Monday, November 19, 2012
Cyclocross!
We had enough rain this weekend to ensure excellent mud at the cyclocross bicyle race at the Portland International Raceway. Luckily, there was only occasional light drizzle during the race itself, which make it possible to do some fun sketching.
At first, I tried using a brown colored pencil on the sketches to emphasize how mud was building up on legs and gumming up the brakes of the bikes...
But then I started just doing gesture sketches of the cyclists, since there were such great poses going on during (and around the edges of) the race.
It took a lot of effort to push the bikes up the steep stretches of hill that were nothing but deep, slick mud!
As you can imagine, there was a really long line to use the hoses to wash the bikes off, post-racing, throughout the day.
Of course, the impatient folks could always wade into one of the larger puddles and wash the bikes off that way.
The giant puddles worked for personal grooming, too!
When I finally make it out to see "The Body Beautiful" exhibit at the art museum, I am pretty sure I'm going to imagine all the fancy marble statues of athletes covered in mud...
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You deserve the "intrepid sketcher" award this time, Katura! I really like the gesture drawings and the story that you tell with text and sketches. They're all great, but I especially like all the energy in the one of the rider pushing his bike uphill (4th from end). The Body Beautiful statues are going to seem very still and clean after this!
ReplyDeleteThanks, Vicky! I think the dilute ink smears due to light drizzle on the facing page add to the energy of the one that you mentioned. Some of the riders were literally trying to push on that hill on their knees as their feet slipped out from underneath them...it was nutty!
DeleteGreat gestures! Ambitious to sketch these rapidly moving subjects. I enjoyed the accompanying narrative as well.
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