I spent most of Sunday afternoon in the Fitzroy Gardens, Melbourne, preparing for my Nature Sketching with Watercolour Pencil class next Saturday. I was doing a ‘run through’ deciding on timings for sketching, which trees to choose and where the shade and seats are.
Below are three sketches. One is looking at the tree trunk close up, observing. The second is stepping back a bit, with the same tree, but a bit more scenery. The third sketch of the day was a large panorama, including the same tree. I remembered to take photographs along the way: one at 5 minutes, one at 15 minutes and the final at 20 minutes. It was a learning experience for me.
Sketch one- Moreton Bay Fig up close
I started by sitting close to a tree and observing the bark in the trunk. I was looking at its patterns and colours. It is a large Moreton Bay Fig and is a feature of the Gardens. If we don’t choose to sketch this tree, there are many others nearby with character.
Sketch two-stepping back
For the second sketch, I stepped back from the tree. I still wanted to include it in the sketch, but also give some background to provide context.
Sketch three – stepping back further
The final sketch to include this tree had me walking back even further to try and include some of its branches and the tops of other trees.
And to end the day, a quick unplanned sketch of magpies on a low branch in the tree next to me. My class is Nature Sketching, but there is not a lot of highly visible wildlife in the Gardens. In my class. I will ask the students to collect something off the ground to sketch. The Moreton Bay Fig has some nice interesting leaves when they have fallen on the ground, and some lovely fruit that are small, round and greenish purple).
Of course, if it rains, this may change….. but we will sketch anyway.
There are still places available if you would like to join in , book here.
At yesterday’s Travel Sketching with Watercolour Pencil class, I used an example of drawing a watermelon to demonstrate how to use watercolour pencils on the page.
We were at Dromkeen homestead, just outside of Melbourne, It happened towards the end of the three hour class, when we had returned to the (airconditioned) conference room. This was after sketching in the garden and inside the house, as we avoided rain and humidity.
There were questions about applying the watercolour pencil to the paper and spreading it on the page. Today. I drew it again, taking photos along the way. I hope that this explains the way I use pencils and achieve the final result. Let me know if you have any questions.
Step One
Waterbrush and the three watercolour pencil colours used . Alizaron Crimson, Pine Green and Grass Green
Draw the watermelon shape and outline directly with the watercolour pencil colour that is going to be used. The watermelon is red the skin is green.
Heavily and roughly add colour in the areas of of the watermelon that are darkest.
Step Three
Using the waterbrush, rest it in the coloured areas and pull the colour across the page. This adds a lighter colour to areas of the page.
Step Four
Wait to dry, then add more colour in some areas to give depth and texture, Dabbling the watercolour brush on areas of colour can give, texture, and remove any hard lines. Add hard lines with a sharpened watercolour pencil along some of the skin and just some of the darkened areas of the watermelon.
I spent today with three sketching friends, planning for a potential future event,
They actually don’t really look very much like this, but you get the idea.
It took a bit of coordination to actually find a time that we could all meet today. We spent five hours at a cafe from brunch to lunch throwing about ideas. While we were talking we were also sketching. We have four different styles of making marks on the page, the colours we use and objects and things that we choose to sketch, For me, this is the wonderful thing about sketching- there is no right or wrong and it is all about capturing the moment on the page.
Here are my sketches
Mt Tulk Cafe at State Library of Victoria.
RMIT (University) buildng features large green clouds of tiles on its facade, Mt Originally built for the Singer Sewing Machine company in 1912,
and some of the others as they painted.
Watch this space for details on our project. My year was already taking shape, after a weekend of planning early in the New Year. This has neatly fitted into my calendar. I have some classes and exhibitions planned.
I sketch when in doctors waiting rooms. It is a wonderful way to fill in time and to take my mind away from being there. I sketch other people waiting, the reception desk. etc, but today I am featuring my shoes – There is always something to sketch !!! I have a lot of annual doctor check-ups due to a little medical adventure in 2011. This week I had some more and a friend’s first comment was – did you draw your shoes? That prompted this week’s blog post
Some are in watercolour pencil ( with or without water added to the page) and others in ink pen.
I write a blog post at this time each year looking back at what I have done during the year. This is quite a long blog with a few photos. Once again, I realised that I had a very busy year! ( I have done this in 2018, 2017 as well as 20142015 & 2016 )
Daily sketching. I filled eight Moleskine watercolour sketchbooks 13 x19 cm of everyday sketching. I scan every page of my sketchbook and put them all on Flickr (an image sharing website) Some go onto Facebook at Alissa Duke Art , some on Instagram alissaduke1. I have fewer daily sketchbooks than previous years as I have spent more of my “everyday sketching time” on private commissions.
I have maintained my weekly art blog. Thank you to everyone who follows my weekly art blog. I hope that you find it enjoyable and interesting to read and full of information. I hope that I am able to share a bit of my passion for drawing and watercolour pencils. Please let me know if you have any questions or would like me to explain anything I do. I still hope to be able to produce a video one day, (but that is in the too hard basket again) You can subscribe to my blog to receive it via email.
Etsy Sales – I have an Etsy online store selling my Greeting cards. This year was quieter as I focused on promoting other areas of my art. Once again, as I promised myself last year, I need to learn more about marketing in the new year, and making people and organisations aware of my art.
Newsletter. I sent three newsletters this year to the 112 people who subscribe to my newsletter, in January, March and September. The newsletter is for people who are interested in my art and would like to know when major events happen – new card designs, markets, exhibitions and classes. They may not necessarily be interested in my Weekly Art Blog, but still want to be updated.
Instagram. I now have over 1300 followers on Instagram alissaduke1. I post an image daily to Instagram, so they are examples of sketching every day, and hopefully inspire some sketchers.
2019 month by month – my projects and commercial activities. (paying for my pencils)
I have written about them below, with a link to the blog post about the event, if I wrote one.
Watercolour pencil sketching classes. I shared my joy of sketching and my passion for watercolour pencils by running classes locally in and out of Melbourne, I held four at Dromkeen homestead, just outside of Melbourne.
Dromkeen Children’s LitFest Riddells Creek, just outside of Melbourne. Saturday 30 March. I was honoured once again to be invited to sketch at Dromkeen LitFest 2019: Stories connect us to the past, the present & the future’. It was a day of celebrating Australian Children’s Literature http://alissaduke.com/2019/03/dromkeen-litfest-2019.html
April
Commission I drew a family home that is being sold. As part of the same commission, I completed a second drawing of six objects and scenes from around the house that have special memories to the owners. I love the combination of the two.
May
Melbourne Rare Book Week launch & posters – I designed five posters for the Melbourne Library SErvice events for Melbourne Rare Book Week in July. Marketing due in early in the year for the July event. http://alissaduke.com/2019/05/melbourne-rare-book-week-launch.html
Clunes Booktown Festival I applied for and was appointed a Social Media Reporter for the day – a BIG event for me. It was perfect for me as could combine my love of books and sketching, http://alissaduke.com/2019/05/clunes-booktown-festival.html and a
Melbourne Rare Book Weekhttp://alissaduke.com/2019/07 . Once again, I was Sketcher on location at many of the fascinating events at Melbourne Rare Book Week. This is a major event in my year and I am so pleased to be involved with the people and organisations that make it.
Commissions – St Peters Eastern Hill Church. Drawings for an event invitation and cards. Below are the sketches as works in progress.
Commission – bookstack – this is as it was as a work in progress. The final version had personalised book titles.
commission – an A4 drawing for a raffle prize. Below is a work in progress.
as a work in progress
I held a Travel Sketching with Watercolour Pencil class as part of the Melbourne East Arts Festival, based in the local Holy Trinity church. We were fortunate to have nice, but cool weather to go for our walk.
Commission – womble . Lisa from London had seen my previous sketch of a Womble on the Wimbledon page in an old London A-Z Street Index. Fortunately, I had just purchased another discarded old London A-Z and could draw a new one for them, choosing Uncle Bulgaria as their favourite womble.
I hope that everyone had a lovely Christmas break with whatever you had planned.
I flew home for a week and spent a festive time, with many friends and family visiting us. The table was decorated and food always out to offer visitors, who also brought more food! I always had a colourful array of things to draw during my holidays.
I was delighted to be invited to have a stall to sell my greeting cards at today’s local East Melbourne Library Community BBQ. We were very fortunate to have good weather (after some some shockingly hot few days) for our outdoor event.
There were stalls and people from the local Melbourne Men’s Shed Inc, East Melbourne Community Herb Garden Group, East Melbourne Historical Society and Melbourne Rooftop Honey. and me . I took along a selection of greeting cards printed from my drawings of books and libraries, Christmas themes and nature sketches and I was pleased with the amount of sales.
This free community barbecue (sausage sizzle and curry puffs) had Christmas goodie bags for children and festive poetry readings. The queues for the food were long and people stayed around and chatted for a while as well.
I had fascinating conversations with local people who were visiting the library to borrow books or to visit the BBQ. We think about 400 people visited (based on the number of sausage in bread and curry puffs that were eaten). I caught up with friends and met new people (including three who live in the same apartment block as me !)
I also had a poster about my watercolour pencil classes which started a few lovely conversations and some potential bookings.
Well done to everyone who was involved and thank you to East Melbourne Library for organising this great event and inviting me to be involved ! It was a wonderful community event.
Yesterday was a very special watercolour pencil sketching class – Christmas High Tea at Dromkeen.
I arrived at the historic homestead Dromkeen to find the dining room magnificently decorated for our Christmas High Tea watercolour pencil class. I have held classes in the beautiful room here during the year, but on Saturday it was looking grand and festive. Dromkeen is about 1 1/2 hours from Melbourne and hosts a wonderful array of events during the year, It has a children’s literature centre, art gallery and tea rooms. Denise and Bernadette cooked a beautiful selection of savouries and sweets, which were set on on the tiered plates and we also had tea and coffee. It was all so beautiful to sketch and to eat.
There was full class of ten and they all went home after the three hour class with full stomachs and many sketches. There was so much to choose to sketch: the appealing food, pretty plates and matching tea cups, ornaments or tiered plates
It was a lovely way to end my classes for the year, There are more watercolour pencil sketching classes planned for January, February and March next year, These include Travel sketching, Nature sketching and Sketching Memories and Nostalgia. Details of times and dates and bookings here
This past weekend I took a long weekend to travel with a sketching friend, Angela ( instagram @lunchsketch) to Warrnambool and Port Fairy . We were going to Port Fairy for the Exhibition Opening night of the Blarney Books & Art Biblio Art Prize. We both had entries accepted. It was such a thrill so see mine exhibited among so many creative works. That is another story….
A long weekend gave us three days of sketching ! I completed 25 pages of sketches (Angela was about the same ) and two postcard giveaways on Instagram. Today I am showing you the sketches from DAY ONE – the Great Ocean Road, My sketches are with watercolour pencil and Lamy Safari ink pen.
The Great Ocean Road is a famous drive with 243-kilometre (151 mi) stretch of road along the south-eastern coast of Australia . Built by returned soldiers between 1919 and 1932 and dedicated to soldiers killed during World War I, the road is the world’s largest war memorial. The road is an important tourist attraction in the region.
It has beaches and stunning craggy cliffs composed of limestone and sandstone. You look out on the wild and windswept Southern Ocean. The coastline is dramatic ! The stories associated with it are too.
The day was grey and cool ( 16 degrees) and very windy along the coast, At the stops where stayed and sketched we found a sheltered nook to stand in.
The tourists came in waves as the buses came and left. They did not stay for a long time. As sketchers, driving by car, at our own pace, we are fortunate to be able stop and stay longer. When you sketch, you look and observe and see things that a quick photo would not see. We sketched and could hear the waves crashed in on the rocks.
Travelling the Great Ocean Road was a wonderful experience and the dramatic coastline continued to amaze me. I was very fortunate took have slightly local person (Angela) who could tell me a bit of background and stories of these places.
My entry has been accepted into Blarney Books & Art Biblio Art Prize. When you enter the competition you get given a book title to interpret artistically . I entered in June this year and got A year of Wonder : a novel of the plague by Geraldine Brooks. I purchased a second hand copy, knowing that I would draw on the page.
I read the book twice (and really enjoyed it) and have browsed through it numerous times in the last few months. My initial thought was that the drawings I would do in the book would probably be of the plague as it was described on various pages through the book. But in a moment of inspiration I noticed the references to plants in the novel. Looking further, I realised there were many references and knew that this would be my theme.
The novel is set in 1666 when the plague sweeps through England. It is based on the true history of the small Derbyshire village of Eyam that quarantines itself in order to prevent the disease from spreading further. It is written from the point of view of Anna and what she lives through in that time. It includes her observations of the reaction of villagers as they descend into social chaos with increasing fear, paranoia and suspicion. Anna’s resilience grows as she takes on a role as healer. During this time she learns about medicinal plants and they work to help the community at this time.
This weekend I have scanned the pages I have drawn on. I will post the book shortly to arrive in time for the Saturday 7 December Exhibition Opening Night at Blarney Books & Art in Port Fairy. If you are Melbourne, It is about a three hour drive. I would love to know if you are going to visit. My friends Angela & Jodi also have their projects in the exhibition. I believe they have both done paintings for their titles.
You can view all of the above drawings on my Flickr site
I also entered last year, drawing on the pages of a book of my own choice .see my blog post about my entry Blarney 2018 entry
I realised last year that when people were at the exhibition looking at my book, which was displayed open on a bookstand, that they did not turn the pages to look at the different illustrated pages. This weekend I am working on a poster of all the images, which I plan will stand next to the book, and once again, all pages will be bookmarked with a ribbon.
Once again, it will also be available for purchase.
