March 7, 2021 "Passion for Pencils"
Michael Klampfl, Sandra Biskup & Paul Tathagata
If you are one of the winners, congratulations! To claim your prize you can send an email to winner@cretacolor.com with your full name, address, and phone number, and we’ll send the prize to you!
Michael Klampfl from Cretacolor
Michael Klampfl joined us from Vienna, Austria, to tell us all about the Cretacolor brand, some of their new products, core products such as graphite and charcoal, and some popular tool sets. We also learned about the history of Cretacolor. “The knowledge of graphite production we have today goes back to 1863,” when it started as the Zues graphite pencil factory by Carl Brevillier. Cretacolor’s current owner, Hans Wolfgang Hromakta, has a private collection of 35,000 pencils and originated their slogan, A Passion for Pencils.Sandra Biskup and the Urban Sketching Set
Sandra Biskup also joined us from Vienna to talk with Rob and Michael about how Urban Sketchers Vienna helped develop the Urban Sketching Set that is being given away as today’s prize. Members of USk Vienna and representatives from Cretacolor met in a coffee shop where they sketched with Cretacolor materials, gave feedback, and made recommendations for the set. The Urban Sketching Set includes a variety of materials – graphite, colored pencils, calligraphy markers, and accessories. Rob noted how thoughtful the whole set is, offering a nice range of materials.Sandra showed a demonstration video of an urban sketch she made with a reduced color pallete of cretacolor pencils. She said she likes the texture of pencils, and the variety of being able to use the side of a pencil lead to cover larger areas, and being able to get a range of values.
Cretacolor Factory Tour and Quiz
Michael and Rob had fun with our viewers as they showed pictures from the pencil production process and asked viewers to guess what the step was. We had so many responses and winners for each step and a couple of bonus questions!
Congratulations to all of our winners! You can claim your prize by sending an email to winner@cretacolor.com with your full name, address, and phone number, and your prize will be sent to you.
Paul Tathagata, Cretacolor Brand Ambassador
Paul Tathagata, a hyperrealist artist based in Kolkata, India, showed a demonstration video of how he uses Cretacolor’s charcoal pencils and the range of Nero pencils (soft, medium, and hard) to build up layers in his hyper-realistic artwork. He prefers Cretacolor pencils because they smudge very little, and suggests using the Nero range for urban sketching.Challenge: Savor the Sweet Life
Rob and our guests indulged in some sweets to introduce this week’s challenge, Savor the Sweet Life. Michael had a traditional Viennese chocolate cake called Schwarzwalder Kirsch, and Sandra also had a Viennese dessert, a homemade Apfelstrudel. Paul had a traditional Bengali dessert, Rasgulla, balls made with paneer and cooked in sugar syrup, beautifully light and spongy! Rob’s “humble” desserts were Hong Kong’s pineapple bun and cocktail bun.What local dessert do you love? Using only pencils, sketch and share the story of your favorite local dessert, and don’t forget to list tools and brands!
Be sure to share your USk Talks Challenge sketches on Instagram using the hashtags #usktalks and #usktalkschallenge. Tag our guests in your challenge sketches, and follow them on Instagram: Cretacolor @cretacoloraustria, Sandra Biskup @sandfarbe, Paul Tathagata @tathagatapaul_art, and our host Rob Sketcherman @robsketcherman.