Sunny Days

With the rain finally becoming more intermittent, the people of Portland have taken to the streets, parks, patios, causeways, and food carts in droves! This past Saturday, was exceptionally beautiful, and the Saturday Market was packed! Runners, bikers, walkers, kite-flyers, layabouts, eaters, shoppers, and ware-peddlers alike converged on the waterfront soaking up as much sun as possible in preparation for the dismal week to come. Once again, however, the sun is teasing us with thoughts of warmth and radiance over the coming weekend, and I for one, plan on soaking it in.

Canvas Art Bar, monday night model

Monday night at Canvas Art Bar the model had on this really bizarre dress of polypropylene string. I wish I could have done justice to it and to her great profile but it was too challenging for me so I resorted back to my comfort zone... fudging the details.

Tall Ships, two days

These are the result of two days sketching the tall ships 'Lady Washington' & 'Hawaiian Chieftain'. The first on a beautiful day last Saturday in St Helens and yesterday between rain storms at the Vancouver dock.

Linda was in Vancouver too and after looking at some of her detailes of the ships I was encouraged to do some also.

Lady Washington in Vancouver

Lady Washington in Vancouver, a set on Flickr.

I snapped a few pictures while waiting for my husband's bus. That's all the time I had today.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/tafrin/sets/72157626463482009/
A bit windy there but the sunshine was so nice!
Here's a few pics of the ships.

SketchCrawl - Tall Ships & Pirates in St. Helens, Oregon

The tall ships Lady Washington and Hawaiian Chieftain are docked at St. Helens, Oregon, for Easter weekend. A large group of reenactment folks and pirates came out to meet them on Saturday... and so did four of the Portland Urban Sketchers.

We got to St. Helens early in order to spend the entire morning with the ships. Unfortunately, due to a very slow lunch service, the morning was pretty much all we had - we ran out of time for our intended second session and none of us felt at all done with the ships when they pulled out to commence the Battle Sail. I had only just started to figure out the shapes of the ships and the particular problems of drawing complicated vessels like these, with all the copious ropes and lines and their relationship to the masts and sails. I could use a lot more sketching time with the tall ships!

Once the ships left, we switched to sketching the costumed officers, ladies, and pirates. The black line drawings were done with the Noodler's Flex fountain pen, which seemed to be working better for me this weekend - I loved using it for these sketches.

The costumed lady really was dispensing herbal remedy prescriptions.

Worldwide Sketchcrawl

The Portland Urban Sketchers met at (A) Tabor Space coffeehouse  before walking up to Mt. Tabor (B)

where we found this gorgeous view

According to Wikipedia, Before becoming part of Portland in 1905, Mount Tabor was a rural farming community dating back to the 1850s. It became a city-recognized neighborhood (encompassing a far smaller area than its historical boundaries) in 1974. Mt. Tabor is a volcanic cinder cone.

 I attempted to draw that view...

and then compiled a few more sketches.

According to Mt. Tabor neighborhood association:  Mt. Tabor Park is a special park in many ways.  It has views identified as some of the most scenic in the City, due to its elevation of 643 feet, as well as the beautiful open reservoirs.  It was the largest park in Portland for nearly half a century, until Forest Park was finally created in 1947.  Mt. Tabor Park is a hard-working park that earns its keep.  It even generates it's own electricity to light the lovely historic lampposts that follow the original roads and paths in the park.

 Five reservoirs, two large open reservoirs and one small tank, were built on Mt. Tabor in a striking romanesque style that dates to the era of the City Beautiful movement.   All but one of these reservoirs have continued to serve Portland for more than a hundred years.  Reservoir 2, along SE Division St. was taken offline and sold for development, in the 1990's.  The remaining three open reservoirs are currently under threat of demolition. 

We walked up to Caldera Public House  (C) for lunch and some sharing of our sketches. I did a quick sketch of the Urban Sketchers.. 

Then, Deb, Kalina and I went to the Oregon convention Center for the Stumptown Comics Fest. We participated in a Dr. Sketchy's Anti-art school and drew some costumed models.

A great day and a great sketchcrawl!

Workshop with Veronica Lawlor and Margaret Hurst

I thought some of the Portland sketchers might be interested in this workshop that is taking place in Seattle July 8-11. Might be somewhat of a consolation for those of us who are not making it to Lisbon this summer.

Veronica made a very powerful presentation of her 9-11 sketches during the past Urban Sketchers Symposium.

There is another workshop that she is teaching in San Francisco, let me know if you are interested and I will send you more information. 

Mt Tabor Sketchscrawl

Here is one of my sketches from our sketchcrawl at Mt Tabor on April 15, 2011

William Woods

Mt Tabor reservoir and Stumpton Comic Fest

Mt Tabor reservoir offered some architecturally interesting buildings and great views of Portland skyline on this cloudy and cool morning. But it became increasingly cooler and it was good to get to lunch at Caldera.

After lunch Alanna, Kalina and I moved to the Convention Center and the Stumptown Comic Fest.

It was great to see all of the artwork and talk to some of the 'tablers'.

At 3:00 we joined a good sized group in room 105 to participate in 'Dr Sketchy's Anti Art School' What fun! There was a 'goon' and two 'dolls' (or 'molls'?). I couldn't stay for the full session so missed the longer poses but it was great fun to draw these real life action figures!

An old lady and a smart phone...

While on the MAX between Sunset Transit Center and Goose Hollow I observed an elderly woman and her smart phone. She seemed very intent on getting something worked out on the contraption. It must be crazy for someone in their 70′s to hold in their hands something like a smart phone. I mean, I have trouble keeping up with technology and I pretty much grew up alongside the advent of computers, cell phones, video games, and other assorted electronica. I’m blown away by smart phone technology. That woman probably started out using the early rotary dial telephones… and now she holds in her hands, a source for a good percentage of the information one is able to attain.

Sketching on the way home after the Max Yellow Line

On the way home after sketching on the Max Yellow Line, I saw a couple of signs that I had to sketch.  So, I went back and made a few more sketches (I didn't limit myself to the 15 minutes between trains).

-sketched by Anne Henderson

wake up and smell the cherry blossoms

On Tuesday of this week I was waiting for the bus downtown and the sun was out, the sky was blue and I was enjoying the cherry blossoms at the Unitus Plaza. I started this little sketch and was struck by the fact that people were passing by, so engrossed in their cell phones that they weren't even noticing the beautiful (and rare) beautiful Spring day!

Travel on the Yellow Line

It so happened last week prior to the yellow Line sketch crawl, I had an appointment on N. Mississippi St. and decided it would be a nice change to go by light rail.  I got off on the Prescott stop, one beyond Overlook Park.  Skidmore goes over I-5 and another couple blocks or so you are at Prost and the Mississippi Food Carts.  I had given myself a little extra time to have a brew and sketch on a sunny afternoon.

Yellow Line Sketching

On Saturday morning I wasn't feeling great and had a lot to get done, but couldn't resist joining the sketchcrawl anyway.

I drew feet as we rode on the train, and then we arrived at Union Station where obviously I was having trouble focusing on any one thing...

We got a good view of the grain elevator structures from Rose Quarter station. Along with the Kuretake Brush Writer in light gray, I used Noodler's Whaleman's Sepia ink which is more of a warm gray than an actual sepia. This ink came to me by way of Goulet Pen's "Ink Drop" monthly ink sample club, which I have to recommend - it's a great service.

Albina/Mississippi Station is surrounded with great views. I tried to catch the Fremont Bridge. This is with Noodler's Whaleman's Sepia and the Brush Writer again.

Overlook Park Station actually didn't offer an "overlook" from the station itself, so I sketched Tony sketching. This is lovely Diamine Red Dragon ink (another Goulet Pens Ink Drop sample) in a Lamy Safari... but I topped up the cartridge with some J. Herbin Ambre de Birmanie which is probably starting to affect the color by adding a slight orange tone.

Then I skipped ahead to Kenton. This was sketched through a window from Kenton Station, where I had a sandwich for lunch and our server was charismatic.

Riding and Sketching the Yellow Line

  Portland Urban Sketchers went on a sketchcrawl inspired by the Seattle Sketchers who sketched public art at Light Rail stations around Seatlle. We took TriMet's MAX (Metropolitan Area Express) Light Rail

yellow line from downtown up to North Portland.


We met on PSU's campus and boarded the first train at 9:45am

We got off at select stops to sketch at, giving ourselves only the approximately 15 minutes to sketch before boarding the next train.

 This would have been even more enjoyable if it hadn't bee so cold, although it did warm up after our lunch.

All in all, a great way to explore the city and practice fast sketching. We'll definitely do this again!

more of my sketches from the day: