At 10 Am Orlando Sketch Crawlers headed to Panera Bread for breakfast and a chance to share sketchbooks and talk. Megan, an artist I had sketched before, showed up with her mom and was taking photos of the event. Our group filled up these three front tables and people talked art while others sketched. I was sitting on the long leather bench shown in this sketch, but after eating, I decided it made more sense to get up and sketch our group. Ricardo the photographer for the Sentinel sat behind me the whole time I sketched watching every line and wash as I put it down. Usually I get distracted with such attention but I had to get this sketch done, so I lived with it. Kristen or Kelp as she refers to herself online, can be seen sketching the photographer and myself. She has the art of clandestine sketching down because I never actually noticed her glancing at me directly. I am sure this is a skill I have as well.
As I was sketching, artists slowly got up and headed out for the next leg of the crawl. There were artists sitting in the two empty chairs when I started the sketch. By the time I was splashing on the final washes everyone was gone. The photographer said he had more that enough shots and we said our goodbyes. When he left, a woman who was seated in a leather chair behind me, introduced herself. Her name is Dina Mack and I knew of her work through a friend named Summer who had told me of an artist journal workshop that Dina was going to organize. Dina and I spoke for close to an hour about art and journal keeping. Sketching on location isn’t something Dina does often, but she said she liked having the time to fully soak in the environment. We joked about how Panera’s is such a sterile place with harsh glass cases and coffee dispensers that look like space station refueling depots. A cafe in Europe would have a much different feel. The smells of the pastries is pleasant however and I kind of wanted to sketch them and the cashier but we had to get to the next stop on the Crawl route…
