"Travels with a Sketchbook" recommended by "The Times"

Learn How to Sketch - links to information and advice on my website

Just in case you missed the news - I'm absolutely delighted to announce that this blog Travels with a Sketchbook AND my advice on how to sketch were both highlighted and recommended by "The Times" newspaper last week!

That's the London newspaper with the name which was borrowed by every other newspaper with 'Times' in its title all around the world!

You can read the piece - included in the "Daily Universal Register" page below.  It's very pleasurable to read people's perspectives on your work when they are as good as this!

extract from the "The Times" newspaper 25th February 2011

I can't walk very well at the moment - so I found the article online and "he who must not bored while I sketch" bought me a copy of the newsprint version.  I had the page it was on memorised by the time he turned up with it! :)

It was nice to see that Urban Sketchers got the the "If you liked this then you might like this too" slot.

Tomorrow - I'll be highlighting my article about Ten reasons to sketch with coloured pencils which will be published by Derwent's LovePencils blog on Tuesday 1st March 2011.


Links:  Making A Mark - Press and Media coverage

A second group - Sketchercise on Flickr

It's obvious quite a few of you like the idea of Sketchercise!

However it was very sad yesterday to have to turn down about half the people who applied for membership of Sketchercise yesterday. This is because while our Ning community is still very new and getting off the ground we're limiting new members to people who are already active in terms of sketching combined with some form of activity. What that means is that I take a look at your website or blog to find evidence of what you've achieved so far - in terms of combining sketching and exercising.

Some people were engaged in only one - but not the other activity.

Bert on Heron Bridge 4th June 10.30am
8.5" x 11.5", pencils and coloured pencils in Daler Rowney sketchbook
copyright Katherine Tyrrell
(see sketches from the same walk in Herons, coots and goslings - grooming, housekeeping and babysitting)

A second Sketchercise Group

As a result, I've decided (a bit like Urban Sketchers) that's there's going to be a need for a place where people can join in while they develop their sketchercise habit.

So I've set up a new group on Flickr - called Sketchercise on Flickr! See http://www.flickr.com/groups/sketchercise/. This is the description of how it works.

Sketchercise is for people who enjoy sketching AND taking exercise to maintain or improve their health outside a gym!

Sketchercise is a new community with two groups

SKETCHERCISE ON NING All you need to do to join the Sketchercise on Ning group is to enjoy sketching from life (no photos!), have already developed the sketching habit AND have found ways of getting out and about - with a sketchbook. You can walk or cycle or paddle your own canoe - so long as it involves activity and sketching! This group is for people who've already got the Sketchercise habit and we review your nominated website for evidence of this before new memberships are approved.

SKETCHERCISE ON FLICKR If you like the idea of Sketchercise and want to have a go at Sketchercise and develop a Sketcercise habit then this NEW FLICKR GROUP is the place to post your sketches and show us how you're getting on. Post all your sketchercise sketches in this group and tag them all with 'sketchercise' and that makes them easy to find.

So Sketchercise on Flickr will be the group which in future I will refer people to if they apply to join Ning but have very little demonstrable evidence of sketching and exercising at the same time.

It has a few rules which are detailed below. The emphasis is on the process rather than the output - we're not expecting drawings or paintings which are exhibition ready!

The focus of this group is the process of sketching and exercising and the Group rules are very simple

1. Upload up to 3 sketches each day - in any media
2. The sketch must be done from life and ideally done plein air (no sketching from photos at home!)
3. The sketch must be done while taking exercise
4. Say where you went and how you got there
5. Tell us what you noticed while out exercising and sketching

Sketchercise on Flickr

If you are by any chance writing about Sketchercise on your blog, would you mind linking to this post and highlighting the difference between the two groups - thanks! :)

Note: My sketch is another one for the Ecology Park pond series and is of Willow Pond and was done while on my walk last Thursday morning. You can see Bert the Heron sat on Heron Bridge in the foreground!

The NEAC Discussion Panel 2008

NEAC Discussion Panel - Can you teach art or drawing?

(L to R) Alex Fowler, Francis Bowyer, Charles Williams and William Packer
8" x 11", pencil and coloured pencils in sketchbook
copyright Katherine Tyrrell

Last week, the New English Art Club arranged a Discussion Panel at its Annual Exhibition in the Mall Galleries - on the topic of "Can you teach drawing or painting?"

I'd drawn the panel at the discussion at last year's exhibition and wanted to do the same again so made sure I got there in good time and had a good view. Nobody on the Panel sat still of course so the sketch was completed in snatched moments as people settled for short periods - and I was darting back and forth between people all the time I sketched.

I find that the most difficult thing when sketching people like this is trying to guess which is the 'comfy' pose - the one an individual will always return to whenever they move.

I should have posted about the discussion last week as, although interesting, I can't now remember some of the points made in the debate. I do remember there was a long discussion about the various models of teaching drawing and painting which have been used over time - in particular comparing how people were taught themselves in the past and how they have to teach now - within whatever context.

Having qualified as a teacher myself in the dim and distant past, I do remember thinking I was less interested in how drawing and painting can be taught and more interested in how people learn to draw and paint in an effective manner (ie going beyond achieving a likeness).

In my view, in order for teaching to be effective the approach used does need to be based in an understanding of how people learn at different stages of their development as an artist. Sometimes you need to learn how to do and sometimes you need to be left to get on with trying to find what you can do with what you've learned. It did strike me me that maybe some of the approaches employed over time haven't always factored in how learning works - and that some approaches will have too structured and constrained for some and too vague and loose for others. I guess the question is a good one - even if it's not always easy to answer!

Note: NEAC has a Drawing School called, unsurprisingly, the New English School of Drawing. The information on the website is somewhat out of date but does provide a contact email for latest courses.

Links

• New English Art Club
  
• New English Art Club - Annual Open Exhibition 2008
• Sketching and quotations from the NEAC Exhibition

Sketching the Olympics in Trafalgar Square - and afternoon tea!

The medal ceremony in Trafalgar Square

11.5" x 17", pencil and coloured pencils in sketchbook

copyright Katherine Tyrrell

Yesterday, inbetween the Press View for the Threadneedle Figurative Prize and the evening Preview Party at the Mall Galleries, I sat on the steps in Trafalgar Square, in front of the National Gallery, and sketched the huge screen showing the Olympics and the watching crowd.

I arrived just as Christine Ohuruogu won her gold medal for Britain in the 400 metres and my sketch is of the medal ceremony. Christine lives in Stratford, right next door to where the 2012 Olympics will be held - which is also a hop skip and rather long jump from where I live in London.

I did toy with trying to catch live action - but they were all just too fast for me so I waited until the action slowed up a bit - like when the National Anthem gets played. We didn't all stand but we did clap!

There was a very good crowd in Trafalgar Square - all watching the Olympics on the big screen erected at the foot of Nelson's column. The action all takes place with Sir Edwin Landseer's Lions who guard the outside diagonals of Nelson's Column looking most aloof!

It began to drizzle so I decided that having missed lunch and due to get home late I'd better go and have a National Gallery Afternoon Tea in the National Dining Rooms which overlook Trafalgar Square. The sketch below is of other people enjoying tea against the light from the windows which overlook the Square. I love sketching people 'contre jour' - you get rim lighting. One of my tips for 'how to sketch people' is to try sketching them against the light so you focus on shapes and can't see any detail, except for outlines. I was rather amused by the fact that the banners hanging down outside are about 'Radical Light' the current exhibition at the gallery.

Afternoon Tea at the National Gallery

11.5" x 17", pencil and coloured pencils in sketchbook

copyright Katherine Tyrrell

With both sketches I got a bit of colour down when I sketched but added a bit more later to get more coverage. Plus I waited until I could see the photo of the medal ceremony properly before I completed it - having roughed in the shapes and placement while staring at the screen in the Square.

I had the Orange Pekoe Tea and sketched slowly so I could enjoy the tea! I did mull over the notion of sketching the Afternoon Tea..........maybe I need to go back?