Drawing Attention – January 2014

Happy 2014, sketchers! Looking back on 2013, Urban Sketchers had an amazing year! Here are the highlights:

Urban Sketchers Organization Achievements

The 4th International Urban Sketching Symposium in Barcelona, Spain, was a huge success, with more than 200 participants, instructors, interpreters and organizers in attendance at the three-day event. Ten participants earned scholarships to attend, and one correspondent reported on the entire event with sketches, thanks to sponsorship from USk.

Urban Sketchers also helped instructors in Montreal (Canada), Seattle (U.S.), Naples (Italy) and Sansepulcro (Italy) bring exciting workshops to their local sketching communities.

A call for the 2014 Urban Sketching Symposium host drew applications from 10 cities worldwide – and Paraty, Brazil, is excited to be selected as the host city! Planning is well under way for the Aug. 27 – 30 event.

To better fulfill its mission of “raising the artistic, storytelling, and educational value of location drawing, promoting its practice and connecting people around the world who draw on location where they live and travel,” the USk Board of Directors reorganized into two boards: an Executive Board and an Advisory Board. 

Worldwide Community Expands and Shares Sketches

Plenty of new Urban Sketchers groups formed in 2013, including New Zealand, North Bay (USA), San Diego (USA), Vancouver, B. C. (Canada), Birmingham (U. K.) and Swansea (Wales). Look on the right-hand border of this blog to see the growing number of communities that meet, sketch and share!

Urban sketchers in Barcelona (Spain), Malaga (Spain), Singapore, Penang (Malaysia), Portland (USA), Memphis (USA) and Seattle (USA) were among artists who showed their work in group exhibitions in 2013, raising awareness of the art of urban sketching in their communities.

Sketchers Publish Books, Exhibit Their Works

Matthew Brehm’s book.

Two landmark books on urban sketching were published in 2013: Sketching on Location, by Matthew Brehm (USA), and Freehand Drawing and Discovery: Urban Sketching and Concept Drawing for Designers, by Jim Richards (USA).

And what seems like a record-breaking number of books by urban sketchers was announced for publication in 2014: Steve Reddy’s (USA) Now Where Was I? A Sketchbook Memoir, James Hobbs’ (USA) Sketch Your World, Lapin’s (Spain) Oldies But Goldies and Thomas Thorspecken’s (USA) Urban Sketching: The Complete Guide to Techniques.

Several urban sketchers had solo exhibitions of their work, including Alex Raventós (Spain), André Sandmann (Switzerland), Marcia Milner-Brage (USA), Kiah Kiean (Malaysia), and Jane Wingfield (USA).

What a terrific year for Urban Sketchers! And now, on to new happenings:

Urban Sketchers in Action

Veronica Lawlor’s new book.

One Watercolor a Day, part of the One-a-Day series, is a new book by New York urban sketcher Veronica Lawlor.

Montreal sketcher Marc Holmes’ sketches from the Barcelona symposium are published in the current issue of The Artist’s Magazine, which also includes Kansas sketcher Cathy Johnson.

Marc also reports that the science fiction and fantasy illustration magazine ImagineFX published a short article about the Barcelona symposium.

Cathy McAuliffe’s sketch at Mandela’s memorial.

Cathy McAuliffe, member of the San Francisco Bay Area Urban Sketchers, reports that the group sketched at a memorial for Nelson Mandela Dec. 11. The South African anti-apartheid leader died Dec. 5. “The San Francisco Bay Area played a big part in the anti-apartheid movement,” Cathy said. “In 1986, California became the largest government in the U.S. to require divestment of South Africa-related investments.”

Wes Douglas announced that Urban Sketchers Chicago will host a sketching weekend June 7 – 8. The event will attract local and visiting urban sketchers from near and far, Wes said. While sketching at various locations throughout downtown Chicago, respected and qualified instructors will teach workshops on location sketching.

A toast to Twin Cities sketchers!

Twin Cities sketchers Ken Avidor, Roberta Avidor, Lisa-Marie Greenly and John Miller have created a series of drink coasters featuring their urban sketches. “Fans of downtown St. Paul’s Lowertown neighborhood can now set their beers down on a likeness of Mears Park, the St. Paul Farmers Market or the century-old Union Depot,” reports the Twin Cities Pioneer Press.

Seattle architect and urban sketcher Stephanie Bower is offering a series of workshops at the iconic Pike Place Market this winter with a focus on architecture. The first weekly series in February, “Good Bones,” filled immediately, so a second workshop, “Good Bones 2,” has been offered on March 14 – 16.

Suhita Shirodkar’s sketch kit as shown on Parka Blogs.

James Hobbs, Swasky, Richard Sheppard, Francis Theo, Suhita Shirodkar, Favian Ee, Liz Steel, , Khoo Cheang Jin, Ch’ng Kiah Kiean, Marc Holmes and Marvin Chew are all urban sketchers who have recently been featured in an excellent series of interviews about their art materials on the popular Parka Blogs. If you love peeking into the art kits of other sketchers, check out these interviews!

Tina Koyama’s sketch of Gabi’s exhibit.

The Museum of History and Industry and USk founder Gabi Campanario invited Seattle Urban Sketchers to attend and sketch at a members-only opening reception for Gabi’s exhibit, “Drawn to Seattle,” on Dec. 3. Better known locally as the Seattle Sketcher, Gabi is exhibiting sketches that have been published in his Seattle Times column since 2009. In celebration of the exhibit and to further involve the community, members of Seattle Urban Sketchers will be leading weekly mini-sketchcrawls at the museum during the next several months. Check out the Seattle Urban Sketchers blog for sketches and photos from the opening reception.

Sketch by Kumi Matsukawa.

Blog Surfin’

A random sampling of USk regional blogs brought up images of food and café sketching in Japan and Eskilstuna, the canals of Venice, enviable (for this Pacific Northwesterner) summer scenes in Australia, and commuters dozing in Taiwan.

Shout it Out in Drawing Attention! 

Not seeing anything about you or your Urban Sketchers group in Drawing Attention? Then we want to hear from you! Please send your urban sketching news items with links and images to: drawingattention at urbansketchers dot org. Or tag me, Tina Koyama, on news you post on the Urban Sketchers Facebook page. Happy sketching!