Sunday, September 30, 2012

Goose Hollow and another attempt at the Vista Bridge

We have been having some wonderful weather days here in Portland lately and even though personally I sometimes bemoan the heat it has been wonderful to go out and sketch without worrying about the possibility of having a backup plan for rain.
a nice little block of older homes surrounded by a newer highrise.
 In the above- trying to pick up on some of the shading with my Tombow and Pitt markers
Vista Bridge looking past the car dealers big tent waning.
This past Saturday sketching was no exception...great day, great fellow sketchers...how could we miss? Fun!

Saturday, September 29, 2012

Goose Hollow



I’ve never really explored the Goose Hollow neighborhood before, so I was excited to go to the sketchcrawl there this morning. But the coffee shop where we met up was decorated so charmingly that I spent most of my time inside, admiring the artificial crows. * Nunca había explorado la vecindad de Goose Hollow mucho antes, así que estaba muy entusiasmada assistir al sketchcrawl ahí esta mañana. Pero las decoraciones dentro del café donde nos reunimos eran tan encantadoras que pasé la mayoria de mi tiempo adentro, admirando los cuervos artificiales.


Realizing that it was a beautiful sunny day, I took a quick walk around the block and did fast doodles of pretty decorations on people’s porches. * Me dí cuenta que era absurdo estar adentro durante un día tan perfecta de otoño. Rapidamente pasé por las casas históricas y dibujé las decoraciones en las porches.

US Correspondent Spotted Downtown

Today, a group of about eight of us went to the Goose Hollow neighborhood for sketching. We met at the Hof, for tasty treats and sketching. This was my first sketch, from the porch...


Then I went about a block away and sketched this Victorian house. Luckily, I got it all sketched before a woman parked her car in front of me. I'm guessing she's not a sketcher.


This florist shop was so appealing in its autumn colors. I wish I hadn't got carried away with the cross-hatching, but once you've hatched, there's no going back.



After Deb and I walked around the neighborhood, I headed downtown, and look who I spotted by the one of the food cart pods (near where Tommy Kane recently sketched, btw): Matthew Brehm, shown here with one of his sketches of Pioneer Square.


Urban Sketching is making the world smaller!






Friday, September 28, 2012

Impromptu Sketchcrawl: Goose Hollow and Fun on Foster

A two-part sketchcrawl has been spontaneously proposed for this Saturday, Sept. 29.

Part One: Goose Hollow! Meet at 10 am at Fehrenbacher Hof, located at 1225 SW 19th Avenue, Portland OR. (*note: original post had typo in address, now corrected!) Map here.


Part Two: Fun on Foster event!  This neighborhood block party happens along SE Foster, between 49th and 93rd Avenues. Activities go from 11 am to 5 pm. We'll play in by ear in terms of heading from one side of town to the other...


Hope you can join us. Happy sketching!

Wednesday, September 19, 2012

Taylor Electric Supply Co Boiler Room

Taylor Electric Supply Co Boiler Room in all its Grafiti beauty.  I must say I do not like grafiti but the sum of this fire damaged Boiler Room is breathtaking and I would love to have this room reserved as a sort of mausoleum to the Company.  I went back yesterday on 09/17/12 most of the grafiti we observed on Saturday 09/14 had been removed and painted over with new unappealing wanna be grafiti thugs scribbling on the columns and walls.  So most of the visual is gone but surprising nobody touched the Boiler Room except somebody pulled at the red plastic tongue and now its almost hanging out.  The Men's Restroom is not bad.  The back wall has a wonderful skull grafiti but I cannot remember if it was there before or not.  All in all I wish that my favorite room will not be destroyed.  Oh!  Also the wonderful electric post seen through the window (from outside it looks like a meowing cat , ears mouth wide open) now sports grafiti on the bottom of the post. But this site is still an awsome sight with its grafiti rooms and half insinerated, melted glass on SE 2nd Ave.

Tuesday, September 18, 2012

It's Electric...

... or at least it was electric, or rather an electric supply warehouse. Now, it's just a decrepit, burnt out, shell of a building. It might not function as much, but it's kind of cool to look at it. The collapsing walls, bent and rusted metal, old boilers, and graffiti strewn walls have become the subject for many a photographers' lens and this past weekend, many a sketchers' hand. Not being one for too much architectural drawing, the dilapidated building held my interest long enough to get off this one sketch. It was great to see everyone's sketches and see the different styles and techniques. Always inspiring. Until next time...
Taylor Electric, East Side Door Way, watercolor in moleskine watercolor sketchbook.

Sunday, September 16, 2012

Putting the "Crawl" into SketchCrawl: Taylor Electric Supply

On Saturday we met at the Coava Coffee Bar, and after we chatted and soaked up the amazing woodwork of that space, we went over to the location where the Taylor Electric Supply company building had been before the big fire in 2006. * El sábado nos juntamos en el café Coava, y después de charlar y admirar la madera elegante del café, fuimos al sito donde la compania Taylor Electric estaba antes del incedio de 2006.


The graffiti on the remaining walls was what first caught my attention, since it was so colorful. It was fun trying to capture the effects of spray paint in watercolor. * El graffiti en las paredes restantes es muy coloroso, y es lo que primero me agarró la atención. Es divertido tratar de replicar el efecto de pintura en aerosol con la humilde acuarela. 


A lot of the windows clearly showed warping from the heat of the fire. The rust colors was a rather lovely compliment against the blue sky. * En muchas de las ventanas, todavía se puede ver cómo el calor del incedio deformó las ventanas. El color de la oxidación del metal sirvió como un complemento bonito para el azúl del cielo.
 

 
My attention wandered back to the graffiti again. The message "Don't f*** up" was making me want to paint this one extra-carefully, hee hee. * Otra vez me enfocé en el grafiti. El frase “Don’t f*** up” me dio ánimo a pintar un poco mejor, je je.
 


Angelika and I went back after lunch, and I painted this portrait of a burnt telephone pole. I noticed during the time I was painting that a whole lot of photographers and their models kept dragging themselves under the fence. It's a popular place for portraits! We use the term "sketchcrawl" a lot, but for this adventure, crawling was a genuine option. *  Angelika y yo regresamos al sitio despues de comer, y hize este retrato de un poste de teléfono quemado. Noté que, durante el tiempo en que había estado pintando, un montón de fotographos y sus modelos se habían arrastrado debajo de la cerca—¡es un lugar muy popular para retratos!  Decimos “sketchcrawl” para describir nuestros adventuras, pero esta vez, tuvimos la opción de gatear de veras.
 

Friday, September 14, 2012

Streetcar at So Waterfront

Here's my late arriving sketch of the streetcar from the last sketchcrawl. I took advantage of the long stopovers for this one, and combined some details from the different streetcar models that went past.

Wednesday, September 12, 2012

Lone Fir Cemetery sketch of the McLeay Mausoleum.  This sketch, yes I like details, I tried to be looser but it just does not fit me well so I am detail oriented with my own spiel, took 2 trips to the Cemetery.  On Saturday the sun blinded me to details on the cherubs and the side turrets which I caught on the cool and overcast Monday.  I love this Cemetery and plan on having many more sketching outings.  Thank you all you guys who made my first sketch crawl a wonderful and happy experience so hopefuly I will see some of you at Taylor Electric and Supply on Saturday.

Saturday, Sept 15: Sketchcrawl at Old Taylor Electric Supply building


Join us this Saturday, September 15, for a sketchcrawl at the Old Taylor Electric Supply Building. (You can read more about the history of this structure, from how it burned down in 2006 to how it has become an inspirational spot for the local arts community, in this Oregonian article.) 

Meet at 10:00 at  Coava Coffee Brew Bar, at 1300 SE Grand Ave. (Coffee, pastries, really gorgeous woodworking display space--worth doing some sketches here, in its own right.) 

At 10:30 we'll stroll over to the Taylor Electric Supply building, located at the corner of SE Third Avenue at Clay St. There are lots of interesting industrial buildings in the neighborhood to explore as well.

New Cascadia Bakery, at 1700 SE 6th Ave, would be a great spot for lunch... 





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Lone Fir Cemetery: Small Gravestones

Small gravestones, from last weekend's trip to the Lone Fir Cemetery. I drew the living plants, treating the gravestone itself almost as negative space. * Lápidas pequeñas del cemetario Lone Fir, que visitamos el fin de semana pasada. Dibujé los plantos vivientes, tratando la lápida como espacio negativo.

Brown colored pencil on tan paper gave subtle results. But it's a cemetery, maybe it's OK for the drawings to be muted. * Usando un lápiz de color marrón en papel café claro dió resultados sútiles. Pero, dado que estamos en un cemetario, tal vez es apropriado hacer un dibujo un poco apagado.

Sunday, September 9, 2012

Lone Fir Cemetery

In black and grey.... kind of 'Addams Family-ish'. Do you think?
 A small group of five made it to Lone Fir Cemetery on Saturday. The day was perfect for sitting under the trees and sketching.
trying to capture the overall light and shadow.
 I am pretty fascinated by this Macleay mausoleum and wanted to make another attempt at it (first was on 7/24/2010). In comparison the previous sketch shows more of the structure but this one is closer in feeling, I think.
The awesome structure of the Macleay mausoleum
sketch from 7/2010

Wednesday, September 5, 2012

Scavenger Hunt: Final Results

I'm sure you've all been waiting with bated breath to see the grand tally of our Scavenger Hunt Sketching Challenge! The graph is below, with highlights of the data called out after that.

Most-Sketched Items: 
  • Coffee (8 sketches)
  • Fountain, Fire Hydrant, and Bridge (7 sketches each)
  • Unusual Hair, Rose, Watercraft, and Stripes (6 sketches each)
Least-Sketched Items:
  • Three Groins in a Fountain (1 sketch)
  • Mount Hood and Hung Far Low Sign (2 sketches each)
  • Streetcar, Umbrella Man, Food Cart, Bird on It, Pigs in NW (3 sketches each) (I suspect we have more streetcar sketches out there, but they didn't get posted yet, rats!)
People With Most Sketches: 
  • Katura, 30 items
  • Vicky, 23 items
  • Katharine, 20 items
  • Deb, 12 items
That was a lot of fun! If we were to do it again in the winter, I'd be curious to hear if there are suggestions about how to structure the challenge. Longer (or shorter) length of time to work with? Fewer (or greater) number of items? Do share your thoughts!

Hood River and Mosier OR

 Last weekend I traveled east to Hood River to tag along (for a day) with the plein air painters participating in the Columbia Center for the Arts 5 day Pacific NW Plein Air 2012....of which a couple of our local usk members (Celeste Bergin and Bill Sharp) were juried in.  The first day everyone gathered at the Gorge White House on Rt 35 out of Hood River.

There was a quintessential view of Mt Hood and it may be a little cliche but it was there and I was there so.....



 Although a sunny day there was also some wind and I got quite chilled doing the sketch of the tractor below.


Tractor with Plein Air painters in background

 The next day I was in Mosier sitting on a rustic bench with my tea and sketching the view across the old Highway road, Rt 30.

Mosier Gas Station

panorama view including the Mosier Fruit Growers Bldg and 10 Speed Coffee House

 I don't get out to this area very often and I wonder why because it really is a short drive to get there. And the scenery is spectacular and it is wonderful to be in such a different place....different colors, different plants, different views.