Nia Dancing

While I'm not quite ready for any of the extreme activity I tried to portray in these sketches, I'm at least able to look at them again without wincing. Thank you for all the well wishes here and elsewhere, I appreciate them all so much and am recuperating steadily!

This was a Nia dancing 'jam' held at moyo restaurant at Zoo Lake on the first day of Spring last month. Barbara, Anni and I went along for some more action sketching. All and sundry were invited to join this stretching, energising class after the torpor of winter and we on the sidelines were tempted to discard our sketchbooks and join in, it looked so much fun. It was fun to sketch too, once we'd (well, I) got over stage fright - we were welcomed to come in, watch and sketch and the dancers seemed to appreciate us appreciating their agile creativity.

I've been asked again for tips on drawing moving figures so I've tried to analyse what I did here. It does differ with the amount and pace of movement - this was very fast in comparison to the Tango lesson of two posts ago, where the same actions were repeated over fairly slowly so I had more time to study the shapes of arms, legs, backs etc.

• Remember, none of these are definitive captures of a single pose or body position, as in a snapshot. They are the results of watching the movements of a group, scribbling down fleeting impressions of, for instance, outstretched arms, then watching some more and adding a torso, fitting it to what's been put down, looking again to catch a leg position - perhaps from your original subject, perhaps from somebody else who has moved into your field of vision - attaching as logically as possible to what's happening in the rest of the figure.

• Clothing, hair, head gear or scarves can help to create the impression of movement, flowing wavy lines or creases across a torso describing a sideways stretch or a swooping lunge.

• Try and relax into the movement of  your pen or brush - this may only happen deep into your sketching session - allow it to dance lightly around your page. I sometimes find myself 'conducting' the music in the air with my brush before lowering it to the page and constraining it into body shapes while keeping some of the swirling, twirling motion of my baton.

• Feel within your body the music, the rhythm, the big shapes of the dancer's bodies as well as the smaller ones of hands and feet - see this sketch with arms stretching upwards - by no means accurately drawn hands, but imitating the many fingers flickering together in the air. If you look at some of the individual limbs, hands and feet I've sketched, there are some weird shapes and renditions, but as a whole, give the impression of movement, stretches, lunges, etc.

• To analyse and store in your 'memory bank' some of the postures bodies can get into during sport or exercise, try pausing your TV during a programme like 'So You Think You Can Dance' (a favourite of mine!) and sketch what you see, you'll be surprised at the odd shapes limbs can get into in the middle of a pas de deux!

Does all of that make sense?... probably not, but I hope it helps somebody, somewhere, somewhat! Do let me know if so.

...Aaa..a..nd rest!!

Down Time

I'm out of action for a while after some unexpected surgery - not too serious but painful to sit at a computer (which is also giving me major uphill with scant internet connection) and scan or type.
I'm posting this from my fabulous little Galaxy SIII phone, the only thing that seems to cling on to any weak connection available...There is no shortage of things to do while horizontal with this, the Tab2 that came with it, my kindle plus real paper books, magazines and sudoku. Oh and Downton Abbey. Not much sketching going on but I have a backlog to catch up on once all systems are go again - I hope in a few days time. See you later!

Coffee and Dancing at the Mall

My friend Anni and I went to Rosebank Mall on our Women's Day, the 9th August (sheesh, I'm behind on posting!) We had coffee at the Mugg & Bean and started sketching the surrounding customers and waiters. We then wandered upstairs and from the balcony (under the optometrists sign in the above sketch) we sketched from the higher angle. The staff working below looked very suspiciously up at us until I showed them my sketch in progress, then it was smiles and thumbs up to go ahead. I messed this one up a bit using markers to colour it - should have used watercolour later as in the top sketch, or left it as a line drawing like the girl reading

 Nearby was a dance studio where a promotional make-up session was in progress. We were invited in and I started an unsuccessful sketch of ladies being transformed when a dance class began and I moved across the room to try and catch the - luckily quite slow - moves of the tango. The girl was teaching the guy, lots of concentration, they seemed to not notice me on the sidelines at all! I did only two of these sketches per page, but I put them together here as a sequence.

Delta Park

On Saturday only John and I turned up to sketch at Delta Park on a cold, overcast and windy day. I could understand why, but I do think we're a bit wimpy when I see sketchers out in midwinter, in places like Sweden and Canada! We had more of a plein air session than urban sketching, as John had his oil paints and I made myself slow down a bit, after a lot of rather frantic fast sketching lately. I wished I'd taken proper watercolour paper - I had only sketchbooks with me, one being a watercolour Moleskine which I used for this long format painting. I had planned to have lots of the yellows and blues I used evident but it ended up looking, once again...green and brown. In spite of the weather it was good to be out - I finished off with a little sketch of John painting in the bleak winter landscape (ignoring his complaints that I should choose another subject!).

Ackland Museum Show in North Carolina!

 The first group show of Urban Sketchers: Seeing the World, One Drawing at a Time opens at the Ackland Museum of Art, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill on Thursday August 16th. Thirty eight of the group's one hundred contributors have donated sketches, proceeds from the sales of which will go mainly to Urban Sketchers to support their educational programmes, with a small percentage to the Ackland Art Museum. These are two of the four sketches I sent in, with my thanks to Gabi Campanario and Urban Sketchers, for the wide world they've opened up to me! 

This is a street scene in Parkview (other sketches from there here). Along the pavement, vendors set up their wares and hope people visiting the shops and restaurants will stop and buy. The man was selling bulbs from his carrier bag, with a magazine opened on a page with pictures of clivia in bloom. I have bought bulbs from a similar salesman before, and something completely different came up from what he showed me, so you take your chances!

The woman selling baskets and pots sat patiently, aware that I was sketching her. When the sun started sinking she loaded up her goods to leave - she saw me pick up my pen to sketch her again, and said in words I couldn't really understand, but got the gist of, that she certainly wasn't going to hang around to be drawn again - and within minutes was flouncing off down the road, and gone.

Waiting, again

Here is a long series of sketches I did last Thursday while once again waiting for my son to book his Driver's test - after three years and for the fifth time (five goes at the learner's too). I won't go into the corruption and bribery that is rife in getting licences in this town - just saying - he qualified and deserved to get it a long time ago! We went to a new and apparently straight testing station, so once again, with feeling...

 I sketched quickly, thinking I may have half an hour or so - only applicants were allowed inside the building. After my pen ran out of ink and four hours later, he came out, booking in hand for Monday after next. Holding thumbs, crossing fingers and toes and ready to go into battle if it doesn't happen this time!

A Boy, a Butterfly and a Birthday

My Postcard From My Walk to Desiree arrived in California - hooray! Done on the visit to Shepstone Gardens of a couple of posts ago, it was stretching the concept of 'from my walk', as it was more of a gentle amble from spot to picturesque spot.
The butterfly, however, is one I see quite often while walking, and this one was sitting very peacefully on an arum lily in my garden after a walk, to be photographed and later painted. My sister-in-law in Cape Town, known in her area as The Butterfly Lady, tells me it is a Citrus Swallowtail, also known as a Christmas butterfly.
A Sketch in Time is now five years old, and once again I ask myself, "Quo Vadis?", but it will probably carry on bumbling along in its rather aimless manner, as I do. Thank you to all who visit here for bumbling along after us!