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| Winter Walk, watercolour, 11 x 15 inches |
Excuse the liberties taken with Ms. Streisand's lyrics. Just my sneaky introduction to a discovery I made
some time ago, in a workshop with ArtCunanan, I think, that inserting people into a landscape painting adds both
scale and interest to the subject. I also discovered that I had great difficulty
actually drawing them.
When it came
to inserting a figure or two into a painting, it was hit and miss. The figures
often looked clumsy and distorted and did nothing to enhance the work. And so I
was hesitant, fearing I would ruin the piece. "Winter Walk" is the exception, thank goodness. (It's long since found a new home).
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| Kensington Pedestrian Day October 2015 Typically awkward figures |
In the
meantime, I have begun sketching en plein air. In this, I am following
in the footsteps – or sketchbooks – of thousands and thousands of artists
worldwide who enjoy the phenomenon known as urban sketching. Of course, once I
got outside with my pens, brushes, and pocket watercolour kit, I came face to
face with … people. What to do?
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| Practice, practice No faces in this one! |
Turning to
Google for help in finding sites and videos, I came across Felix Scheinberger. Eureka! His book: Urban Watercolor Sketching opened my
eyes. Where I had been trying to draw people realistically (and failing due to
lack of expertise), Felix showed me how to loosen up and draw what amounts to
caricatures. Perfect. I started filling sketchbooks with imitations of his work
and variations on the theme
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| A page from my studio sketchbook There are many more |
However, I felt I could only go so far with these odd characters. I needed something between the caricature and an impression; similar to the way I have developed my watercolour painting.
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| The "Eye Line" and figure proportions per James Richards |
Enter James Richards and his course Sketching the Energy of Places on the
Craftsy web site. In this
short six-lesson video, I picked up more information on sketching in the urban
environment than I could possibly find in a dozen books.
There are
many artists providing sketching information on the web; those that I recommend
include Cathy Johnson, Liz Steel and the gang at Sketchbook Skool – and, of course, James Richards - links below.
Be sure to subscribe to their various blogs and/or newsletters. (Liz Steel
seems to produce a blog entry per day)
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| Putting the Eye Line into practice |
There’s still a lot of plein air to go
around, albeit somewhat chilly at the moment. However, one may still recall the feel of summer from the warmth of the studio.
Links:
http://www.sketchbookskool.com/
http://toronto-urbansketchers.blogspot.ca/
https://www.facebook.com/groups/torontopleinair
http://toronto-urbansketchers.blogspot.ca/
https://www.facebook.com/groups/torontopleinair
What a great post. So informative!!!
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