DRAWING
Attention
The official zine of Urban Sketchers MARCH 2018
Drawing Attention Mandate Drawing Attention, the official monthly zine of the Urban Sketchers organization, communicates and promotes official USk workshops, symposiums, sketchcrawls, news and events; shares news about USk chapters; and educates readers about the practice of on-location sketching.
Managing Editor: Brenda Murray Mailchimp layout: Jane Dillon Wingfield ISSUU layout: Alex Rocklin & Anne Taylor Writers: Mark Anderson; Brenda Murray; Meagan Burns; Pedro Loureiro; Ann Schwartzwald; Leslie Akchurin. Contributors: Parka; Maria Regina Tuazon; Amber Sausen; Phil Griffin. Front cover image: Melanie Reim.
Subscribe to Drawing Attention. Read the February edition of Drawing Attention. Circulation: 8628 Readership: 12000 (Feb 17, 2018). Web: urbansketchers.org Urban Sketchers is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization dedicated to fostering the art of on-location drawing. Click here to make your tax-deductible contribution via Paypal. © 2018 Urban Sketchers.
PRESIDENT’S MESSAGE Did you know? The Executive Board of Urban Sketchers consists of seven members from five countries. Combined, we speak over ten languages. We work to ensure the global community of Urban Sketchers is thriving and that the educational opportunities we provide will help you to better see the world, one drawing at a time. The board meets in-person two times per year, at the Symposium in the summer and in a new city in February. This February, the board had the exciting opportunity to visit Tokyo, Japan. Through connections made at ASIA-link in Kuching, Malaysia, we were hosted at Chiba UniversityMatsudo campus. This collaboration allowed the executive board to do more than just hold our board meeting face to face. We provided educational opportunities, led a workshop on
observation skills, hosted a guided sketchwalk led by Maria Ermilova, sketched with Urban Sketchers Japan, and participated in an academic panel discussion on Urban Sketching’s use in research and for tourism development. It was clear to the board that sketching is a common language we all share, and we are so thankful for the hospitality we received from our fellow sketchers in Tokyo. Let’s sketch together again soon! If you want to connect with the Executive Board about how we can strengthen the Urban Sketchers community or learn more about research using urban sketching, don’t hesitate to send a message. Happy sketching! Amber Sausen, USk President
Thank you, dear readers – all 12,000 of you – for your continued support of Drawing Attention. If you are reading Drawing Attention on a laptop or desktop please remember to select the FULL SCREEN icon. If you are reading it on a handheld, please click on one of the links on page 3 and download the appropriate app. If you prefer to read the pdf version, please click on that link. Cheers, Brenda Murray, USk Communications Director drawingattention@urbansketchers.org.
Contents
CONTENTS 04 USK NEWS & EVENTS 16 FEATURED CHAPTER: USK LAS VEGAS 28 DYNAMIC PICTURE MAKING IN SEATTLE
melanie reim
28
34
46
& kiah kiean ch’ng
34 FEATURED CHAPTER: USK BFC FRANCE 46 EVOKING A SENSE OF PLACE
16
simone ridyard
59
54 CHASING DOWN THE STORY
gabi campanario
59 NEWS, REVIEWS, VIDEO & ENDNOTES
DOWNLOAD THE ISSUU APP FOR IOS DEVICES DOWNLOAD THE ISSUU APP FOR ANDROID DEVICES
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READ THIS ISSUE AS A SCROLLING PDF HERE.
FOR EASIER READING OF DRAWING ATTENTION REMEMBER TO SELECT FULL SCREEN. MARCH 2018 3
USk News & Events
USK NEWS & EVENTS LETTERS TO THE EDITOR Physically Possible, January 2018 – I love it! Especially the article called Physically Possible. Good to see others with physical challenges like myself, out there doing their thing. Thank you. Liz Brown Re: Drawing Attention on ISSUU, January 2018 – Wow! This is not the bare-bones roundup of urban sketching news I started publishing in our site back in 2010. That was my reaction when I saw the new format of Drawing Attention a few months ago. Managed and edited by Brenda Murray (USk Waterloo Region), DA is now a professional-quality publication you can browse on the screen or download and print. It comes with a wealth of information and sketches, including a message from our president, reports from USk Chapters across the globe, contributed articles and colorful magazine-style spreads.
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Drawing Attention has become a must-read in the urban sketching community, and we have many volunteers to thank for the service it has been providing over the years. Lisbeth Cort, an artist based in Santa Fe, New Mexico, published the newsletter religiously every month from February of 2011 to May of 2013. Tireless Seattle urban sketcher Tina Koyama managed DA during years of incredible growth in our community, from November of 2013 through July of 2016. Brenda is the fourth editor to take the helm of DA and the first to establish a team of contributors. The diversity and enthusiasm for sketching reflected in the pages of Drawing Attention makes me feel proud of being an urban sketcher. I hope you feel the same way and look forward to every issue as much as I do.
Gabi Campanario USk Seattle Urban Sketchers Founder
Please keep Letters to the Editor to 200 words. Please include your name and USk chapter. We reserve the right to edit, condense, or reject letters. E: drawingattention@ urbansketchers.org.
USk News & Events
SYMPOSIUM NEWS Call for Correspondents Last month a call for Symposium Correspondents was posted in the USk world for the 2018 Symposium in Porto, Portugal July 18-21 and many very compelling applications were received. The successful candidates will be announced HERE in midMarch.
Symposium programming and schedule will be published HERE for your reference. Subscribe to Drawing Attention for the latest news.
Symposium Workshop Selection For those who registered for Workshop and Basic Passes for the 2018 USk Porto Symposium, the selection for workshops opens on March 3. Log in again on March 3 to pick your workshop choices.
THANKS TO KRISTINE SEDERHOLME USk would like to sincerely thank our outgoing Systems Administrator, Kristine Sederholme from BC, Canada. Kristine made a valuable contribution to the Tech team and will be missed. Best wishes Kristine on your future endeavours.
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USk News & Events
A TRIBUTE TO PETER HOLDEN, USK MANCHESTER by Phil Griffin Peter Holden, who has died aged 70, maintained the look of the Bloomsbury Set, or perhaps William Morris, with the merest hint of Captain Pugwash. His beard was almost as old as he. I never saw his chin. Peter was the best of us, an English gentleman, through and through. I knew of Peter long before I met him. Peter was everywhere, every exhibition and theatre opening, every bar and concert. Manchester had its Madison Avenue moment, and Peter was in among the mad men. He was the go-to Art Director for every big campaign and TV commercial. His personal energy, vision and creativity benchmarked the entire city. In what cruelly turned out to be the last and fullest phase of his creative life, Peter set up Holdens, with two of his sons, Olly and Ted in a studio is on Edge Street, above a bar called Common. Peter and Sarah started sketching with the Manchester USk group five years ago. Peter developed his signature coffee stick sketching style (wooden coffee sticks dipped in Indian ink) and he created the charcoal-drawn ‘M’ that became the logo for the 7th International Symposium in Manchester in 2016. The couple drew their way around Chicago in 2017 and had booked their travel to Porto this coming July. With his full grey beard, broad-brimmed hat and glinting eyes, he never failed to put a smile on my face. Urban Sketchers would like to express our sincere condolences to the family of Peter Holden. He will be missed. 6 DRAWING ATTENTION
USk News & Events
USK VOLUNTEERING OPPORTUNITIES Urban Sketchers is currently seeking volunteers to fill the following positions: • Volunteer Fundraising Director • Volunteer Finance Committee Member • Volunteer Sponsorship Administrator For more information click here.
PLACE YOUR AD HERE ...and reach thousands of artists & art lovers For more information about ad placement sizes and costs for corporate sponsors, email: omar@urbansketchers.org.
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USk News & Events
10X10 WORKSHOPS Do you want to start being an urban sketcher? Are you already a sketcher and want to improve your drawing skills? Don’t wait any longer. Join a 10x10 class in your city. Or take a train or a plane to a beautiful city and learn with an USk instructor. To see the list of 10x10 classes around the world click HERE.
SKETCH TOUR PORTUGAL In celebration of our 10th anniversary in 2017 Urban Sketchers, in partnership with the Tourism Office of Portugal (TP), have organized a sponsored sketching trip called Sketch Tour Portugal. This month three teams of sketchers will participate in Sketch Tour Portugal. From March 1-6 Róisín Curé from Ireland and Hélio Boto the host sketcher in Portugal will sketch the Algarve region. From March 15-21 Linda Toolsema from the Netherlands and Pedro Cabral from Portugal will sketch on the theme of trails. And from March 26-31 Inma Serrano from Spain and Nélson Paciência the host sketcher in Portugal will sketch the Center of Portugal. The sketchers will sketch a minimum of 6 drawings per day. Tourism Portugal will use sketches made during the trip to promote Portugal in different events such as at fairs, in postcards, on social media, and at exhibitions. We wish this amazing group of sketchers happy travels and happy sketching! USk Executive Board of Directors
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USk News & Events
BRING A WORKSHOP TO YOUR CHAPTER
Urban Sketchers organizes workshops taught by our top instructors in collaboration with USk chapters around the world. If you would like to bring an official USk workshop to your chapter, start the conversation with our Education Director, Mรกrio Linhares at education@urbansketchers.org.
EDUCATION COMMITTEE WELCOMES JANE BLUNDELL The Education Committee would like to warmly welcome our new Workshops Coordinator, Jane Blundell. Jane has already served on this committee for two and a half years and is the perfect fit to step into the role of Coordinator. We are looking forward to working with Jane in this new capacity. Welcome Jane! MARCH 2018 9
USk News & Events
FOLLOW URBAN SKETCHERS ON INSTAGRAM
With over 142K followers, the Urban Sketchers Instagram account is one of the most popular ways to engage with USk. Don Gore from Kansas City, Missouri, and Lizette Vargas originally from Mexico City but now also living in Kansas City, have worked hard to manage and grow the account for the past three years. The team searches for images with the hashtags #urbansketchers or #usk and reposts individual sketches from around the world without bias of the type of sketch, medium or location
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provided that the sketches align with the USk Manifesto.
have more opportunities to see your sketches.”
The USk Instagram account is most popular with people aged 18-25. “We have lots of people who aren’t sketchers but they follow us anyway,” Don explained. “People are so generous in sharing what they do. That’s why we are successful.”
Another way to increase your chances of getting reposted is to add your chapter’s hashtag. For example, #USkOrlando. “I’d like to tell people not to be discouraged if their sketch doesn’t get reposted,” Don said. “We see thousands of sketches and we can’t repost them all. We’re only able to repost a fraction of what’s out there.”
Don and Liz are often asked, how do we get our sketches reposted on the USk account? “Use the hashtags,” Liz said, “and post often so that we
Follow us on Instagram.
USk News & Events
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Title News & Events USk
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New Chapter
Heritage connections USK WELCOMES THE NEW CHAPTER IN SUWON, SOUTH KOREA. BY JANE DILLON-WINGFIELD Suwon, South Korea, was once completely surrounded by fortress walls. Today the walls are a designated UNESCO World Heritage site and the urban boundaries have spread beyond the famed walls. Still, the city’s heritage and historical sites make it a perfect setting for one of Urban Sketchers newest chapters, USk Suwon. Keesung Song and Jiwon Jeong are two of the chapter’s Administrators. The group started with a shared interest among Jiwon’s friends. They started meeting together regularly in and around Suwon. They have sketched in many of the historical buildings, castles and palaces in the city. The 15-20 members of USK Suwon meet officially once a month and the group also hosts informal gatherings.
Last fall they hosted their own 10x10 workshops to kick off their chapter. Keesung may be familiar to many of our symposium participants because he has attended several symposiums as a representative of our sponsor Pen Up.
CONNECT WITH SUWON
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USk News & Events
Seeing SWINDON WELCOME TO NEW REGIONAL CHAPTER, USK SWINDON, UK. LOCATED IN THE SOUTHWEST REGION OF THE UK, SWINDON BOASTS A DIVERSE COMMUNITY AND A RICH HERITAGE THAT HAS MORE TO IT THAN FIRST MEETS THE EYE. BY MEAGAN BURNS
SKETCH BY SONIA LEGGETT
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SKETCH BY DONA BRADLEY
New Regional Chapter Title
“W
E MAY BE THE ONLY CHAPTER THAT HAS A MEMBER WHO SKETCHES WITH ELECTRICAL TAPE!” Jo Beal initiated this local sketch group with the first sketchcrawl in September, 2016 at the Museum of the Great Western Railway, aka the STEAM, which is housed in a beautifully restored railway building in the heart of the former Swindon railway works. Swindon is the closest chapter to Stonehenge, one of the wonders of the world and the bestknown prehistoric monument in Europe. Swindon became an official USk Regional Chapter in October, 2017, with current Admins Kaveri Sharma, Jo Beal and Dona Bradley. Kaveri is originally from Delhi, India, and works as a UX Designer at a Bristol-based startup. “I’ve been sketching for as long as I can remember, but I joined Urban Sketchers after moving to the UK to help make sense of the new culture and environment, as well as to connect with my community.” Sketch locations have included the Central Library, Swindon Dance, museums, cafes, shopping centers, train stations and a number of Swindon’s lovely parks. The best attended session was at Radnor Street Cemetery; the last resting place of 33,000 Swindonians, including 104 war heroes. Kaveri notes, “The photos look like it was a gray day when in fact our fingers were numb because it was a bitter cold November day!” The group has a list of locations to be sketched, which include the Sir Norman Foster’s Renault Building, the Oasis Leisure Centre and Lydiard House and Gardens, a beautiful historic estate on the western edge of Swindon, with the Palladian House, Church and Walled Garden, set in 260 acres of parkland. “It’s exciting to be a part of this sketching community, our chapter is working collectively on a sketchbook that we’ll send to the Brooklyn Art Library, and we may be the only chapter that has a member who sketches with electrical tape!” There’s something unique to sketch in every USk Regional Chapter, and thanks to the Swindon chapter for introducing their group! Keep on drawing your world and sharing it with our global community.
SKETCH BY KAVERI SHARMA
CONNECT WITH SWINDON
i SWINDON’S INSTAGRAM MARCH 2018 15
Featured Chapter
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SKETCH BY ERIC ROBERTS
City of Lights
Sketching in the City of Lights LAS VEGAS IS BEST KNOWN WORLDWIDE FOR ITS OUTLANDISH CASINOS AND EXTRAVAGANT STAGE SHOWS, BUT THERE IS MUCH MORE TO THE PLACE THAN WHAT WE SEE IN MOVIES, AS PEDRO LOUREIRO DISCOVERS. “There’s a lot of great and weird architecture in town”, says local urban sketcher Anna Peltier, but she points to the Nevada desert as one area that’s just as wondrous as anything on the Strip. Anna – a landscape architect and sketcher since late 2015 – is one of the three admins in the Las Vegas USk chapter, official since November 2016. But, like many chapters, it had its inception in a prior informal sketching group, linked with the American Institute of Architects (AIA), and founded by admin Eric Roberts. The local AIA chapter “still puts out the dates in a newsletter and an email blast when sketcher events are coming up”, Anna says. It’s a growing group. Anna says they’ve “just got over a hundred members in the facebook group”, their main sharing platform. “Eric encourages people to post the sketches by themselves”, and thanks to that, Anna reports, the group is “picking up some steam”. Around two dozen people show up every month, and USk Las Vegas has been consistently holding monthly sketch crawls around the town. “Typically, Eric will pick an area to sketch, but lately we’ve been taking suggestions at the meeting the month before”, Anna says. One of their most exciting meetings was in a ghost town outside of Las Vegas, and the older part of the city is interesting too. “We’ve also sketched in casinos on a couple of occasions, but some of the people aren’t really excited about seeing us there,” she says. While sketching the present, USk Las Vegas have their minds set on the future: “We’ve teamed up with the University of Nevada Las Vegas extended learning programme”, Anna tells us, and have been getting some students in the group. Because of that, they might double the sketch crawls per month. They also plan to organize a sketch event during the AIA National Conference in 2019 “which will have hundreds of people in town from all over the US”. Closer to that, a USk exhibit is being prepared for April, also in partnership with the AIA. “It will be our first!” Anna concludes.
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City of Lights
USK LAS VEGAS MEMBERS OUTSIDE THE NEON MUSEUM
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SKETCH BY KENNETH PERREAULT
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City of Lights
“W
E’VE SKETCHED IN CASINOS ON A COUPLE OF OCCASIONS, BUT SOME OF THE PEOPLE AREN’T REALLY EXCITED ABOUT SEEING US THERE” – ANNA PELTIER MEMBERS AT GUARDIAN ANGEL CATHEDRAL MARCH 2018 21
Featured Chapter
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“O
NE OF OUR MOST EXCITING MEETINGS WAS IN A GHOST TOWN OUTSIDE OF LAS VEGAS...”
City of Lights Title
FEBRUARY MARCH 2018 23
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SKETCH BY ERIC ROBERTS 24 DRAWING ATTENTION
THE LINK BY KENNETH PERREAULT
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City of Lights
LEFT: SCULPTURE AT SYMPHONY PARK BY ANNA PELTIER BELOW: SMITH CENTRE COURTYARD BY AMY ATKINSON
CONNECT WITH USK LAS VEGAS
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PIKE MARKET FISH STAND BY MELANIE REIM 28 DRAWING ATTENTION
USK Tutors
Dynamic picture making
in Seattle
LESLIE AKCHURIN SHARES THE EXCITING ‘DANCING LINES’ OF USK TUTORS MELANIE REIM AND KIAH KIEAN CH’NG.
ABOVE: FISH STAND GUYS BY MELANIE REIM MARCH 2018 29
USk Tutor
At the conclusion of their ‘Dancing Lines’ workshop last July 14-16, 2017, Melanie Reim and Kiah Kiean Ch’ng came together in a garden of glass Chihuly flower sculptures to draw a picture, their highly individual lines overlapping and extending each other’s as they worked. This joyful collaboration seems a fitting metaphor for their workshop as a whole, which featured their beautifully unique styles but also their shared artistic values in
responding to the world: strong composition, varied calligraphic line and patterning, and boldness of approach. The workshop these two masters delivered was the brainchild of Seattle Urban Sketcher leaders, Gail Wong and Jane Mansfield and was, according to Melanie, “a really fantastic, exciting experience.” While Kiah Kiean often focuses on architecture, Melanie is primarily interested in “people, lots of people, people doing activities, people at work, people at play,” and participants of their two-day Seattle workshop, ‘Dancing Lines: Ink Drawing on Location, People, Places, and Things’ benefited from both these preferences. In her time with the students, Melanie taught strategies for composition, which she considers the foundation of drawing, followed by different kinds of mark making with ink pens and ways to draw dynamically, first in a relatively placid park and then at bustling Pike Place Market.
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Dynamic picture making in Seattle Title
PIKE PLACE MARKET BY MELANIE REIM MARCH 2018 31
USk Tutors
To demystify the challenge of capturing crowds, Melanie explained how to take advantage of repeated motion, to combine people’s forms, and to break complex scenes down into shapes. She urged students to commit to their line work—“Don’t erase your own insight!” she advised— as they worked to develop individual responses to these environments. Melanie herself favors expressive lines and loves irregularities, “nuances of change of weight, splatter, and ink blots,” that take her drawings in unexpected directions. She has a favorite old Pelikan pen with a pliable nib that she finds ideally responsive. CLICK HERE TO WATCH MELANIE & KK IN ACTION
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Melanie has been an art educator and illustrator for decades and as of this writing, was just named Distinguished Educator of the Arts for 2018 by the Society of Illustrators in New York. While she has recently shouldered the responsibilities of Acting Associate Dean of the School of Art and Design at the Fashion Institute of Technology, she has taught illustration there as a
professor for many years. And she teaches and creates art in many other contexts; for example, she has traveled to engage in reportorial drawing in the Dominican Republic for over 20 years and has also developed a body of artwork, entitled Another Woman’s Life, which she continually expands and exhibits. Melanie has been involved in Urban Sketchers since 2008 and has taught at four symposia. Currently, she has plans to hold a figure drawing workshop in NYC this fall. Supporting all Melanie’s artistic and pedagogical activities is her devotion to on-location drawing. “Get out and draw from life as often as you can,” she says. “Pay attention to composition and the basics of how a figure is constructed. Be patient and consistent in your practice. And remember that creating a drawing is more about thinking on paper than about recreating a scene. In this way you can tell a true story of your experience.”
Dynamic picture making in Seattle
INSIDE PIKE MARKET BY MELANIE REIM
MARCH 2018 33
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T
his eastern central region of France is incredibly beautiful. The Jura Mountains create a countryside of rolling hills filled with vineyards, verdant fields, rich forests and story-book villages.
Christine Deschamps (from Tonnerre), Marie-Odile Mourel (from Besançon) and Jérémy Soheylian (from Semur-en-Auxois) formed the new USk chapter in March 2017. Christine describes her region as “one of the largest areas covered by only one chapter – that’s why we are called the BFC chapter – we drive or take the train to meet. Bourgogne and Franche Comté are mostly rural areas. We are special ‘urban’ sketchers.” The chapter has a following of about 200 on Facebook with 20-30 attending each outing. When asked about favorite sketching locations Christine responded, “Our next meetings will be held in Beaune, Chalon-sur-Saône or Dole… and members are planning to hold meetings in their areas: Tonnerre, Semur-en-Auxois, Dole or Cluny. There are so many things to see around here!” Visitors from around the world enjoy sketching in some of the enchanting locations in BFC. “Next year, Dijon will be the host city of the French national meeting, in June 2019.” “Kate Barber, from Seattle said it’s one of her favorite places to sketch! When Ale and Carlos came to visit from Madrid, I took them to many nearby places: an abbey in Pontigny, and medieval villages Flavigny-surOzerain, Noyers-sur-Serein, and Auxerre. There are thousands of places to visit and draw. Gérard Michel, from Liège, Belgium, has already sketched most of them! We are lucky to have some of the most famous and wonderful castles, churches and monuments in France.”
SOME OF THE NEWEST THE C 34 DRAWING ATTENTION
‘Rural’ Urban Sketching
‘Rural’ Urban Sketching in BFC, France
T URBAN SKETCHING CHAPTERS ARE NOT VERY “URBAN”. THAT IS CERTAINLY CASE FOR THE BOURGOGNE AND FRANCHE-COMTÉ (OR BFC) USK CHAPTER, REPORTS ANN SCHWARTZWALD MARCH 2018 35
Featured Chapter
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‘Rural’ Urban Sketching
SKETCH BY JEREMY SOHEYLIAN MARCH 2018 37
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‘Rural’ Urban Sketching
SKETCH BY GÉRARD MICHEL
MARCH 2018 39
SKETCH BY CHRISTINE DESCHAMPS 40 DRAWING ATTENTION
‘Rural’ Urban Sketching
ABOVE: SKETCH BY ASTRID MARCH 2018 41
Featured Chapter
SKETCH BY JEAN-PIERRE L. 42 DRAWING ATTENTION
MARCH 2018 43
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ABOVE: SKETCH BY MICHIO RIGHT: SKETCH BY LOLO WAGNER
CONNECT WITH BFC, FRANCE 44 DRAWING ATTENTION
MARCH 2018 45
USk Tutor
Evoking a sense of pl
HAVING SPENT FIVE YEARS STUDYING ARCHITECTURE AT CANTERBURY SC ART, SIMONE RIDYARD (ARCHITECT AND SENIOR LECTURER AT THE MANC SCHOOL OF ART), KNOWS THE CITY OF CANTERBURY VERY WELL. HER EX LOCAL KNOWLEDGE LED TO A JOINT WORKSHOP WITH PAT SOUTHERN SUMMER CALLED ‘EVOKING A SENSE OF PLACE’. BY MARK ALAN ANDERS
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lace
CHOOL OF CHESTER XTENSIVE PEARCE LAST SON.
MARCH 2018 47
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What is it that makes a place special? It’s difficult to define the authenticity of a place – after all, the same locale may be perceived in different ways and muster up dissimilar emotions, depending on one’s ties to that particular backdrop. “For the workshop, I revisited a number of favorite locations,” she says. “Because I have such fond memories I really wanted to return and immerse myself in a weekend of sketching in at Canterbury.” 48 DRAWING ATTENTION
Ridyard teaches sketchers to first understand the basic principles necessary to visually describe a view in order to truly evoke a sense of place. “I’m very much about the architecture, about the perspective, and Pat has this sensitive ethereal style.” Workshop participants grounded themselves in notions of one and two-point perspective to better capture the emotional response of “the big picture.”
‘Evoking A Sense of Place’ was in many ways a holiday workshop, commencing each morning with a gathering of participants over coffee and tea, before breaking up into workshop groups. Ridyard describes Canterbury as “a very small, very beautiful cathedral city with a lovely sense of scale.”
Evoking a sense of place
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Following a morning of demonstration and sketching exercises, the group explored the city and cathedral grounds with sketching tools in hand. Sketchers enjoyed an evening of “drink and draw” in a local pub garden. On the following day, sketchers traveled to the picturesque coastal fishing village of Whitstable, there to respond to a world of yachting, oyster bars, and very bijou structures. Ridyard intentionally set out to design a workshop where sketchers were seeing a place with fresh eyes. “I wanted it to be a holiday, very social; a tourist experience – but more than just the obvious tourist things.” And that’s where an intimate knowledge of, and relationship with a place becomes an essential ingredient. Capturing the character of a community is one of the things an urban sketcher does to compel a drawing to be more than mere likeness, but rather to reveal a story, to provide context and meaning to a location. A sense of place, after all, is infinitely more than a loose collection of lines on paper; it’s about expressing the distinct personality and quirks that make a place uniquely itself. 50 DRAWING ATTENTION
Evoking a sense of place
Simone Ridyard led the local organizing team for the 2016 Manchester Symposium. She is planning a workshop similar to Evoking a Sense of Place this summer. Ridyard will also be conducting a workshop in San Francisco. Ridyard founded Urban Sketchers Manchester in 2012. Her research is concentrated around architectural reportage and in-situ architectural drawing. Her book, Archisketcher was published in 2015 by North Light in US and Quarto in UK. She is a Member of Society of Architectural Illustration (MSAI) and Manchester Academy of Fine Arts (MAFA).
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Evoking a sense of place
ALL SKETCHES BY SIMONE RIDYARD MARCH 2018 53
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Chasing down
THE STORY BRENDA MURRAY TALKS TO GABI CAMPANARIO, THE FOUNDER OF URBAN SKETCHERS, ABOUT HIS PROCESS, HOW HIS ART HAS EVOLVED OVER THE YEARS AND HIS PLANS FOR THE FUTURE.
“G
ABI LITERALLY CHASE AN ELECTRIC UNICY VERY INTERESTING STOR AS WELL.’”
54 DRAWING ATTENTION
ED DOWN A COMMUTER ON YCLE....‘I THOUGHT THAT WAS A RY AND IT WAS STRONG VISUALLY MARCH 2018 55
USk Tutor
“O
PHELIA’S BOOKSHO CLAUDIA AND I FO WHEN NEW OWNERS BO THEY HAD TO PROMISE TO
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OP HAD A CAT NAMED OUND OUT THAT OUGHT THE BOOKSHOP O TAKE THE CAT TOO.”
Chasing down the story
Gabi began sketching as a teenager in his home town near Seville, Spain. But it wasn’t until 2006 when he moved to Seattle, Washington that he began drawing again in earnest. With sketchbook in hand, Gabi set out to explore his new city. Luckily he got a job as an illustrative journalist with the ‘Seattle Times’ and he has been sketching his way across the city ever since. Like all of us, it took time for Gabi to start feeling confident in his drawings. “I cringe when I look at my early drawings,” Gabi said. “But it’s about enjoying the process. Drawing forces me to really look at things and spend time contemplating the subject.” In his view, we benefit not just by the end result – a drawing – but by learning more about our surroundings. As an illustrative journalist, Gabi’s sketches are at the intersection of journalism and art. “A good drawing must have a good story. A good story has to have a strong visual.” For example, Gabi literally chased down a commuter on an electric unicycle for a ‘Seattle Times’ story. He noticed that e-riding has become a lot more popular and he had to know more. “I thought that was a very interesting story and it was strong visually as well.” Recently in his quest to find hidden, off-the-beaten-track places he stumbled upon a funky little bookshop called Ophelia’s. “It was so cool,” Gabi exclaimed. “It had a cat named Claudia and I found out that when new owners bought the bookshop they had to promise to take the cat too.” Gabi gets charged up by his own sense of curiosity to find those little-known places and to try new things. Recently Gabi started taking acrylic painting classes so that he can make some of his sketches into paintings. About a year ago he began doing most of his sketching for work on an iPad. “I crossed over to the dark side” he said jokingly. What’s in the future for Mr. Urban Sketchers? Gabi is looking forward to spending time with his wife and two teenaged children, teaching a workshop in Bothell, Washington in March, and a 10x10 class later this year. In the Bothell workshop, Gabi will teach students how to go from line to value to colour. “I’m drawn to making lines”, he explains. “But over the MARCH 2018 57
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years I’ve learned to better understand value.” Students will learn how to see in monochrome then move on to adding colour. ‘Pocket Urban Sketching’ is the name of the 10x10 class Gabi plans to teach this year. In this class he encourages students to carry a small pocket-sized sketchbook everywhere they go and to make discovering new places and sketching a part of everyday life.
Where has your curiosity taken you in your quest for interesting sketching subjects? Share your sketch and story on our Facebook group.
SHARE YOUR STORY
SKETCHING TIP: Even when you’re not sketching, look at your surroundings and practice drawing in your head. Measure distances, look for vantage points, edges, angles, shapes, contrast of light and dark. Trace the contours with your eye and pick the colors apart. It’s a good exercise that will keep you interested in everything you see even when you don’t have a pen and a sketchbook handy.
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USk Event
CHIBA UNIVERSITY & USK TOKYO host USk Board The Chiba University, Tokyo Graduate School of Horticulture was host to the Urban Sketchers executive board in early February. The board met in-person over three days for their annual strategic planning meetings and also participated in sketchwalks and a lecture series with USk Japan. Host Professor Isami Kinoshita discussed the possibilities of urban sketching as a research method then introduced his PhD student Maria Ermilova from Russia who presented her Iwase Neighbourhood Research Project. Maria’s project involves using urban sketching to document the changing city scape. USk Education Director, Mårio Linhares shared his understanding of how urban sketching has been used to help promote Portugal through the Sketch Tour Portugal project and USk Secretary, Peggy Wong shared her experiences as the organizer of the 2017 Kuching Sketchwalk. Thank you Chiba University and USk Japan for hosting!
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Review & Video
PARKA REVIEWS BY TEOH YI CHIE Teoh Yi Chie is an infographics journalist who joined Urban Sketchers Singapore in 2009. He’s probably better known as Parka from Parkablogs.com a website that reviews art books and art products. This month Parka video reviews the Leda Art Supply Sketchbook. Check it out!
USK FOUNDER GABI CAMPANARIO’S 2017 CHICAGO KEYNOTE ADDRESS 60 DRAWING ATTENTION
Review & Video
COOL GEAR John McCoy from USk Cincinnati, shared his cool gear secret. This is a GoPro Hero 4 Silver attached to a gooseneck mount clamped to his sketchbook that he used to videotape then speed up the making of his sketch. Do you have a cool gear secret to share with our readers? Email: drawingattention@urbansketchers. org.
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Endnotes
USk is pleased to announce four new Regional Chapters. The newest groups to join the family are: USk Qingdao, China; USk Londrina, Brazil; USk Paraty, Brazil; and USk Semarang. Welcome to the Urban Sketchers family!
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Endnotes
SHARE YOUR CHAPTER’S NEWS WITH OUR READERS
Contact us to share your chapter’s news, special events, joint meetups, and exhibitions with our readers. You don’t need to write the story yourself. We will assign a super fun writer such as Meagan Burns to cover your story!
Again this winter Marc Taro Holmes and Liz Steel are throwing down the One Week 100 People challenge. You can post your sketches on your own blog, your chapter’s blog or Facebook group, the USk Facebook group, or your prefered social media. Be sure to use the hashtag #OneWeek100People2018.
Contact us at: uskdrawingattention@gmail. com.
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Our Manifesto • We draw on location, indoors or out, capturing what we see from direct observation • Our drawings tell the story of our surroundings, the places we live and where we travel • Our drawings are a record of time and place • We are truthful to the scenes we witness • We use any kind of media and cherish our individual styles • We support each other and draw together • We share our drawings online • We show the world, one drawing at a time.
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