Cafe du Monde

With all the people sketches to post I am behind a little. Last Saturday the NYC Urban Sketchers did a virtual event for Mardi Gras and New Orleans. I thought back to when Jerry and I visited New Orleans (pre Katrina) and had such a wonderful time. We stayed in a quaint inn that didn't serve breakfast, so in the mornings I would throw on my clothes and run over to Cafe du Monde to pick up biegnets and coffee. I loved the biegnets so I decided to sketch Cafe du Monde as well as the tasty biegnets. Every time I look at this my mouth starts watering.

 

San Miguel de Allende

 On Saturday the NYC  Urban Sketchers took a virtual trip to San Miguel de Allende, Mexico. It is a location that I have never visited but I have a connection to it. 

 Many, many years ago my sister, Fran went to San Miguel de Allende for the summer to take art classes. I'm not sure what year she went, but I think it was after she and I toured Europe together two summers in a row. I know I was jealous that she was going, but I think I must have been taking classes over the summer at Queens College to complete my degree. She did bring back an onyx candleholder for me which I still have some 45+ years later.

Our guide on Saturday provided a lot of links to walking tours and photographs of the city. I could happily sketch there in real life. I started with a sketch of this balloon vendor in the park. It was a scene I had to sketch.

Then I focused on La Parroquia de San Miguel Arcangel, a beautiful neo-Gothic 17th century church.

It wasn't quite the same as being there in person, but I had fun anyway.

Prague Sketch #2

For the afternoon session of the NYC Urban Sketchers virtual event on Saturday our aim was to do a night sketch of Prague. There were a lot of images if you Googled "Prague at night," which was what I did to find a reference. I haven't done too many nocturnal scenes so it was fun to try to get the feel of the evening atmosphere. I think I went a little too dark with the night sky and then had a hard time getting the trees to show, even doing them with a Sharpie marker.

Bannerman's Castle - Sketch 2

I liked the NYC Urban Sketchers virtual location on Saturday so much that I had to do another sketch. This location still had ruins but with the added color of a garden which I liked.

Newport "Cottages"

I continued taking part in the virtual sketching event that the NYC Urban Sketchers were doing yesterday. After my seascape along Cliff Walk I looked around Newport, Rhode Island to find one of the "cottages" to sketch. I liked this one a lot. It isn't as stuffy-looking as some of the big ones. I did this in my Strathmore Toned Tan sketchbook. This is the William G. Weld House on Bellevue Avenue. Again these are not "urban sketches" because they were done virtually.

The afternoon assignment was to do an interior view of one of the cottages. I didn't get around to that until today. This is one of the rooms in Hunter House.