Thursday, November 17, 2005

Sketchcrawl 5.0 ALCATRAZ!!!



Took me a few days to get around to posting this. I was hoping to post photos as well, but I just haven't had the time to upload them from my camera.

It was another gorgeous day in the Bay area, these Sketchcrawls have managed to have some great weather. I had never been to Alcatraz before and I think I should have gone earlier so that I could focus on drawing this time out. I was caught up in the overwhelming amount of information and massive amounts of things to draw thus, not much drawing was done. Not many people use the word "thus" any more. If I had more pull, I might try to bring it back. Um any ways, as I was saying, hopefully I will be a little more prolific next time...


I liked the shape in this, but I wish I had "pulled the camera back" to see more of the building.


I would have liked to do caricature portraits of all of the famous inmates, but I think people were getting tired of me standing in the way while I drew this. The wonders of digital technology allowed me to take the drawing outside, and slap some washes on it using the pic I took with my digital camera as reference. My teachers in school always told me to draw from life, I wonder what they would say knowing that this is done from a picture of a picture?

8 comments:

2depaus said...

The Bird Man of Alcatraz portrait is awesome, specially because of the stylization you brought to his face. I miss doing "on the spot" sketching...

Cedricstudio said...

Wow, great sketches--especially the face! I tried to visit Alcatraz once but couldn't get in, so I'm jealous.

Jon McNally said...

Sounds like you had a great time, John.

Hey, "drawing from life" in the strict sense is great when it happens, but the person in the photo was once alive, too, wasn't he?

Mark my words, "thus" will live again!

Unknown said...

great sketches!

Guy P. Ciurezu said...

you know you are a great artist, don't you? well YOU ARE! i'm sure as gravity acceleration is 9,8m/s2. KEPP GOIN'!

Unknown said...

These are great sketches!!

monkeyfeather said...

Ven - Until I moved out to the bay area, I wasn't doing much on the spot sketching myself. I'm glad I have gotten back into it because it was always one of my favorite things to do back in my college days.

Cedric - Alcatraz is tricky, you have to get tickets to the ferry at least a week in advance. Kind of ironic since all people used to want is to get away from it, now people are ordering tickets a week in advance to get in.

Jon - Thanks for helping "thus" live on, knew I could count on you.

Thanks Bobby.

You're too kind Guy. I think I have a ways to go before I'm a great artist, but nice of you to say.

Thanks for continuing to check the blog out Alina.

Gerald de Dios said...

Your sketches look great. The "Bird Man" seems to be the crowd favorite...but I really like your environments. I can't believe you added that fence?! But you got it.

Your comment to Cedric was just hilarious (tourist wanting to get to the island).

Until the next sketchcrawl!
Good luck with the bear design, I'm digg'in it already.