USK is Urban Sketchers. Today the Melbourne Group had a very special final end of year catch-up. They usually meet once a month at place oragnised by one of the wonderful Admin team. We chat sketch, have a throw down (ie lay our sketchbooks out on the ground to see what everyone has done) a group photo and then go. I usually can’t attend as I have other events on the weekends,
I put this one in my diary when it was announced. About 60 people registered. a few sent apologies. In the end, there were 43 (?) .
Helen organised an AMAZING day. We thankfully had great weather, avoided protests, and everyone had a great time.
Met at 10:00 at St Pauls. The challenge – we were given a list of 30 things to sketch on the route down Swanston Street to meet at GPO at 12:00pm. There was no right or wrong, they did not have to be in order and open to interpretation.
The more sketching, the more raffle tickets you got for a draw at the end. It was quantity not quality. As you can see from my sketches below.
The only two I did not get were “someone reading”, a protester
When we met at 12 we tallied up sketches, handed out tickets, and then had a break for lunch.
On re-meeting back on the stairs at the GPO we had a new afternoon challenge.
Sketch a portrait of as many of the 24 people in the group that came back after lunch.
We had one hour.
Two rules
It must be a continuous line for each sketch. That means when you put your pen down and make the first mark on the page you can’t take it off the page until you finish that one. AND you must ask their name. This, of course, led to lots of conversations. People gathered in a few groups moving slightly and staring at each other for a short amount of time.
You got more raffle tickets depending on how many people you sketched.
Then we had the group photo and the raffle was drawn. Lots of prizes as many people had donated their unwanted art supplies.
It was such a fun day of quick silly and fun sketching. I got to catchup with friends and meet some people who I had only seen as names online in Melbourne Urban Sketchers facebooks group.