Bridges are Portland

The last couple of sketchcrawls in Portland have been located around bridges....and we love our bridges here in Portland!

The Tillicum Bridge is Portland's newest; dedicated to pedestrian, bike and public transportation only. It is a beautiful modern bridge and much admired by us all. On this day though I was interested in some of the new architecture and sculpture that has sprung up on the west-side.

watercolor, rainbow pencil, Kuretake brush pen

watercolor with Kuretake brush pen

watercolor, Kuretake brush pen, white acrylic One4all pen

Finally I turned to the bridge...the sun had highlighted some of its cables to a brilliant white. I wish I was able to do it justice but it is a challenging subject. I suspect that I will try again however....!

watercolor on Moleskine with white acrylic One4all pen

Our latest sketchcrawl was in solidarity with our Portland sketchers who are at the the USK Chicago Symposium. A small but determined group of Portland sketchers gathered at Union Station to sketch the pedestrian bridge there.

watercolor and Kuretake brush pen

watercolor on Moleskine sketchbook

Last Saturday's sketchcrawl began a little drizzly, but I didn't want to miss a chance to sketch the outside of Union Station. I drove around in a perplexing circle of one way streets, until I found a perfect parking space. This view was periodically blocked by buses, but over two and a half hours, all of it was revealed in bits. I was delighted to be able to see Union Station's towers, the Fremont and Broadway bridges and two construction cranes all from my lucky spot. By the time my drawing was done, it was pouring rain and my windows were all fogged up. I finished up with watercolors at home.

Outside and Inside Sketching

It may look like I'm getting the jump on next month's Tilikum Crossing sketch crawl, but actually, I was just out enjoying our somewhat sunny day on Monday. It was my first time walking over our newest bridge. Afterwards, we got coffee at Elephants on the west side and I sketched the view from there. I'm eager to come back next month because the sketching possibilities look great.

Here's my sketch from last Saturday's sketch crawl at Union Station. If you were one of the two dozen or so people who came out for this, you might realize that this sketch was black and white when we shared sketchbooks.  I added the watercolor at home. If you're one of the sketchers shown here, please excuse me for taking liberties with your appearance as they were unintentional. It was a fun sketch crawl and it was great to have so many people join in the sketching and then the lunch and sketchbook sharing.

This last sketch was made at f&b, the cafe inside Rejuvenation Hardware. I took liberties with these people, too, adding a beard on the barista and combining parts of other people for the customer. Those were intentional coverups to fix mistakes made trying to draw quickly moving people.

By Rail, By Sail, By Bike

I'm catching up on posting sketches from the last several crawls, and find a transport theme has accidentally emerged.

We celebrated National Train Day at Union Station...




We sketched the tall ships Lady Washington and Hawaiian Chieftain while they were docked in Vancouver over Memorial Day weekend. I started with a thumbnail in which I worked out some problems of ratio, but still had a lot of trouble in the final drawing. And then the Hawaiian Chieftain sailed away...



Katura and Alanna and their spouses teamed up to provide an organized sketchride as part of Pedalpalooza.



 

Many thanks to Katura and Chris and Alanna and Tad for their work to make the sketchride a success! It was also great to meet new sketchers and to get return visits from sketchers we haven't often seen.

Here's hoping this summer treats us all gently and we can have many beautiful sunny days of sketching together.

Train Day at Union Station in Portland

I escaped on Saturday for  a little retreat to join the other Urbansketchers and have some fun at Union Station.
I thought the crowds would be a problem in finding a bit of space to settle and sketch but it turned out not to be the problem I had anticipated. I focused on the steam engine SP and P 700 (Spokane, Portland and Seattle 700) in this head on view. This was a favorite spot for picture taking!

Ink and big Pitt pen.

 

And then moved to a view of the whole scene from the pedestrian bridge over the tracks.

Ink and big Pitt pen for the shadows

Later I found a spot to get a little more up close and personal to these two very bright train cars.

Watercolor and ink after the color was set down

There was so much activity...... the world of trains and train aficionados. Some miniature and  some full scale, everyone seemed to have an interest in being there! 

Train Day

Today, the Urban Sketchers gathered at Union Station to record the festivities of National Train Day.

I started with a quick sketch of a fellow sketcher.

Next, I tried to capture the crowd waiting in line for a close up look at an old steam engine. There were people of all ages, lots of little kids, train buffs, and several clowns.

watercolor and ink on toned paper

 After a while, I escaped the crowds and sketched in the garden outside the station.This napper had a dog that watched over her. There was really only the one dog, but I liked it in both positions. Later, another young woman switched places with this one and brought another dog! I felt like my sketch of two dogs made it happen:) I decided I'll draw a large pile of money to test this theory.

I went back for another quick sketch of this engine and added the gel pen and marker at home.

As always, it was fun and inspiring to sketch with the Urban Sketchers of Portland.

National Train Day

Wow. The sun comes out in Portland, and the people of the city are eager for action! National Train day at Union Station was packed with folks of all ages. * Híjole. Cuando sale el sol in Portland, ¡la gente de la ciudad esten listos para celebrar! Un montón de gente asistieron el evento celebrando trenes en Union Station.

Pen & watercolor. * Tinta y acuarelas.

The historic steam engine had very long lines to tour the inside. I stayed on the platform and enjoyed the periodic blasts from the steam whistle. * Las colas para explorar adentro de la locomotora histórica eran muy largas. Me quedé en el andén del tren y disfruté de los soplos periodicos del silbato de vapor. 

Pen & watercolor. * Tinta y acuarelas.

Seattle Sketchcrawl

Here are my sketches from the wonderful sketchcrawl in Seattle last weekend. Since Alanna and I sketched in the same places, you'll see some repeating scenes.

On the train ride north, we talked and sketched eachother, (as well as an agreeable young woman who offered to model for us). I think by about an hour into the trip, Kalina had convinced her to become an urban sketcher.:)

After the warm welcome from the Seattle Sketchers, I joined the group going to Pioneer Square.

The first sketch I did was of Merchants Cafe, Seattle's oldest restaurant. It still seems to be pretty busy.

Then I sketched in the park. Lots of tour groups left from here. There was an artist who was displaying his work in hopes of sales. In drawing the group, I was trying to put into practice Veronica Lawlor's symposium advice of seeing the group as one whole, rather than as individual people.

Windows and signs... It's pretty hard to imagine that rooms were once that cheap.

After the group sharing of sketchbooks, Gabi took us down by the ferries which were unloading huge numbers of soccer fans. I sketched the ivy covered viaduct. I'm hoping that Gabi will post his sketches, since some of us were lucky enough to have been sketched by him.

This man, all in purple head to toe, was smoking near the garbage can.

This family seemed to be waiting silently for a ferry to come in. Maybe they were entranced by the gorgeous bay and mountains.

It was a beautiful fall day in Seattle and it was very fun to meet the other sketchers and to sketch in their city. I'm looking forward to another group sketchcrawl together.

Portland Sketchers Crawl Around Union Station

 August 22

Symposium sparked increased membership in Portland - Lots of local talent

Here we are Sunday morning on a break at Laughing Planet.  We were up on the Foot Bridge to the right of the station for a couple hours.  After lunch some of us continued sketching around Union Station and met back near the entrance to share sketch books. Here's a couple of my images from the day.>>>>

Urban People and Today's sketchcrawl

Earlier this month, I sketched some of Portland's UrbanSketchers:

And today, I met up with some folks and we sketched around the train station: