Category Archives: drawing

drawing, Urban Sketching

Urban Sketching the Station

2 Comments

Another great outing with the Vancouver Urban Sketchers – we went to the Via Rail station near Main Street. Built around 1917 on reclaimed land in False Creek, this building, in addition to being a train station, has also been Greyhound’s Vancouver home since the old bus depot on Dunsmuir Street was torn down. I’ve been travelling on  Greyhound since I was 15 so I’m a little sad it’s shutting down its Western Canada operations, although I’m not particularly surprised. My first sketch is the ticket counter, soon to be a memory. I’ve also posted these sketches to the Urban Sketchers site – you can see my fellow sketchers’ work at this link.

 

 

 

drawing, Urban Sketching

Heat Wave

Leave a comment

We’re in another heat wave in the city but I found a nice shady spot to sit for a couple of hours and sketch. A group of Vancouver Urban Sketchers met at City Hall then spread out around the grounds.  Regretfully, I didn’t bring a pad of heavier paper and the scan shows  ripples on the page from the washes, but OH WELL. Just means a visit to the art store for more art supplies! Such a chore…

 

drawing, illustration, Photography

Beautiful things

Leave a comment

Often walking down the street on my way somewhere, I glance in shop windows and see beautiful things then wistfully wish I was at home so I could draw something like it. Then later on, I get home, start doing tasks and forget about the wistful moment. But not a couple of days ago. I saw some lovely vases in a window and wished I could try and draw something like them but I was busy…No, I actually wasn’t. I had a day off. I could just go home, pull out the paints and do something. So I did. A couple of vases…not at all like the ones I was looking at but a nice surprise anyway. Reminds me of roman glass.

“Vases”, watercolour, pencil crayon, pen and ink, approx. 30 x 21cm

Working on a new set of illustrations, studying birds – specifically, starlings. At the Art Gallery Outdoor Cafe a few weeks ago a friend of mine and I were inundated by them (and a few crows). I think they must have heard I was illustrating a children’s book about starlings so they came to model. I took 40 pictures, all great for reference. I got a few lucky shots as well:

Kind of an existential moment. What deep starling thoughts are going through your mind…?

drawing, illustration, printmaking

The Crow Book

3 Comments

Finally, our little children’s book is done. I worked with my author friend and former co-worker Kat Beaulieu on this project for the past, well, for quite a while. Just before Christmas, we put it on Amazon. Here’s the link: http://newest-stories-in-verse-childrens-books.aoiservices.com/hello-hello-said-craigellachie-crow. Kat has written another charming kids book and I get to illustrate this one too. Stay tuned. It’s about an opera loving starling…

Life has been pretty chaotic but I’ve managed to do a bit of artwork. During the Christmas break in 2015 I did a couple of monoprints. I recently pulled one of them off the wall and added some drawing.

“Alley near Main”, 22.5 cm x 30 cm, oil monoprint with charcoal drawing on paper