This was a great workshop and the enthusiasm that Barbara brought to Fish Hoek Art Society should encourage us all to take up a pencil, if not pen, and get on with sketching.
She pointed out that you don't have to be in a special place to do a sketch: just waiting for a friend in a café, bored by the boys watching rugby, stopping on the edge of the road, or even waiting for supper to warm: you use those five minutes to sketch. And Barbara does so very well!!
18 members and guests came along - those that didn't missed a treat.
As Barbara comments, sketching is a way to create a visual diary - a journal of her life, as she says, one sketch at a time. And slowly it becomes a habit, one that constantly improves your style and drawing.
Being part of a sketching group is a great incentive and many of these groups can be found online in Facebook, where their work is shared. And groups go out sketching together.
So what does Barbara suggest as tools for a sketching moment?
THANK YOU BARBARA!
She pointed out that you don't have to be in a special place to do a sketch: just waiting for a friend in a café, bored by the boys watching rugby, stopping on the edge of the road, or even waiting for supper to warm: you use those five minutes to sketch. And Barbara does so very well!!
18 members and guests came along - those that didn't missed a treat.
As Barbara comments, sketching is a way to create a visual diary - a journal of her life, as she says, one sketch at a time. And slowly it becomes a habit, one that constantly improves your style and drawing.
Being part of a sketching group is a great incentive and many of these groups can be found online in Facebook, where their work is shared. And groups go out sketching together.
So what does Barbara suggest as tools for a sketching moment?
Firstly, a good sketch book. She favours one that opens up to give the option of a panorama. One that can take water too for cartridge paper is great for a single line drawing but if you use a brush with water, this paper isn't the most apt. She usually uses pens, and enjoys the colours that fountain pens can produce with old fashioned Quink ink. She also uses platinum carbon ink pens. See below:
and the refill cartridges https://www.gouletpens.com/platinum-carbon-black-cartridges/p/Plat-SPC-200
The Lamy Safari fountain pen favoured by many sketchers worldwide, including Barbara, is available on line in South Africa: These come with water soluble ink.
Barbara looked at why people sketch, and the varying styles and quirky ways that people choose to record their lives.
She showed simple line drawings with soluble ink and wetting the ink to create shading and then looked at hatching and cross hatching using permanent ink.
Here are more of Barbara's own sketches from her travels - but remember: you don't have to travel to sketch!!!
THANK YOU BARBARA!
