Charles Rennie Mackintosh's sketches of Northern Italy

The Glasgow School of Art has developed a wonderful website which allows us to see the sketches of Charles Rennie Mackintosh (1868-1928). 

I adore Mackintosh's drawing style and can stare at his drawings and sketches and paintings for hours and hours - so finding this site is very special for me!

The Northern Italian Sketchbook is a comprehensive website, created by Glasgow Arts Scool and funded by The Arts and Humanities Research Council [AHRC], offering:

• Browse the sketchbook
• Follow the journey using our interactive maps - these show the route he covered on his tour of Italy and also how the northern Italian sketchbook fits in with this
• Search by keyword and theme
• find out More about the sketchbook

Follow the links (above) to explore Northern Italy through the eyes of the celebrated Scottish architect Charles Rennie Mackintosh (1868-1928) during his sketching tour of the Continent in 1891. Compare his superb sketches with present-day photographs from the same locations, and retrace his steps with our interactive 19th century Baedeker maps

The Sketchbook contains drawings from the later part of Mackintosh's tour, beginning with Verona. It covers

• Verona (11-14 June); 
• Mantua (14 June); 
• Cremona (14-15 June); 
• Brescia (16 June); 
• Bergamo (17 June); 
• Lecco (18 June); 
• Cadenabbia and Lake Como (19-25 June); 
• Como (26-27 June); 

Como, Cathedral, studies of window and two finials

Charle Rennie Mackintosh - Northern Italian Sketchbook

© The Glasgow School of Art

• Milan (28 June-6 July); 
• Pavia (7 July-?); 
• Certosa di Pavia ( probably several days around 12 July); 
• Paris and Chateau d'Ecouen (late July?); 
• Antwerp (late July?). 

It also contains several pages of designs for the Glasgow Art Club (1892-3) and the Glasgow Herald Building (1893-5).

If you use the search facility, it also shows you photos of the place today.

Most of the sketches are in pencil and some are now a tad faint.  However there are a few where colour has been added in watercolour.  He doesn't draw people - he draws buildings and most particularly he draws bits of buildings.  He's working out how the structure and ornamentation work.

What I like about is as a facsimile sketchbook is it shows you exactly what a real sketchbook looks like - even one kept by somebody who is technically very proficient at drawing.  It has all the unfinished sketches and the ones that went wrong and the bits of this and that which make it very real for me.  It's also very apparent, as one might expect, that he loves drawing architectural details.  He fills pages with unpicking and reassembling the twirly bits!

Finally, I have to add that I am very impressed by the Glasgow School of Art.  They appear to be one of the few art schools in the UK which have really grasped the potential of IT and the internet for sharing the riches of our artistic heritage.  Often, people start out on a path to learning about art because of the images they have seen and have been able to study.  I'm very grateful for their enlightened approach which allows others to share  and be inspired by Mackintosh's talents and skills in drawing.

Links:

• You can learn more about Mackintosh's connections with the Glasgow School of Art on their Mackintosh heritage website
• You can also read about my admiration for his drawings of flowers in Flowers in Art... and Charles Rennie Mackintosh on Making A Mark

Taking a line for a walk - from Le Havre to Rome

Paul Klee once explained that "a drawing is simply a line going for a walk". In the summer of 2000, Christopher Lambert drew a straight blue line between Le Havre and Rome on a map of Europe when eighteen months short of his 70th birthday. He then set off with his all leather Brasher walking boots, a small rucksack, a couple of pens, some watercolour pencils and a sketchbook journal. 1,075 miles and 71 walking days later he arrived in Rome having taken a page each day to sketch and write about what he saw on his trip.

This is the hardback facsimile version of his sketchbook. As a concession to his handwriting, there is a thin typescript margin containing two lines of summary text about each day - as he says his writing gets a bit cramped at times!

Lambert developed a taste for long distance walking when, on his retirement, he walked 440 miles along five ancient footpaths across southern Britain to his new retirement home in Devon. For the Millennium he thought he'd like to try one of the pilgrim routes across Europe. Consequently, in July 2000 he set off carrying a pilgrim's passport - a letter of brotherly greetings in Latin from the Anglican Provost of Portsmouth Cathedral to Pope John Paul in the Vatican in Rome. On his trip he averaged just over 15 miles each walking day overall, although this inevitably varied along the route across France, through Switzerland, down through northern Italy and the 'thigh' of Italy to Rome. En route - and along his straight line - he visited Honfleur, Fontainebleau Forest, the Canal de Bourgogne, Dijon, Lausanne and from there along the ancient pilgrimage route, the Via Francigena, through the Grand St. Bernard pass across the Alps to Aosta, Lucca and Siena before reaching Rome.

What particularly appealed to me about this book is his habit of doing daily sketches while travelling - a habit I developed on my two USA trips last year (see RH column for more details). I also identified with his approach to sketching. He uses pen and ink to sketch, followed by coloured pencils to indicate values and form and something of local hues. The book contains over 240 illustrations of a huge variety of 'views', buildings, people, flowers, insects and the butterfly which sat on his hand one day while he drew (see below - page 52 Col du Grand St Bernard)

Pages 85 and 85 Lucca

"Taking a Line for a Walk"

copyright Christopher Lambert - used with permission

His working life as an architect is evident in the ease with which his eye takes in and quickly absorbs the key features of complicated architecture. I loved the way he tells himself off when he's done something overly complicated - giving himself injunctions to simplify. Overall, despite what he says below, his style is very pleasing - being loose and unfussy. Some of the very simplest sketches have the greatest impact.

"The sketches had priority - to the extent that I would often make myself late departing from a place because I just had to record it....I wanted to shake off my architectural topographical style and in a few flicks of the pen and pencils capture the essence of a thing or place, but it very rarely happened. Nevertheless these small drawings became my footsteps as the miles elapsed and the pages filled...."

His habit of sketching over meals is also one with which I'm very familiar. I even suspect, given the nature of his sketches, that we might share the same habit of table hopping to find the table which offers the 'right' view. Which is not always the best view but rather is the one which lends itself best to sketching.

His meditations on walking, his surroundings and the impact that a long walk has on an individual are both interesting and powerful reminders to reflect on life at something less than 4 miles an hour. It's a book which more than repays any attempt to read his handwriting - which is not so difficult once you get used to it. This is a book that I can particularly recommend to all those accustomed to travelling to many destinations at top speed and who may not be acquainted with the benefits and "the inevitability of gradualism"! ;)

In conclusion, I'd highly recommend this book for anybody wanting to keep a sketchbook journal of a trip. Those visiting places along this route will also get an insight into life outside a car and the rhythm of life which occurs when walking everyday on a very long walk.

"The illustrations have a wonderful vividness and the text has a gentle undercurrent of humour.......It's the kind of book that you can pick up time after time and feel yourself wandering through the byways of France and Italy, hearing the sounds and smelling the fragrance of the hedgerows and fields around and about, or imagining yourself sitting outside in a village square enjoying a glass of wine" Sir Chris Bonington

NOTE: In future: the new revamped version of this blog will contain reviews of various books relevant to individuals travelling with a sketchbook. I'm anticipating this will include:

• the published sketchbooks of other artististic travellers
  
• 'how to sketch' books
  
• good travel guides for an area
  
• maps I've found useful in the past

Since I have bookshelves weighed down with the above it should mean I can avoid the stop/start frequency of a blog which is just about trips!

Links:

• Christopher Lambert: Taking a Line for a Walk: 1000 Miles on Foot - Le Havre to Rome (2005)
  
• More quotes by Paul Klee
• The Antique Collectors Club - publishers of the book
• Other travel guides published by the Antique Collectors Club - do take a browse, they look very interesting
• Via Francigena:
• Advice for and from people using this route
• Diaries of other pilgrims

Technorati tags: books, book reviews, coloured pencils, drawing, France, Italy, pen and ink, sketch,sketchbook, travel, travel sketchbook, watercolour pencils

Venice 2005 - Summary

This thread provides links to all the individual posts relating to my trip to Venice in May 2005.
They are all posted sequentially so if you go to the first, you can then read the whole trip by scrolling up the page.

1. Sketching in Venice - May 2005 - introduction
   
2. Venice - Sunday 8th May 2005 - sightseeing, a boat race, Harry's Bar, the Dogana and the Salute
   
3. Venice - Monday 9th May 2005 - what to do when it's wet and windy; the pescheria and Desdemona's house
   
4. Venice - Tuesday 10th May 2005 (morning) - the view from the Arsenal
   
5. Venice - Tuesday 10th May 2005 (afternoon) - a shopping trolley, pigments and wooden pears
6. Venice - Wednesday 11th May 2005 - Piazza San Marco, lunch and sketching at Quadris and the Palazzos Dario and Barbero on the Grand Canal (both associated with Monet painting in Venice)
   
7. Venice - Thursday 12th May 2005 - the Friary Church and the Ca D'Oro
   
8. Venice - Friday 13th May 2005 (morning) - the market, the Rialto Bridge
   
9. Venice - Friday 13th May 2005 (lunch and afternoon) - lunch and sketching waiters, more Rialto and noisy gondoliers, exhibition
   
10. Venice - Conclusions

Technorati tags: art , sketching , Venice

Venice - May 2005 - conclusions

The reason for creating the (original) thread like this is to encourage everybody to have a go at plein air painting - and to visit Venice if they can. It's certainly an ideal place for anybody wanting to paint - you can get to everywhere quite easily through a combination of vaporetto and foot. There are things to sketch and paint everywhere you look, it's a real visual feast - even if it rains!

The painting at the top of the page was one I completed when I got home - it's called "Painting Party at the Pescheria" - based on our trip to the Fish Market on Monday when it rained.

This trip was linked to an advanced course with Paul Riley who is a watercolourist and tutor. You can see details of the regular workshop schedule and painting trips on the website of Coombe Farm Studios.

I've stopped going on painting holidays for the tuition per se and now do pretty much all my work independently rather than with the group - as I did this time. However, I still very much enjoy having people to converse with over breakfast (planning the day) and over the drinks and dinner in the evening (what did we do / would do differently if we did it again ). I'm still not sure about whether or not I've got the nerve to go out to somewhere like Venice and do a whole week on my own - although I've done a few days at a time in different places on a few occasions so far. I've also been known to pick restaurants on my travels for their view as well as their food before now!

What did I learn on this trip? Well how about:

• you can get a big return if you do decent homework / preparation in advance (eg where to go / what to tackle) but aren't limited by what you've found out in advance - there are always going to be surprises
• I can actually get a great deal of work done if I put my mind to it and get up and out early - I probably achieved more on this trip than any other
• there's a lot of places to paint in Venice where you needn't be bothered by crowds - you just need to look
• a good guidebook helps (I used the Dorling Kindersley Venice and the Veneto (Eyewitness Travel Guides S.) - lots of great location maps)
• a guidebook which is annotated (by me following a bit of research) with the location of places where others have painted before me is even more helpful!
  
• even if you set yourself up in the same spot others have painted from, you can always get a new take (ie mine!) on a popular scene or motif
• a tip I once got from Jackie Simmonds proved jolly useful when I employed it on this holiday. She recommends coming up with a title for a picture after choosing a scene and before committing to paper. It helps to get the focus of the picture sorted straight away - and keeps you focused on it all the way through.
• digital cameras can take an awful lot of photos so long as you have a big enough memory card and remember to carry a spare set of charged batteries on you - I forgot to take a spare set the first morning and had to go haring back to the hotel for the spare pack when I forgot to put a freshly charged set in that morning
• shopping trolleys work well for carrying painting materials around - and help you to stand up on vaporettos! However, they're not so wonderful on some of the little bridges. However the wheels survived my specially devised autodestruct test while bouncing up and down steps!
• don't sit on the windy side of the pescheria when it's raining cats and dogs - those red blinds can flap rain all over your painting! But Art Spectrum Colourfix doesn't mind!

I'm reasonably pleased with what I did on site. However, the real test after every trip is converting sketches and photos into fully worked up paintings. What I'm enjoying at the moment is I have the complete image for at least three or four large pieces already fairly well sorted in my head - it's just a question of starting to get them down on paper.

I think I'm going to try and focus on going on painting trips with like-minded friends in future if that's possible and try for the 'modus operandi' in the field of the sort which tends to operate in within groups of people who get to know one another over the internet.

(Note: This commentary on my trip to Venice was written in May 2005. My next trip is to the southwestern USA this month - with friends I've met and got to know over the Internet and who I've not yet met in real life!)


Technorati tags: art , Venice ,

Venice - Friday 13th 2005 (lunch and afternoon)

About 1.30pm I went for lunch at a nearby trattoria which is well thought of - and had the most amazing time - and four courses! So menu first - this time it was fish, fish, fish and sorbet!

• Hors d'Oeuvres Madonna (all the little shell things I'd seen in the fish market),
  
• Spaghetti with squid in black ink,
  
• fillet of St Pierre in bread
  
• and then Lemon sorbet with Proseco. (I'm now on a diet!)
  

And I've got photos of inky squid and St Pierre if anybody wants to see them in their raw state.

But the best bit was the waiters!

There was this very tall and patrician Maitre D (what's the equivalent in Italian?) who obviously ran the place 'just so'. And then sat at the back was a whole table of waiters of various ages. I thought they might be having their lunch but then thought that was odd as it was lunchtime - and waiters normally eat just before or after the time a restaurant is open for lunch.

It turned out that they were all shelling the scampi for that evening. There were ENORMOUS mounds of cooked scampi and scampi shells - each one of them had a little mountain! So I asked if I could take a photo and they said Yes and then I started to sketch in pen and ink. And this is the sketch of "The shelling of the scampi" - which is going to make a marvellous painting as it's all black and white and neutral colours and then these big pinky apricot mounds of scampi and shells.

I probably didn't spend more than 15-20 minutes on the sketch - there are times when attending life drawing tends to pay off - but unfortunately not for the bloke on the left whose head I got wrong! He was absolutely fascinated by what was going on and kept looking round to see what I was doing.

And then.........waiters started coming over to watch me.

And then...........the Maitre D came over and I thought he was going to stop me - but I showed him where I was up to and he nodded and said something in Italian which I didn't understand. I think I was OK because nobody was identifiable - again just suggestions of faces rather than portraits.

And then........because he'd been to look even more of them came over to look! What I hadn't appreciated until I looked around the trattoria a bit more was that they had paintings absolutely everywhere - on every wall three and four high up the walls.

When I finished I gave it to one of the waiters who then took it around the table of waiters - as they were all still shelling! - and everybody had a good look at the picture - and, of course, what they looked like! Lots of nods and smiles and 'Bella' type comments. It always makes it worthwhile when you do a sketch which people know you're doing and they get to see it - and then they don't make faces! Must have been OK then!

Note a bit of lunch escaped and got on the sketch!

The afternoon was a bit less successful. I tried a sketch next to the Rialto but it was just too busy and noisy (gondoliers arguing!). This is what I was trying to do and will probably have another go at - it's photo no. 167 since Monday morning!

So I went back to near the Fish Market and did a very fast sketch as I was due back at the hotel by 5.00pm to fulfil my honorary task of 'End of Course Exhibition Organiser'. I even bring my own blu-tak! Here is the exhibition of the various paintings executed during our week in Venice.

And then we all went out for dinner!

Technorati tags: art , drawing , pen and ink , plein air , sketching , sketchbook , Venice ,

Venice - Friday 13th May 2005 (morning)

Guess who didn't realise it was Friday the 13th?

The rest of the party class went off to paint further up into Cannareggio but since that was where we stayed last time we came to Venice, I decided to stick around the Rialto area which I'd not got around to looking at properly last time.

So I loaded up the trolley and set off in the traghetto at San Sofia for the fish market just the other side of the Grand Canal where we painted on the first day.

Last Friday it was in full swing as a fish market. Now to avoid loading this thread with yet more images I'm going to post a link to images of and explanations about the Fish Market and Fruit and Vegetable Markets which is rather good. This is the day I took well over a 100 photos of fish and fruit and veg and the market. Here's a just a very small selection of the fish I saw in the market.

The fruit and veg market was just as good - and I finally got the hang of that thing with digi cameras where you use the screen thingie to show you what you're doing - and as a result you can take all sorts of photos which you can't do if you've got your eye smack up against it in normal photo taking mode - it was a very educational experience!

Here are a few of the fruit and veg piccies. Notice how the green and white asparagus are decorated with wisteria blooms - colour co-ordinated or what? And have you ever seen dried tomatoes like this before - I certainly haven't?

I finally dragged myself away from the market and set off to find a place to paint.

I'd had a notion of doing the Rialto Bridge but as a background. Here's the drawing I did which when worked up will be called 'The steps near the Rialto Bridge' slight pun fully intended.

This is very much a colour sketch rather than a WIP and probably won't be finished. It's the only piece I did while I was there in which I consciously tried to work people in while I was working - and very difficult it was too as the models kept moving. Fortunately I had a couple - whose photo I won't post - who stayed very still for a long time and were sitting in a wonderful place in compositional terms. All the 'real life' people will lose their identities in the painting so it becomes one of those paintings were people will think "that could have been me".

Lunch comes next!

Technorati tags: art , drawing , coloured pencils , pen and ink , pencil , plein air , sketching , sketchbook , Venice ,

Venice - Thursday 12th May 2005

And the sun shone again! We took the vaporetto down the Grand Canal to St Tomo and went to the square in front of the Friary Church (in the Santa Croce and San Polo district).

I was very sniffy and said it didn't do anything for me and went off on a walk in search of something better but didn't find anything. Came back and walked to a different bit of the square (the quiet bit with the sunshine!) and instantly found a view - such is life! It always pays to walk all the way around the first place you come to before setting off to find something better! Anyway, I set myself up on the doorstep of the Institute of Archivists (I kid you not!) and proceeded to get going on this view - except this is the photo take nearer the end when I'd worked out that I needed some people to give scale to the piece.

In the middle of the square shortly after I started, was a guitar player sitting playing classical guitar - in classical guitarist pose. (This is the way to draw/paint folks - in the sunshine in Venice with somebody playing classical guitar less than a stone's throw away!) so guess what the piece will be called. This one is a dead cert to be done again - but needs lots of thinking around how to populate it with figures without losing the focus on the guitar player who I want to be deliberately understated.

Anyway, here is the colour study sketch - minus all figures except the classical guitar player - in my sketch book - hence slightly funny looking scan. It's across two pages and I had to stitch them together and the software didn't want to do it automatically so I had to it 'manually'. It's the biggest drawing I actually did while I was there approx 17" x 9" in about 2-3 hours. Eyeballing all the way on all that ' challenging' perspective in sepia ink before I started to use the CPs.

Then I had a chinese lunch(!) sitting in the sunshine in the chinese cafe in the square and sketched a window with flowers in pots, again in sepia ink inbetween munching prawn crackers.

After lunch, I walked north from the church, back to the Fish Market and set up to the left of the Fiush Market and opposite the Ca d'Oro to see how much I could get done of that.

I'd already worked out that in the late afternoon that the sun would be on the building and I would get to sit in the shade. (It's always a good idea to work out where the sun will be at different times of day if you're staying in one place and can choose when to do your sketch / drawing / painting).

Here's the photo and then the painting - with a big space to the left as I ran out of puff for painting! The Ca d'Oro has a marble front - hence why it is so very pale. Finally at 6 o'clock, I 'clocked off' and caught the traghetto back over the Canal to get back to my pre-dinner drink at the cafe on the corner.

Technorati tags: art , drawing , coloured pencils , pen and ink , pencil , plein air , sketching , sketchbook , Venice ,

Venice - Wednesday 11th May 2005

This is the day when I skipped the trip to Burano and Torcello and got my head down for some serious painting. So lots of images in this post.

First of all I planned to go to the basin at the back of St Marks Square where they park all the gondolas. I've seen some paintings done by people who have worked there and it looked very promising...........but big disappointment - very busy. Getting there was easy as I had my new shopping trolley with the big wheels. However until I got it, I never really realised quite how many times you walk up and down steps going over little bridges over canals!

As I walked through into St Marks Square it was, as usual, full of people. I then spotted some artists who had tucked themselves away at the far end of the square in a quieter area but with a good view of San Marco - so I went and joined them. One of them was doing a fabulous oil painting of the basilica.

Anyway, being the 'sensible girl' that I am, I get my sketch book out and settle down to a preliminary sketch. Truth be told, I'm not stupid and there was no way I was going to attempt the basilica without trying to work out how it worked first.

I made myself work in pen and ink because I find it makes me look harder as there is no scope for rubbing out mistakes. So first image is a photo of the basilica and the crowds and then my sketch of the basilica in sepia ink.

Then I decided to have a go at doing it in coloured pencil. Interesting decisions to make about where to crop - and whether what I decided actually turned out to be what happened! It's a very difficult building to assess whether or not you're sizing things correctly. Anyway, here is the result - unfinished - CP, A4 size, on a 'neutral' shade of colourfix (not sure what the name is).

Then, after I got very tired going cross-eyed trying to draw, I decided to award myself a very late lunch in the restaurant at Quadris. It's amazing what being uncomfortable for a few hours will do in terms of making you want a comfortable seat to sit on. This restaurant is a very old fixture in the square - silly prices which I don't mind paying once only for the views from the first floor restaurant!

I had the fish, the fish and the fish (getting the food theme yet?) plus a glass of proseco and spent my time while eating next to a window looking out over the square and doing 10 second sketches of people in pen and ink to help populate my painting. And here they are........plus a photo of the interior of Quadris taken on leaving - I got the distinct impression they thought I'd taken root, but you know a comfy seat is a comfy seat!

Then I walked over to the vaporetto stop opposite Palazzo Dario to have a go at painting for real right in front of it rather than than interpreting Monet's versions of it. I had to sit on the corner of the vaporetto stop hoping that the people getting off wouldn't knock me off my chair so my CPs and I ended up in the Grand Canal! So here is the photo of the place - and boy does it lean!

And then my painting - on an A4 size terracotta/rust shade of Colourfix. I might just have exaggerated the lean a bit! This is probably the first one where I felt I was getting back into Monet mode. Quite pleased with this one.

And then it was on to the vaporetto for a No1 ride back up the Grand Canal - with my eyes closing most of the way there.

But not so much that I couldn't take a photo of the Palazzo Barbaro (next to the Accademia Bridge) where Monet (my hero!) stayed in 1908 and painted the Salute - he stood there!!!

Do you think he had problems with the oil paints rolling into the canal?

I've preached to various people on the trip about not setting out to do finished pieces and quoting the statistic about Monet starting 38 pictures of Venice of which 35 were finished at Giverny. Makes me feel better anyway!

Technorati tags: art , drawing , coloured pencils , pen and ink , pencil , plein air , sketching , sketchbook , Venice ,