, Pilot Falcon, Platinum Carbon Black

Evidence of that is here.  I’d sat down on a bench looking out at the river.  It was thoroughly enjoyable but there wasn’t much to sketch except for a large ‘other side of the St. Lawrence’ sort of sketch and I didn’t have the energy for that.  But, in front of me, on the storm wall was a light, part of a series of them along the wall.  Behind, and well below them were rocks and the river.  So, I drew one light, drinking coffee and breathing in the fresh air.  I was thoroughly content with the day and this sketch was the final drip from my pen.

 

Sketching On The Montmorency River

CMontmorencyOne of the tourist spectacles around Quebec City is Montmorency Falls.  The falls themselves are nice but the tourist areas around it are equally nice so it’s fun to go sketching there.  To make it even better, I can hop a bus that will take me there, which is what I did this morning.

Yvan and I met very early  and headed for the Montmorency Falls area.  The falls weren’t our target though.  Our quary was rocks.  I’m tempted to make a quary/quarry joke here but I won’t.

Suffice it to say that when we got to the falls we crossed the bridge above them and headed north, up the river.  It was much cooler than I’d expected and my shorts and t-shirt left me shaking in my boots, almost literally.  Yvan was smarter, wore long pants and even brought a windbreaker.  Even so, he said he was cold.  I was colder.  I win…errr…lose.

Stillman & Birn Delta (6x8), Pilot Prera, Lex Gray

Stillman & Birn Delta (6×8), Pilot Prera, Lex Gray

But we’re tough sketchers and had fun anyways.  I got to break in a new Stillman & Birn sketchbook. This one is a 6×8 spiral-bound Delta series book.  It’s the first time I’ve used their ivory paper but I thought I should try it.  I think I like the ivory color.  It’s probably better for some things than for others but this morning’s subjects seemed to like it just fine.  The paper itself goes without saying as it’s one of the best watercolor sketchbook papers in existence.  For those who may wonder, the Delta is the equivalent of S&B’s Beta series which is very popular with the watercolor crowd.

Stillman & Birn Delta (6x8), Pilot Prera, Lex Gray

Stillman & Birn Delta (6×8), Pilot Prera, Lex Gray

 

Sketching The Riviere Lairet… Sort Of

Once upon a time there was the Riviere Lairet.  It meandered through what became Limoilu as Quebec City spread north from its origins atop Cap Diamond.  Ultimate, Limoilu was swallowed by Quebec City during a large merger but everyone still calls it Limoilu.  We’re a stubborn lot.

From the photos I’ve seen one of the basic problems with the Riviere Lairet was that lots of water ran in it in the spring and almost none in the summer.  The result was a fairly deep canyon running through what was quickly becoming a very populated area.

Maybe more important, the canyon had a lot of very fast-flowing, dangerous water at one time of year and at other times it became a dumping ground for the less civic-minded members of Limoilu.  So it was decided, in the mid-20th Century, to build a huge pipe to convey the spring waters underground from north of Limoilu all the way to the St. Charles River – my river.

Parc_Cartier-Brébeuf_smThese days, the Riviere Lairet name can be found on maps as a long, open pond area in Cartier-Brebeuf Park, with the south end of the pond emptying into the St. Charles River.

But the water that fills this park area still has to get there through the pipe I mentioned.  They do everything in their power to hide the pipe’s opening into the park but I thought it would make for a fun sketch.  The weather further convinced me as while it was almost warm, it was also windy.  After climbing down the hill to this view, I was conveniently out of the wind with only a few ants to bother me.

I used a Uniball Signo UM-151 (.38mm) gel pen for this one.  The fine pens in the 101 series are mostly waterproof but anything thicker than .38mm and the gel ink starts to wash into the watercolors, at least on the Stillman & Birn Alpha (9×6) paper that I use.  Hope you like it.

Stillman & Birn Alpha (9x6), Uniball Signo 101 (.38mm)

Stillman & Birn Alpha (9×6), Uniball Signo 101 (.38mm)