Drawing Attention – July 2014

Penang’s Sketching George Town II

Urban Sketchers Events and Workshops

Ch’ng Kiah Kiean reports that Urban Sketchers Penang is looking forward to Sketching George Town II in early July. The three-day event, which will include workshops, presentations and an exhibition, is expected to attract 150 attendees from nine countries.

Drawing on Stage in Tuscany is the name of Simo Capecchi’s Urban Sketchers Workshop in Volterra July 23 – 27. The workshop will include live sketch reportage of the theater company Teatri35.

Oxford, England, will be the site of Pushing Your Sketching Boundaries, an Urban Sketchers workshop July 9 – 12, taught by Isabel Carmona, Miguel Herranz and Swasky.

It’s still not too late to register for the 5th International Urban Sketching Symposium in Paraty, Brazil! If you are Paraty-bound, stay on top of symposium and travel information by logging into the new Discussion Forum. And don’t forget to introduce yourself on the symposium blog!

The Second Annual West Coast Urban Sketchers Sketchcrawl in Portland, Oregon, is coming right up – July 11 – 12! It has already received attention from OregonLive, the online version of The Oregonian newspaper. 

Plein Air Artists of Riverside, California, participated in the 43rd quarterly World Wide SketchCrawl in April.

News from Urban Sketchers Communities

Marina Grechanik reports that Urban Sketchers Israel participated in its first group exhibition as part of Tel Aviv Illustration Week. Featuring the work of 25 sketchers, the exhibit attracted the attention of local and national media, Marina said, including the blog DesignBreak, Israel national television channel 1 and Israel’s largest newspaper, Yedioth Ahronot, promoted by the Municipality of Tel Aviv.

Urban Sketchers Kuching received a great article in The Star on June 11. “Having cameras on mobile phones mean you can take snap shots anywhere anytime,” urban sketcher Peggy Wong said, quoted in the feature article. “Sketching is more of a personal representation of the world. There isn’t even a right or wrong way to sketch.”

The Dallas/Ft. Worth contingent of USk Texas recently sketched at the historic Texas and Pacific Railway Terminal.

The crowning of Spain’s new king was occasion for three sketchers – Joaquín González Dorao, Patrizia Torres and Inma Serrano – to blog about the historic event collectively.

Tim Richardson of USk Birmingham announces that the group’s next gathering will be on July 12 to coincide with the 44th quarterly World Wide Sketchcrawl event. The location will be St. Martin’s Church and its environs. Results will be posted on the group’s Flickr stream, Facebook page and blog. (Is your USk group participating in the World Wide Sketchcrawl? Send a link to your images to drawingattention@urbansketchers.org.)

USk Girona will participate in Festival Pleinart.

Urban Sketchers Girona will gather on Sept. 13 as part of Festival Pleinart. They will spend the day drawing around Montgrí and then meet up again in the evening to share sketches and socialize while enjoying jazz.

Kip Bradley, an administrator of the international Urban Sketchers Flickr group, is now curating sketches from the group’s weekly themes and posting them on the main Urban Sketchers blog. Recent themes include modern steel and glass buildings and construction projects. Participate in the themes, and you may see your sketches on the blog!

The Urban Sketchers editorial team recently announced that it is accepting submissions of guest posts, and proposals from enthusiastic guest contributors are pouring in! You can soon look forward to sketches, tutorials, book reviews, videos and much more from all parts of the sketching world.

Sketchers in Action

Tia Boon Sim, founder of Urban Sketchers Singapore, was featured on the blog My Red Palette about her enthusiasm for urban sketching and its popularity in Singapore. 

Teasers from Marc Holmes’ new book appear on his blog.

Montreal urban sketcher and USk founding board member Marc Taro Holmes is happy to announce publication of his book, The Urban Sketcher: Techniques for Seeing and Drawing on Location. Forthcoming from North Light Books in October, the book can be preordered now on Amazon.com.

Cathy Johnson, urban sketcher and writer of the popular book and blog, Artists’ Journal Workshop, has just published a new book: Painting Nature in Watercolor with Cathy Johnson: 37 Step-by-Step Demonstrations Using Watercolor Pencil and Paint. Available now on Amazon.com in paperback and Kindle version, the book is one of 30 that Cathy has authored. 

USk President Jason Das has an exhibit at BRIC House arts center in Brooklyn.

Urban Sketchers President Jason Das will have an exhibit of large urban sketch paintings at BRIC House arts center in downtown Brooklyn July 30 through the end of August. 

Claudio Feldman Pincas, an Argentine architect and mixed media urban sketcher living in Belgium, just had an exhibit of his paintings and drawings at the Brugge Dienst Cultuur. Pages from his new book can be previewed on Blurb.

Ken and Roberta Avidor, urban sketchers in St. Paul, have been reporting on the flooding of the Mississippi River with their sketches. Their sketch reportage caught the attention of the Twin Cities Pioneer Press. “These days, epic events like flooding rivers and swollen streams are captured in photos snapped on phones and shared in seconds,” the Pioneer Press said. “The Avidors, however, offer a slower, more artistic view of their world.” 

Claudio Feldman Pincas had an exhibit at Brugge Dienst Cultuur.

Urban sketchers James Richards and Richard Alomar will be joined by digital sketching guru Bob Chipman and artist, designer and author Chip Sullivan in leading an all-day sketchcrawl for the national meeting of the American Society of Landscape Architects in Denver this November. 

Along with six other artists, Barcelona urban sketcher Lapin just had an exhibition at Mitte Barcelona Gallery to celebrate the gallery’s third year. “The concept of the exhibition was a tribute to our city Barcelona, and I loved the idea as this beautiful city is a constant inspiration for me,” Lapin said. “My inspiration was the tiles of Passeig de Gracia by Gaudi and through them an interpretation of the iconic symbols of Barcelona.” And speaking of Gaudi, Lapin just finished leading an urban sketching workshop on the Sagrada Familia in June.

Nuremberg urban sketcher Manfred Scholz recently sketched in Camino de Santiago, Spain, including a service for pilgrims in the Cathedral of Santiago, which was a highlight for him.

New York urban sketcher Veronica Lawlor will be joining the captain and crew of the 19th-century whale ship Charles W. Morgan during its historic voyage this summer on its Provincetown-to-Boston leg. “While aboard the Morgan, I will create a reportage essay of the voyage, in words and pictures, to add to my reportage of the restoration of the ship,” Veronica says on the Urban Sketchers blog.

Shout it Out in Drawing Attention! 

Not seeing anything about you or your Urban Sketchers group in Drawing Attention? Then we want to hear from you! Please send your urban sketching news items with links and images to: drawingattention@urbansketchers.org. Or tag me, Tina Koyama, on news you post on the Urban Sketchers Facebook page. Subscribe by e-mail. Happy sketching!