Sunday 14 July 2013

Making New Sketcher-Friends



This weekend I have been delivering location-sketching workshops at the 4th International Urban Sketching Symposium, in Barcelona. I gave a 3 hour workshop on Thursday, Friday and Saturday, called Sketches That Sing but, the rest of the time, I have been taking part in the conference, attending other people's workshops and going to lectures. If last year is anything to go by, I will have been drawing and painting more or less round the clock since the moment I arrived. 


Anyway, since I am not back yet to tell you all about it, I thought I would show you the last bit of sketching I did before I left. We had a mini SketchCrawl in Sheffield last Sunday. To celebrate the sudden, incredible weather, we met at a cricket match. Now, I know nothing about cricket and, to be honest, I was only playing the most scant attention to the game. Mostly it was about sitting on the grass at the back of the Cricket Inn, in the dappled shade, chatting and sketching with friends.


When I finished the drawing above, he came over to see and we got chatting. Turned out he was a graphic designer who missed sketching, so I told him about sketchcrawling. Next day, he emailed me this drawing of me, drawing him, done from memory:



I love the way sketching creates contacts between strangers.

The temperatures were ridiculous in the sun that day. I imagine I will be melting in Barcelona: the forecast was for it to reach 29 degrees today, so I'm guessing I'll have been seeking out the shade again. I'm home on Tuesday night, so I'll let you know how I got on.


In the meantime, if you are interested in seeing more sketching, you can browse the rest of my sketchbooks on my website or watch a series of short demonstration films on my YouTube channel.

2 comments:

Unknown said...

How long have you been urban sketching, and what or who was the reason you started. Also, how large are your sketchbooks

Lynne the Pencil said...

Hi Nick, I has been sketching on-location for 30 years, but have been doing it in a more intensive way for the last 4-5 years, especially since I became a UK correspondant for Urban Sketchers. I draw because I have to, because it gives me a great sense of acheivement and because it allows me to be constantly exploring new ideas and media, in a way that my illustration work cannot. My books vary from A6 up to A4, but are mostly somewhere in between. I like the 5.5 inch square ones best for my train sketches and love the landscape format Moleskin shape for panoramas. Just discovered concertina sketchbooks too!