French Sketch Picnic Workshop
On a beautiful hot day, there we were sketching happily under a shade tree.
One of our students from last summer in Sydney, decided she’d fly north and have a 2 day Essential Sketch Getaway. As she said,’ I can’t travel on any of your tours I’d have liked to join, so here I am’
So there we were on Day One, under our own massive Banksia Tree, blue skies, the waves crashing on the beach beyond, coffee and croissant in hand, thinking about sketching a still life of found items. But we actually chose to go for the classic Pandanus trees. If you want to capture the essence of where you are, trees are often a great way to start. We would also incorporate these into beach scenes done later. You certainly know you’re in a tropical region when the Pandanus features.
We talked about planning the page. Portrait or landscape? A few thumbnails would decide that. Portrait it was
You’ll see those below. We’d also be working in Aquarelle pencil today, as our students wanted to master the convenience of those once again.
A beautiful baguette lunch and a glass of Rose gave us time to relax and think about the sketch ahead. Then into we went. Line by line our tree came to life. Layers of colour gave us a variety of greens and very happy we were.
To finish our day we made a quick visit to Cabarita Beach to get reference for a sketch our student was keen to try on her own. An excellent day and a lovely relax back at the resort would be a great reward.
Day 2 of our French Sketch Workshop had promised all week to be pouring rain! But the gods were with us and instead we awoke to a beautiful blue day, hot but we were fine with that.
Under our Banksia tree we welcomed our next student with coffee and croissant while we talked about what we’d learn. Today we started with some found items and work out the shapes and forms to put onto our sketchbook page.
This little still life was a lovely one for new or experienced sketchers. Everyone managed beautifully to capture pink and white frangipani with banksia seed pods (from above). Everyone very pleased with their work and before long Maurice would arrive with our French baguette, Rose, cheese and fruit.
Sketching is very meditative but you do need fortification!
Our main sketch was to be a pathway to the beach. There are many of these along our beautiful coast and all sketchworthy. The sort of thing you could do do on your own, once you’d learned how to simplify what you’d see.
We did some quick thumbnails of the sort of options we might go for and then headed over to our nearest pathway. So what are your main shapes when you really observe?
1.The pathway. 2.The sand. 3.The sea. 4. The sky. 5. The side banks and trees framing our view.
Once our sketch was banged in, back to our table to apply colour. This time in watercolours.
A few scribbly top and sides were highlighted with our chinagraph paint resister. Layout out our colours we’re ready to throw colour on. That’s exactly the way I talk. No painty painty fiddling around here.
Let the layers go one over the other and watch the scene coming to life, all with step by step guidance of course.
What fun. Look at the different styles and colour we all have. That’s the lovely thing. It’s your impression as you saw it. Being quick is the key. If you have 10 minutes you can sketch. If you have an hour you can sketch. Up to you.
And so ended a marvellous 2 days with such delightful students who were so happy with our time together and the sketches they’d take home.
