Inktober 2022 - Day 30 - Along the Tracks & Times Square

 Today one of my art groups was having a closing reception for our show that has been in a gallery in Cutchogue. So since I was out on the North Fork I looked for an Inktober subject. This building was along the Mattituck train tracks. It was unusual. None of the doors or windows lined up. Each ended on a slightly different level.

Here is the updated version of my Times Square sketch. I added more color, more details, and did some shading with a grey Tombow ink marker as Ian Fennelly suggested.

Here is the version before the additional work if you want to compare them.

Inktober 2022 - Day 29 - Sketching Workshop

 Today I attended an excellent sketching workshop called "Shapes, Colours and Stories" given by Ian Fennerly from the UK. It was sponsored by the NYC Urban Sketchers. I love Ian Fennerly's work and when I was at the Porto Symposium I attended one of his demos. Thru Etcher I also did an online class with him during the pandemic. 

The class was in Times Square...right in the heart of it. Luckily he found a location for us to work from that was a bit away from the insanity of all the dressed up figures, tour hustlers and entertainers. 

The general idea of the workshop was to focus on the story of the area with the signs and activity around the water using the street lamp posts to block in the sketch. Slowly we added the details. We worked on our ink sketches with assorted thicknesses of pens in several stages (the first was with a light grey Tombow marker which we used instead of a pencil to place the largest items in our sketch. We redrew the items with a 0.2 permanent marker adjusting them as needed.  Then we transitioned to watercolor. The final steps will be to do tone work with grey Tombow ink markers. Ian did a demo of each step on his sketch and then allowed us to do the same while he came around commenting and giving advice as needed. It was only a 3 hr class so a lot was crammed into a small amount of time. He suggested waiting to finishing the last step with the ink markers until he sent us his finished sketch to see what he added and where. A lot of the tonal shading is done directly over the watercolor and the sketching we already did. 

Here is my unfinished sketch which I am using as my Inktober sketch for today. I will work on this more and promise to post it when I am done.

 

Here is a photo of Ian explaining what he added to his sketch.

Country and City

This was sketched a few days ago when I went out searching for forsythia...there was lots of it, but finding a place to park and sketch it wasn't easy. lol

I joined the Uskvirtual group on Facebook. Every day they pick a new location to sketch and they happened to pick Times Square. I couldn't pass it up.

Saturday - Part III

I decided to move off the risers and continue sketching from a point below. I had the option of sitting on my chair or a bench. I chose my chair thinking it would be warmer than a cold, metal bench. This time I faced the risers. Here is my sketch from there. I did eliminate about 3/4 of the people that were there, trying to find some good poses. You do see just about everything there.

One of the other sketchers took a photo of me and my friend, Pat while we were sketching. She was sketching on her iPad.

By this time, even with two pairs of fingerless gloves on, my fingers were getting too cold. I did have hand warmers with me, but was too lazy to pull them out. Then the cold started moving to the core of my body, so when the sketch was done Pat and I headed indoors. The plan was to meet inside the Marriott Marquis for drinks and a "show and tell." I had a few minutes to warm up before someone came along and said we were doing a group photo outside, so I headed out again. Here is the group...or what remained of the group and was willing to still be outside by about 4 pm.

Of course when we get together for our "show and tell" we have some time to talk and sketch each other before any sharing gets done. I sketched my friends across the table from me.

We were sitting at tables with a view of Times Square outside the floor to ceiling windows. I think in total we had about 35 people participate at some time during the day, although some didn't stay the entire time. For a freezing cold day I think that was a great turnout. I think 26 of us made it back to the Marriott Marquis for the "show and tell."

I hope you enjoyed seeing a bit of my Saturday!

Saturday - Part II

Saturday was a special day for the Urban Sketchers...their 10th anniversary. To celebrate in style they scheduled a USk WorldWide Sketchcrawl. At least 110 Urban Sketcher Regional Chapters from all over the world participated and the work was live streamed on Instagram from different select cities starting in Australia and moving across the world. NYC was participating and we met in Times Square to sketch. Unfortunately for us Saturday was the coldest day we've had since the winter. It was below freezing in the morning and the temperature rose to a balmy high of about 43 degrees.

I did go prepared. When I came home at the end of the day I felt like one of those Russian dolls with one layer under another layer...you get the point. I had 2 thermal layers under my jeans, special heavy "heat holder" socks, 2 thermal tops, a turtleneck and a heavy sweater under my winter coat. Add a scarf, hat, and 2 pairs of fingerless gloves. For the most part I was warm for the first few hours, but when the sunlight went behind the skyscrapers I started to get cold.

Times Square has these risers that people usually stand or sit on. I was sitting on my folding chair so my rear end wouldn't be on the cold risers, but I had a lot of trouble balancing everything in my lap with my bulky coat, so I ended up sitting on the riser for a while. Here are a few short videos and you can see me sketching in the first one. lol

Here are Katie and Leslie sketching.

(Right to left) Sonia, Paula, Suzala and Leslie.

Here is the sketch I was doing of the view ahead of me.

I also did a sketch of some of the people sitting on the risers, including Leslie who was in the video above.

When I moved down from the risers I was sidetracked by the sailors celebrating Veteran's Day in Times Square. I did a quick sketch of one of them.

More tomorrow.

A Special Day

 Many of us follow blogs of other artists here on the internet that we have never met. Sometimes fate gives us a chance to meet one of them. Today was a special day. I have been following the blog of Wendy Barrett from Australia for quite a while, and she is on a trip to the USA and I met her in NYC today!!! She was so sweet and it was so much fun to spend time with her.

Here is a link to her blog: http://wendybarrettpainting.blogspot.com

I know some of you follow her blog too. We had such a good time together!!!

First we sketched in Times Square. Rain was forecast but we didn't let that dampen our enthusiasm for sketching and talking. Here we are in Times Square...where they saved a table in the pedestrian mall just for us. :)

A selfie of the two of us.

Wendy's work on the right and my work on the left.

Wendy (left) and me (right) working on our sketches.

Sketching was followed by a nice lunch and more talking. By the time we finished lunch it was raining. I had a pass to MOMA (the Museum of Modern Art) where there was a wonderful exhibit of Edgar Degas' monotypes. It was a huge exhibit. Here are a few pieces that I loved.

We also saw some of the other works like Van Gogh's "Starry Night" which Wendy is admiring in this photo.

Wendy will be in NYC for 2 weeks and she will be joining me and the NYC Urban Sketchers in Central Park on Saturday (weather permitting). After several weeks of lovely weather we have been having rain and chilly weather all week. I hope Saturday is nicer. 

Wendy took a few other photos of the two of us. With her permission I will post them when she sends them to me.

Urban Sketching

Today I went into NYC to meet the NYC Urban Sketchers. I went in on the LIRR and was able to sketch a bit in route. There were a few cooperative victims who were in my range of sight.The ride is
1 1/2 hrs so I was able to do more than one sketch.

I was early so I did one sketch outside Penn Station looking across Seventh Avenue.

Luckily I dressed warmly because it was cold and windy.

The plan was to meet on 44th St near the Shubert Theatre to sketch some of the theaters in the area.

When I arrived Mark, Svetlana, and Pat had already been sketching and were freezing.

Svetlana suggested that instead of sketching the theatres we go to her office building which was in Times Square and sketch the views from the windows. It sounded warm and very comfortable.

Mark had lots of room to spread out and paint.

Svetlana made the most of the view.

Pat worked digitally.

We were on the 25th floor and had nice views of the rooftops and buildings.

I did a few.

After a while we headed down to another office on the 15th floor which had a view of the Times Square area. Marie joined up with us there.

It is always fun to sketch Times Square but difficult because many of the billboard designs

change constantly or are moving. I did my best.

I did another sketch facing a different view.

Svetlana was sketching the view of Times Square.

Around 3 o'clock the group split up and people went off to do other things.

I decided to head back to 44th Street and sketch one of the theaters.

Here is the Shubert Theatre where the musical, Matilda is presently playing.

I headed back to Penn Station for the 5:15 train home.

I did get in one last sketch of a woman who was facing me.

I think I did pretty well, and touched on a variety of subject.

Out With the Old, In With the New

I decided to finish the year off right. First I headed down to the water to do the final sunset of 2012. The colors weren't anywhere as exciting as they were the other day. This was done by the water in Sayville.

 

On New Year's Eve after a big prime rib dinner cooked at home and a few martinis I was definitely relaxed and worried that I wouldn't last until the ball dropped. So I decided to sketch until it did. Sketching Times Square from the tv was a challenge in itself. Most of the time they focused on the crowd or the performers with a quick look at the buildings. I did a few of the signs from what I saw, a few people from what I saw (yes, that person on the left in the front is a giant...perspecive isn't easy after martinis. lol), the ball, and a few buildings mostly from memory. Anyway I think it captured the magic of the night.

 

Yesterday, New Year's Day, I spent most of the day taking down my Christmas tree. Usually I don't do that until the middle of January, but we bought a new HDTV and I got a laptop for Christmas, so the cable tech is coming this week to connect everything. Yes, I will finally have the internet at home. Yeah!!!

The result of all that exhausting work is that I didn't get out to sketch anything, so again I sketched inside. I painted this bottle of wine instead of drinking it. lol Come over and I'll share it.