Praha

I spent the long weekend of Easter exploring Prague with Kris & Dave-two colleagues from Aardman. It's one beautiful city, the architecture is stunning. I didn't get too much sketching done but managed to squeeze in what follows between meals, cabarets, sight-seeing & surreal encounters with the 'night-folk'. It happened to be my 33rd birthday too so we celebrated every night with many exotic drinks and I would draw through the hang-over the following morning . . .

The Old Town Square was heaven to draw in-I got down the astronomical clock & a quick sketch of the gothic Tyn Church.







On my birthday we headed 40 km out of Prague to find the famous Ossuary of Kutna Hora. It's packed with thousands of skulls & bones, many of which have been used to create macabre decor. The centre-piece is an enormous bone chandelier-tackling all the detail in a drawing was daunting but I had to try.




That evening we ate in a medieval banquet hall where we were entertained by fire-breathers, duelling brigands, belly-dancers with snakes and a dwarf pirate who put Kris in thumbscrews.



The next day we visited the Alphonse Mucha museum. There were dozens of his exquisite art-nouveau poster designs on show, alongside preparatory drawings, lithographs, oil paintings & sketchbooks.




The Cathedral & Prague Castle


The western end of Charles Bridge




It was an enlightening trip & a fine way to celebrate my 33rd birthday. Only an hour & a half flight from Bristol it's very tempting to return soon to capture more of this charming town in my sketchbook.

Life Drawing pt.2

Here is a selection from last week's session.
Warm up sketches of my fellow artists & the robed models.


I think there were 6 models that evening-in the short pose section we had 3 to choose from at one point.


There will be a break in the life classes now until the end of the month then a new 10 week course begins, so more in May.

Back in the life room

It has been almost three years since I was last in a life drawing class. In France I tried to stay sharp drawing people on the street or at the beach but there's nothing quite like a good life drawing session. I've really missed a weekly work-out in the drawing gym but boy did I feel rusty!


I've found a great class in Bristol where there are 5 models all evening- alternating poses between 5 minutes to an hour. It's the biggest class I've ever been to- there must have been close to 50 artists!



The drawings shown here were all 5 minute poses. Struggling with the time limit, materials & finding a good vantage point I found myself falling back on 'comfort' drawing tricks. I've signed up for 10 weeks so I hope to break out of those old habits.




Will, who organizes the class, has a blog here.

Lacock

Alas, Lacock is not another medieval French village and no it's not a Parisian gay club either-it's a picturesque English village east of Bath. My Story Supervisor had found it & told me it was full of stuff I'd like to sketch;half-timber houses & ancient architecture.




The lady poking her head out of the window in this sketch later found me & asked to see what I was drawing.


I saw this litttle church near the town of Box on the route back to Bath. I stopped the car, jumped over the wall & sat in the graveyard to quickly sketch it.

Bristol

Here are my first sketches from Bristol. I've moved to the city to storyboard on a feature for Aardman. There's tonnes of interesting stuff to draw around the harbour where the studio is located.

Moutarde

Driving across France last week I stopped half-way in Dijon . I got up early the next day for a stroll around the historic city centre. There were a million things to draw but it was too freakin' cold hence the wobbly nature of these sketches.

Place François Rude-great name, lots of chimneys.

The town is famous for its half-timber buildings similar to the Tudor style architecture that I drew in Chester, England . The French call this style 'maison normande'.


Dotted around the town were ancient carvings of chouette or owls which the locals touch for good luck. With my fingers numb from the cold I touched the owl before heading back to the hotel to warm up. I'd love to return to Dijon in the summer & draw more of the architecture.


A grand total of 12 hours driving took me from the bottom of France to the top. I caught the ferry to the UK from Calais. Calais is not as nice as Dijon.

La Toscana

A couple weekends ago I made a whirlwind tour of Tuscany over 5 days. The weather was damp but mild enough to get a decent amount of al fresco sketching done. There were relatively few tourists in the cities & on the roads so it was easy to get around & visit museums.

First stop San Gimignano. I warmed up with a sketch of two of the (14) famous towers seen from the main street into the town.


I found a good vantage point at an outdoor café & sketched the main piazza with its much photographed cisterna.





On the way out I found a spot where I could sketch the town with all its towers. Then it was onto Siena (with a brief stop at the fortress of Monteriggioni)


The Piazza del Campo is the most well known spot in the city but rather difficult to squeeze into a sketchbook. In the sketch above I captured one quarter of the piazza where the palio horse-race is held every summer. A wide format Moleskine was perfect to draw the extreme proportions of the Torre del Mangia. I was eager to climb this sucker but it was closed due to the rain!



Here's the view from my hotel window. The stripy tower in the background is the Duomo.


Inside the Duomo I found the lavish Cappella della Madonna del Voto



Next day I had to hot-foot it back north to Florence. I've visited the city twice before but never drawn the Ponte Vecchio-now was my chance!



I wanted to get a drawing on the bridge too to capture the tourists gazing at the jewellry displays & posing for phtos. I sheltered amongst the stalls selling Pinocchio dolls & tried to keep the rain drops from hitting my page. Florentine policemen look very chic with their white leather handbags & pith helmets!



I only had one hour before the Uffizi museum closed. I dashed around it to find Leonardo's Adoration of the Magi, Botticelli's Birth of Venus & Carvaggio's Medusa shield. However the last day I had a whole morning to take in the Accademia where I wanted to sketch Michelangelo's original David.

It's really well displayed at the end of a 'corridor' of Michelangelo's unfinished slaves. The portly American tourists were a fine contrast to the perfect forms sculpted by Michelangelo!


The male & female forms above are a detail from Giambologna's 'Rape of the Sabines' which is said to be perfect from every angle.

After the Accademia I had to leave promptly accounting for time lost in Florence's labyrinthine one way system. Leonardo da Vinci himself couldn't figure out the urban planning of that place!

More of my Tuscany sketches can be seen at the Urban Sketchers blog.

Desperaux

In early summer 2006 The Tale of Desperaux was in pre-production in London's Soho. I had read the book & while not so taken by the plot I was fascinated by some of the characters individual stories-particularly Gregory the gaoler. I thought him & his dungeon environment very cinematic & wanted to be involved with the project in some capacity.

I contacted the production office & showed them this painting I had made of Gregory. Apparently there were no more positions in Story so they agreed to give me a try-out in the art dept. I thought I could contribute to character design but the style of the film was very realistic & my more flat style was inappropriate.

Nevertheless I did enjoy researching the Flemish masters & trying to incorporate some of their forms & style into my drawing.





The Production Design dept. was looking for layout artists to design this Brueghel-like world. I brain-stormed a bunch of sketches suggesting what common kitchen items might the mice have appropriated to build their town. However, realistic, correct-perspective drawings were sought but I really wanted to work on the characters -they were much more fun to draw!

In the end Production appreciated my efforts to help but there wasn't a position suitable for me (or vice versa). I went to France instead . . .

Happy New Year!

I'd like to kick off 2009 with the final few pages from my first Moleskine sketchbook. Over the holidays I reacquainted myself with British architecture.
Christmas shopping amongst the Tudor style buildings of Chester is always magical.

After two & a half years in France the churches of England & Wales look all the more unique to my eyes.

The cosy dining room of the Hotel du Vin & Brasserie, Bristol.