This week I went on my second field trip with Swansea University’s FIRE Lab project. We went along the old road after turning off the A4067 at the Tafarn y Garreg Inn. My colleagues were studying the bridges and culverts that direct the numerous streams under the road on their way down to merge with the River Tawe, which is quite close to its source here. I worked into a brown paper A4 sketchbook with compressed charcoal and white chalk.
Husb and I were unexpectedly offered free tickets to the musical show “Rock of Ages” at our local Victorian Grand Theatre last week. I thought it was about Queen, the band, so I was a bit surprised by it.
It was good fun though and the cast were great singers and dancers. The energy they gave off was phenomenal and they deserved the standing ovation they got.
Of course I had a scribble. I drew completely in the dark, doing continuous line drawings with a ballpoint pen into my A6 hardbound sketchbook. It’s good practice and I liked the drawings when I opened up my book later at home. You can’t get too precious about things when you can’t see what you’re doing.
I’m a real townie, the countryside is where the landscape lives along with lots of animals and birds I don’t know. I know what pigeons are, and seagulls, robins, sparrows, magpies and blackbirds. I am reasonably familiar with starlings, tits, sparrows, crows and budgies. On my “Walk and Draw” field trip along the Tawe riverbank last weekend I saw a jay (colourful), a kingfisher (even more colourful) and a grey heron (big). There were a few people fishing and we stopped to sketch this one guy. I did a quick drawing with ballpoint pen into my A6 cloth covered sketchbook.
A very moving blog post from artist Patti McJones
A couple more of the drawings I did out and about on my 15 kilometre walk along the banks of the River Tawe last weekend. We stopped periodically to sketch but we also did some “walk and draw” sketching. I like working like this because it forces me to disregard detail and record the fleeting impressions of things on the move. It becomes a montage rather than a static view.
This was my first field trip for the FIRE Lab project at Swansea University. “The Freshwater Interdisciplinary Research and Engagement (FIRE) Lab started in Swansea in early 2018. The lab is supported by a Sêr Cymru Fellowship held by Steph Januchowski-Hartley, and is focused on addressing questions about human changes on freshwater ecosystems and the relationships that people have with these ecosystems in Wales and beyond.” FIRE Lab connects science and the arts in an integrated SciArt approach. It’s fascinating and I’m so pleased to be a part of it.
Here are a couple more drawings done en plein air last Saturday on my first field trip for the FIRE Lab project at Swansea University. I walked with a colleague up the Tawe river bank, 15 kilometres in all, and spent some of that time sketching. I like the drawings for their immediacy, the way they’re rooted in the moment.
I used compressed charcoal and chalk into a spiral bound A4 size brown paper sketchbook. I like using brown paper because it gives me an instant mid-tone.
I did a fifteen kilometre walk last Saturday, along the Tawe River path, from Sainsburys in Swansea to Tescos in Pontardawe. It’s really impressive how the path has been extended and improved over the past few years. There were loads of people using it too, walkers, cyclists, runners and people fishing. I did some ‘walk and draw’ sketching along parts of it, using compressed charcoal and chalk into an A4 ring-bound brown paper sketchpad. This is my first field trip for the FIRE Lab project at Swansea University…..more to come about that …..
I did four sketches at the inauguration of the new Lord Mayor of Swansea a couple of days ago. I did a couple in ballpoint pen into an A6 hardbacked sketchbook and a couple of larger ones in conté crayon into an A4 brown paper pad. It’s challenging doing interiors with people, getting the perspective and proportions right and coping with people moving around all the time. There’s something to be said for working from photographs.
The main image shows a view of the choir of primary school children who performed three songs, including the beautiful Welsh language hymn, “Calon Lan“. It never fails to bring a lump to my throat, it’s so poignant.
Here’s another sketch I did at Swansea’s mayor-making ceremony yesterday. I worked quickly onto a tinted heavyweight vintage paper with conté crayons in black, white and sanguine and also used a Faber Castell Pitt drawing pen, size B.
Had a really busy day today but managed to do lots of scribbling. Husb and I were invited to the mayor-making ceremony at Swansea’s Guildhall (a beautiful building, but that’s another story). It was very formal in some ways, but also warm and friendly. The inauguration happened in the council chamber, an imposing room full of wooden panels and columns and artworks by Frank Brangwyn up around the ceiling. I did this sketch into my A6 sketchbook using a ballpoint pen. I’m not too keen on drawing interiors and architecture, I prefer to draw people, but they were too far away to draw them with any detail.
scribblah 