Gowanus 3 & Inktober 2018 - Day 3

For this sketch by the Gowanus Canal in Brooklyn I stood, leaning against a wall/fence and was looking toward Carroll Street. There was a lot of construction going on...so lots of orange fencing to restrict traffic where the road was all torn up.

My Inktober 2018 Day 3 sketch was done at Little Vincent's in Ronkonkoma. They reheated my pizza slice and it was much too hot to eat without burning my mouth, so I started sketching my view. Of course I stopped once I was able to eat the slice and then finished this when it was done. I used my Lamy pen, a brush pen, and my water brush that I touched to the Lamy pen to get some shading. And yes, the pizza was good!

For

Gowanus 2 & Inktober 2018 Day 2

As I said yesterday the area near the Gowanus Canal is pretty gritty and industrial. There are some buildings that have been abandoned and graffitied. Some of the structures are weathered and worn and have seen better days like this waterpower that doesn't seem like it will be standing much longer.

Yesterday afternoon I met a friend for lunch and parked in a lot by the Bronxville train station. When I got back to my car there was a ticket on the windshield for an expired inspection sticker. I didn't realize that it was due..it was only October 1st. I swear in the past Nissan sent me a reminder, but if they did I must have overlooked it. So this morning I was at Nissan to have the inspection done so I wouldn't get a second ticket. Since I was at Nissan for an oil change a little over a week ago sketching the inside of the waiting room seemed old, so I sketched the view into the showroom this time for my Inktober Day 2 sketch. #inktober #inktober2018

Gowanus 1 & Inktober 2018 Day 1

On Saturday the NYC Urban Sketchers met at the gritty, industrial area around the Gowanus Canal in Brooklyn. We have sketched there before and it is such a fun place. It was (IS?) one of the most polluted areas of our country and they have been working hard to clean up the area. As they do clean it up, new buildings are sprouting up and a lot of the graffitied buildings are slowly coming down. The essence of the place is slowly being lost as the area is changing. The toxic waste area is slowly becoming a lovely residential area. I haven't been there in a few years and the changes are very noticable.

One of our members, Jessica is part of an organization called the Gowanus Dredgers Canoe Club. On Saturday they were offering free canoe rides on the canal. I thought about it but with my poor sense of balance I didn't want to end up in the canal or to have my art supplies in the canal. So I stayed on shore. Several of our sketchers did go out in the canoes and a few even managed to sketch while they were in the canoes. Here is the first of my sketches. It includes a composite sketch of the people in the canoe. They passed by too quickly so I included a bit of what I saw in each of the canoes.

Today is October 1st and you know what that means...INKTOBER!!! Started by Jake Parker, Inktober has become very popular. I have participated in it since 2015 and always look forward to it. If you click on this link you can find out more about it...or just grab a pen and sketch in ink. This was sketched from the parking lot at Smith Point Beach.

#inktober #inktober2018

Return to the Gowanus Canal

It may not be the prettiest place around, but the NYC Urban Sketchers seemed to have a great time at the Gowanus Canal which is considered the most polluted waterway in the United States. There is a strange kind of beauty amid the gritty views along the canal. My thanks to Jessica Dalrymple and the members of the Canal Conservancy for inviting us to come and sketch the views. I missed going there with group last year, but did sketch there once before.  I did feel a little guilty (but not for long) in the morning watching the volunteers hard at work lifting and cleaning while I was sitting on my chair in the shade. They Canal Conservancy is making some headway cleaning up the area.

I found a good spot outside the salt lot to sketch the view across the canal. What drew me to this spot was the "End" sign and the view of the cement factory behind it. As gritty as the location is there are spots that just call to be sketched.

The Third Street Bridge was a great view too.

The views on the other side of the canal were interesting. 

I liked this side view of the cement factory.

Painting right near me was Jeanne Pierre who was working on an oil painting. It is hard to resist sketching another artist at work.

It was a great day of sketching!

World Wide Sketch Crawl #43 - The Gowanus Canal

The NYC Urban Sketchers picked the Gowanus Canal area in Brooklyn for our sketch crawl on Saturday. For those of you outside of NYC, the Gowanus Canal for a long time has been known as one of the most polluted waterways in the country. Recently environmental projects have been done to try and improve the conditions. It is making a slow comeback, and they are trying to get it declared a national historic area. Most of you know that I tend to paint attractive landscapes that are "pretty." Well, this was gritty and dirty and just so much fun to sketch. I was really pleasantly surprised. Just to give you an idea of the area here is a photo of the Union Street Bridge. This was one of the prettier spots.

Anyway plans were made for the group to meet in Manhattan and take the ferry across to Brooklyn and do a walk with some participants that are actually working on improving the canal. My friend, Susan and I were already on the Brooklyn side so the plan was to meet along one of the bridges. One other sketcher did meet up with us, but we didn't ever link up with the rest of the group.

Susan and I started at the Union Street Bridge (pictured above). While we were sketching an instructor came along with two kids and their parents. He was giving them a perspective lesson and it was great to see what they had sketched. I did one of most of the bridge and then one of the bridge house.

Next we drove over to the Ninth Street Bridge. Sunil found us sketching there. He is one of those people who has an easy time sketching standing up...not me. LOL

I sketched the Ninth Street Bridge with the oil tanks and the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway with the traffic on it. Then I sketched an interesting jumble of "stuff" alongside the canal.

At this point we heard voices calling to us. The other sketchers that we were supposed to meet were up on the elevated subway platform to take the train to the next location they planned to sketch. We decided we would rather stay where we were. There was a small fleet of cement mixers with colorful polka dots that I just had to sketch. LOL

Susan and I headed over to the Whole Foods Market by the 3rd Street Bridge. They had a wonderful park-like path around the parking lot that had views of the canal. I did one final (double page) sketch of the 3rd Street Bridge. I sketched it on location and started painting it, but it was getting late so I decided to finish it at home. It was really fun to sketch things so different from what I normally do.