Symposium, day 3: A fully workshopped journey

[By Paulo Mendes, Symposium Correspondent, in Porto] Looking
into the Symposium program, I always saw the third day as the most
difficult, with workshops happening both morning and
afternoon. I had six of these to visit and sketch, some of which
requiring the tough climb from Alfândega to the city centre through the old streets and stairways not made for the unfit. I planned my day in order to start from the
highest locations, moving towards the riverside and starting all over again after lunch.

“It’s
all in the details”, by Liz Steel, was the very first, requiring the
feared ascent; But no ascent of any kind will be hard enough in the joyful
company of Liz. Some stops on the way were used to give precious tips
and advice, and once the top was reached, we were even treated with a
small pastry. Baroque facades demand sweetness!

The
first exercise was to pick a detail and draw it from different
directions. At this point, with the students immersed in
the complexities of Nazoni’s masterpiece, I also had to follow my own
different direcion, as It was time to move away for my next workshop in the not very distant São Bento station.

“Draw
less, show more” by José Louro was my next stop. I found his group
gathering after their first exercise, consisting in sketching a human
figure deprieved of superfluous elements, in order to keep a focus in
the essential.

Another figure, elements from the surrounding scenario and a connection between them  was the next exercise. I still could sketch
some of people and a sample of the station plattform before moving back to
Miragaia for my last visit in the morning.

“Right
up your alley – Shadow, color and light in Porto’s narrow spaces”,
by Shari Blaukopf was happening in Cidral de Baixo street, almost in front of the Symposium. Several colorful houses
in a narrow space, their shadows impregnated with the reflections of
the neighbor colors were the perfect set for the final exercise. I
wanted to catch those lights and shadows while sketching the workshop
itself, this being also for me an excuse to come back to color,
something I’ve been missing

Shari
was happy with the final result. Her student’s lunch was
well-deserved. After all the morning up-and-downs, I dare to say mine too.

My first in the afternoon was “Frame your sketch”, by Pedro Alves. I’m a huge fan of Pedro and love the efficient lightness of his workshops, a quality assigned only to great communicators. Once arrived at Virtudes and after a rest from another climb, he treated us with a masterful watercolor demo of a manor house across the street.

An
exercise, consisting in pairs of students sketching each other in two
versions, the better and the worse they could make, was just finished when
it was time to move to my next workshop just five minutes away.

“Umbrella
perspective”, by Paul Heaston, a very recognizable feature of his
work. An exercise iusing a single point of view had just
finished and Paul was commenting the results when I came by.

After
a few explanations, the students moved into a more complex
3-umbrellas point of view exercise, and I tried to capture them at work within the
same spirit.

“Urban
tales: Buildings can talk too. Architectural scenes without actors”,
by Reham Ali. The old houses of Miragaia are excellent story tellers,
with their balconies overloaded with planters, hanging laundry,
sattelite dishes and many other visual goodies. No human presence is
necessary, as these buildings do all the talk. My sketch, with a focus in
her group spreaded along the stairs, was quite the opposite of this topic, but how to resist this composition?

Reham’s wise remarks on the excellent final results.

The
day ran really fast, for me the fastest since the Symposium opening. It was
time to go back to the “sketcher’s nest in the top floor” before a well deserved short moment with good old
friends at the Drink and Draw. But having this post to write, it was more
like Drink and Go to me.