Monona Terrace Covention Center

4 Sketchers made it to Monona Terrace Convention Center today and we were happy to welcome Louise for the first time!


I sketched Louise drawing and a view from the window looking across Lake Monona. (above)  And Janet's great sketch with Tuscan Red colored pencil.

Sunday April 7th - Chazen Art Museum - UW Madison Campus

The group had a nice time sketching at the Chazen this  Sunday.   These are Larry's sketches of views from the Chazen of which Larry says,  "Both are of the same building just north of the Chazen.  The little one dated 031812 was done in pencil and was the 3rd sketch I did from the bridge that day so it probably took 20 to 30 minutes.  The other one, of the same building dated 040713 is the only one I did today and it took 30 to 40 minutes.  I used a fine point black sharpie pen.  I like it better than the 031812 sketch."      











           

And I did the pencil drawing of one of
the Chazen's Buddha's.

And Janet did a great sketch of an intriguing hare; really captured the mysterious facial expression.

Leonard Cohen in Milwaukee

This is a quick sketch from my seat at the Milwaukee Theatre on March 15th as I waited for Leonard Cohen and co. to come out on stage for what was a wonderful concert.  At 78 years old he ran out on stage and literally skipped off with every exit.  It was a 3 and 1/2 hour concert and he sang almost non-stop with one intermission.  It was a really great night and the audience loved it.  He had not performed in Milwaukee in 38 years; he said he had not wanted "to make a nuisance of myself".  The image of the woman and the horse is a drawing of his projected on to a screen behind the stage.  Hopefully this little sketch will help me remember what a great time I had that night when I am 78!

At The Stream on Sunday March 24th

Here is Linda's sketch from our trip to The Stream, the Art Dept. building at Edgewood College which we all agreed was a cool place with lots of opportunities for drawing.  Welcome to Terry and Anne Marie!  Hope you enjoyed the sketching and to see you again.  Linda's notes about this drawing say it is an "Interpretative sketch of a  white sculpture of a rabbit by Rebecca Corcoran. Prismacolor fine liner pen, Pitt artist brush pen, and Higgens ink wash."

Great subject for this time of year when the Easter Rabbits are busy hiding eggs and making more bunnies.

Linda's Vilas Zoo Sketch from March 17th

I made the sketch with micron pen and Higgens brown ink wash highlighted with the white
jellyroll, all on the moleskin sketch book paper.   I thought the
Discovery Center was fun, and very interesting.

(Linda's comments posted by Pat)

Sunday at the Zoo March 17th

  I think at least 8 sketchers met up last Sunday March 17th.  We hope Ann will come back and join us for some sketching in the future. Our venue was the Discovery Building and Herpetarium at Vilas Zoo.  On display were various animal skulls ranging in size from a mouse to a whale.  Larry chose the human skull for his sketch and did a masterly job.  I really love the way Larry's lines have so much energy in them. He was cheering on the Badgers but unfortunately to no avail!
  As it was St. Patrick's day I wanted to draw at least one green creature and the iguana posed perfectly for me only occasionally moving his head.  I thought the desert turtle would make a cooperative model but he was pretty active dashing about his habitat.  The Common Leopard Gecko kept still very nicely for long enough to get most of the sketch done, then he got up walked around a bit and came back and got in the exact same position; just like a model taking a break.  A really beautiful little creature.  I was drawing in a Strathmore grey toned sketchbook with a Pentel Brush Pen and White Gelly Roll pen.  I added some color with watersoluble crayons.
.

UW Arboretum Sunday March 10th

The Draw:Madison sketchers had a very nice time at the McKay Center on last foggy Sunday afternoon.  There was a nice display of stuffed owls which hold perfectly still unlike the live ones although they hold pretty still sometimes, too compared to many other birds.  The 2 top sketches are Elsie's and the 2 below are mine. Elsie was using Strathmore's grey sketching paper which is really beautiful and nice to sketch on esp with a white gel pen. I was drawing in a Stonehenge white paper sketchbook with Faber-Castell Pitt Artist Pens in a couple shades of grey and used some Neocolor II watersoluble crayons for color.

Gretchen's Sketchbooks

Here are some of Gretchen's sketches (though not in the order I wanted them in - still learning how to post):  the sketch above was from our January Sketchcrawl on State St. which started at HusNus' restaurant for lunch.  Next is Napili Beach from Gretchen's recent trip to Hawaii. The next 3 sketches are from our trip to the Chocolatier Cafe (I esp like the way she captured Larry and Greg!), and last but not least, is another beautiful Hawaiian beach.  Great work Gretchen!!

 

 Draw:  Madison sketched at Victor Allen's on Monroe St. today.  Sun streaming in the windows and coffee and scones; very pleasant place on a Sunday afternoon.  Today's sketches at left:  Top is a sketch of patrons by Larry.  Next are two sketches by Linda: the first a couple patrons and the next  a sketch of a figurine from the trip to the Epic campus a couple weeks ago.  Last but not least are today's pages from Elsie's sketchbook.  Great work guys!!

We decided to give McKay Center at the UW Arboretum a try again next week.  And Wednesday evening we will have our goodbye pot luck for the founder of the group, Dana.  We are all so grateful that she started our blog and got the group off the ground last year.  We've had alot of fun and met some wonderful folks who have a love of art and sketching from life.  Hopefully Dana will post some sketches from her new home in Chicago and maybe check out the Urban Sketchers Chicago some time. 

Last week Elsie brought the great new book by Danny Gregory, "An Illustrated Journey" to the Chocolatier Cafe so the Draw: Madison sketchers could have a look.  And we all agreed it looks worth the $$ with lots of great sketching by many of the Urban Sketchers members.  There are some interesting video interviews by Danny to be seen on his blog or Urban Sketchers blog with artists included in his book. 

 Looking forward to sketching at Victor Allen's coffee shop on Monroe St. today.  Yesterday I painted the barn painting with gouache on a country road south of Paoli.  I painted it on rough 300 lb watercolor paper. It was nice and warm in the front seat of my car.  The page from my sketchbook below was also painted in the car while I was parked at a boat landing south of Sauk City the previous Saturday.  Saw Bald Eagles and various ducks on the river in Sauk City and Prairie du Sac.  Also stopped by the River Arts on Water Gallery in downtown Prairie du Sac and saw beautiful paintings by local artists such as Cynde Quinn and Linda Koenig.  It's a lovely gallery and well worth the drive to Sauk-Prairie.  A great place to see what our local artists are doing.

A great time was had by all sketching in Bolz Conservatory at Olbrich Gardens.  Great place to come in from the cold.  There was a display of local quilters work at Olbrich also; the quilt by Natalie Sewell was spectacular.  Her quilts are like paintings and so beautiful.

Due to weather conditons Draw: Madison at Epic Campus was cancelled today.  Top sketch is a watecolor done from my car atop Observatory Rd. west of Paoli Jan. 12th and below a sketch from last week's Draw: Madison outing at the Chocolatier on Atwood Ave.  Nice place and great hot chocolate.  An added bonus was some Steampunkers stopping in wearing great costumes.





 Draw:  Madison went to the Chazen yesterday and I worked on the pencil sketch attached of an expulsion from the garden of Eden scene that was a fresco painted on tile in 1634 by Giovanni Mannozzi.  I spent about 80 min drawing it. 

The pastel above I painted on Saturday in the wind atop the hill on Observatory Rd. west of Paoli.  It was so warm that even with the strong wind it was not cold.  Now the temp has dropped nearly 50 degrees.  It's a great spot to paint and I'll go back when it's a little warmer.

Finally, I've made some time for posting recent drawings. Lately, I've been on a kick with just using a black pen and lots of hatching. It just makes things simpler. The drawing to the left is from our visit to the Goodman Community Center on Madison's east side. They have a lovely little pergola outside the Ironworks Cafe.

 I did this drawing while waiting for the bus. I think working with just the black pen in a kind of rushed time frame is helping me be fairly selective about which details to include in the composition.

Looking forward to drawing with everyone tomorrow at Raymer's Cove!

Happy Drawing,
Dana

Draw Madison went to Paoli yesterday and it was a beautiful day for sketching.  Lots of folks out enjoying the great weather.  Very interesting current exhibit at the Artisan Gallery there and I was thrilled to buy a small painting by Kelly Hoppman whose work I've admired for a long time.  Her paintings are surreal in subject matter and painted beautifully in a fairly realistic style.  It was part of a series of paintings done in collaboration with a poet.  John Ribble and Chris Gargan collaborated on a great painting of a big brown bear as artist.  My watercolor sketch is of the Artisan Gallery and restaurant sketched from the other side of the Sugar River in a Strathmore Multi-Media Journal that is great for watercolor. 

It took an hour to get an new Gooogle account as I am sure many others have had to do so now I can finally post again.  What a time waster these things are!  But fun and informative also.  Lately I have been working in my sketchbook doing little watercolors with some pen work and it's fun.  I have a page of images to remember the day with instead of snapshots and as we know painting a place fixes it in your memory much better than snapping a photo. This was done on our outing to Olbrich Gardens with Dana, Gretchen and Shirley a few weeks ago.  We all enjoyed the hydrangeas.  This journal is a Strathmore Artist's Journal with mixed media paper which I like alot for watercolor work.  It is pretty forgiving and doesn't buckle much even with alot of water.  I used artist tape to make the borders which is a easy way to design a page.  Paintings always look so much better when I peel the tape away.

Here are a few sketches from 3 of our last 4 outings.  Sorry I had to wimp out on Saturday at Farmer's Market on the Square but the heat did me in.  The first is the aerial view from the Target Starbuck's on University looking across the street.  The next is at Ground Zero where the coffee and company was excellent.  And the last was from Memorial Union Terrace on June 30th.  Always a great place to people watch and sketch. 

  What we really need to do is sketch a nice rainy scene and maybe some Sunday we will get the chance. 

A sketch from Carol!

Here's a sketch from Carol of the MG&E plant on Madison's eastside. From what I hear, our group enjoyed a decent view of the plant from the air conditioned comfort of Ground Zero Cafe. I really enjoy the color palette she choose. Thanks for sharing Carol!

Tomorrow, Saturday July7, we'll be at the Dane County Farmer's Market on the square in downtown Madison. It's probably still going to be super hot, so please stay well hydrated! If we get too hot, we can always retreat to a cafe on the Square.

Dana's Forays into Watercolor

I finally found some time to post my recent sketches!

Monroe Street

Ride the Drive, Capital Square

With summer in full swing, we've been sketching outdoors more and more. Tomorrow (6/10/12, 1 pm) we'll be sketching on the Rooftop Garden at Monona Terrace.  The weather will be hot and sunny, but if we get parched we can stop in at the Lakeview Cafe, also located on the roof of Monona Terrace. 

I've been inspired by the summer colors to take my watercolor kit along to our outings, and you can see the resulting drawings posted to the right.

I love how much life watercolor adds to a sketch, especially for web viewing. Nothing attracts attention quite like color. 

Up until this spring, I had been avoiding sketching with watercolors. I liked the simplicity off just using a pencil or pen and a small sketchpad on our outings. And limiting my materials allowed me to focus on line, composition and value. While I can't say that I've mastered all those things (may be a lifelong project!), I felt like I needed a change, an added element to shake up my drawing style.

After using watercolors at a few sketch sessions, I've realized that they require a more conscious approach to drawing process than my pencil sketches. I'm most pleased with method I used on the Ride the Drive sketch and the Monroe Street sketch. First I used my gray Tombo pens to sketch in basic contours, then I added lighter washes of color and finally a few darker washes and accents in black.

Allen Gardens

With the Allen Garden and Olbrich Garden sketches, I did the base drawings in graphite and charcoal. I think I added more dark areas earlier with the graphite and charcoal in these drawings than I did on the other two. I think combining charcoal and watercolor might be more effective in a larger format, but in my little sketchbook the result is a little too fuzzy for my taste.

One thing I really like about watercolor is that it lets you cover large areas of paper quickly, so I think it might be a good medium to explore value with. I think I'll try using a limited palate of colors and a greater range of values at our next couple sketching sessions.

Happy sketching,
Dana

Olbrich Gardens