Monday, July 21, 2014

SketchCrawl #44 at Hillfox

For the 44th World Wide SketchCrawl I wracked my brains to think of a warm place for our Joburg Sketchers to go and crawl around. Though our winter skies are generally clear blue and cloudless, dry iciness creeps and whistles into every corner. After a small poll, we decided to go to the Hillfox Value Centre, a rather ugly and sprawling shopping complex, but which houses a huge Food Lover's Market and the B&B markets.
 After starting with coffee at the F.L.M. to warm up and to welcome a couple of newcomers, we moved over to the B&B which was looking a little empty and forlorn of crowds - cleverer people had stayed at home under a duvet or near a fireplace. At least we had good views of the stalls that we chose to sketch, without too many bodies blocking our way. A couple of our group were told they weren't allowed to sketch by officious officials, I suppose they had little else to do without customers to harass.

  I went for the more colourful options I could spot in the gloom - first the hookah stand and then onto Clive, with his incredible array of beaded creatures and plants. I only fitted about half of his wares into my sketch, and those (surely frozen) fingers just kept working away at more.

  This warehouse-like basement was no warmer than a Joburg back street in the shade so we headed back to F.L.M. for lunch, where once again I forgot to do the photos of sketchers and their morning's work, you can see them here on our Facebook page. After lunch some of us hung around the bakery section, a place that always calls to me, sketching the wares a better option than eating them, if only I'd remember that. I then crawled, shivering, back to my car which, having been standing for a few hours in the sun was deliciously warm so I did a quick last sketch - cars, shopper, car guard -  before heading home.


8 comments:

Sadami said...

Hi, Cathy, I love all your sketches. Keep up!! Best wishes, Sadami

Maree Clarkson said...

Lovely! Your sketches belie the very cold weather Cathy, actually looks warm and inviting!

Maree Clarkson said...

Lovely! Your sketches belie the very cold weather Cathy, actually looks warm and inviting!

Cathy Gatland said...

Thanks Sadami for your constant encouragement!
Hi Maree - great to hear from you :)

Unknown said...

I love these. Thanks for sharing.

http://hotoystersartjourney.blogspot.co.uk/

RH Carpenter said...

So glad you didn't get chased away from your subjects. Really like them all!! So strange to hear you talk about winter and cold while we're in our summer, complaining about the heat and humidity!

http://carolking.wordpress.com said...

What great sketches. I love seeing scenes of your city.

Unknown said...

Great results! Hope you have thoroughly warmed up now.