Premise Entertainment Drawing Night

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About every month Premise Entertainment hosts a drawing night at Creative Cay, (5959 Anno Avenue Pine Castle Fl). The cost for a two hour sketch session is $10. The poses were fairly short which offered me a chance to do a whole series of sketches instead of the one  sketch I usually do each night at events. The model was Megan Crawford who is a talented local dancer, aerialist, acrobat, body paint model and artist model. I see her at events all over town and have drawn her multiple times.

She was running a bit late because of traffic. When she got to the studio, she was rushing to get on her ballet outfit. On the side lines she started the delicate process of lacing on her ballet slippers. This is the kind of moment I always hope to sketch when drawing on location. Dominic Carola the President and Creative Director of Premise runs the sketch sessions and I shouted out to him, “Do you think we could sketch while she laces up?” He agreed and we were all off an running. I stood so as not to relax and settle into old habits while drawing.

It was a fun night of sketching. My goal was to loosen up working digitally. Instead of creating multiple layers, I simply painted right on top of line work on the sketch. When sketching on location there really isn’t time to switch back and forth between layers. At some point I usually end up painting or sketching on the wrong layer. This meant that some line work was destroyed. Destruction as it turns out is very much a part of creation.

 Dom plays music during the sketch session which adds to the story of the scene. The song I most remember from this session was “Don’t You Want Me” by the Human League which was about a female performer who was lifted from obscurity by some guy who is shocked that she is moving on to a better life without him.

Artist Kyle Gentry brought in a “Making Of Klaus” book and Dom was flipping through while sitting on the model stand during a break. Apparently there are very few of these books and they are sold out. Klaus was produced for Netflix and there was speculation that might be the only reason that this film did not win an Academy Award. The film uses traditional hand drawn animation combined with some simple but very effective ways to paint the characters so that they look volumetric and solid. The backgrounds resemble the work of Disney artist Eyvind Earle. I recently heart that a film is in the works inspired by the drawing style of Ronald Searle, who is my favorite cartoonist and illustrator. My hope is that this is a sign that traditional hand drawn animation may be experiencing a resurgence.

Notre Dame Burns

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2 of 5 Prints SOLD

In 2012 I visited Paris and had the opportunity to spend several hours sketching Notre Dame Cathedral from the banks of the Seine. I was following in the footsteps of Ronald Searle who creating an amazing series of sketches of the city in the 1950s. I tracked down the same locations he sketched and sketched the scenes myself. The styles of the cars had changed but otherwise history had stood still. With his sketch in hand I walked the banks of the river until I found the same view.

It was a quiet sunny day with locals and tourists checking their phones and shooting photos. I was humbled by the buildings immensity. I felt I was in the true heart of the city. I was in the exact same place one of my favorite artists had created about 50 years before. Construction on the cathedral was begun in 1160 and largely completed by 1260, though it was modified frequently in the following centuries. In 1858 some of the statues were damaged by Huguenots who considered them idolatrous. In 1793 after the French Revolution many of the art treasures were destroyed or plundered. 28 statues of biblical  kings were beheaded being mistaken for French kings.The cathedral became battered and ruined from neglect but Victor Hugo‘s novel The Hunchback of Notre Dame written in 1831,  brought a new interest to the structure. During the liberation of Paris in 1944 the building experienced some damage due to stray bullets. In 2016 there was a failed cathedral bombing attempt, and in 2017 four people were arrested on charged that they planned to travel to Paris and attack the cathedral.

None of these damages over the centuries compared to the horrible fire that engulfed the building starting about 6:50pm on April 15, 2019. It is believed it was caused by construction workers who were renovating the building. The fire possibly began in the bell tower. The fire caused the collapse of the spire and the roof. A small statue of a rooster on the top of the spire contained relics including a tiny piece of the crown of thorns which was acquired in 1239.

There is a water reservoir, covered with a lead roof, that is located between the two
towers, behind the colonnade and the gallery and in front of the nave. It was designed to quickly extinguish a fire.  Many of the statues, including statues of the twelve apostles, were removed just last week to allow for construction, so that is some good news. A bucket brigade of people also passes relics to safety as the roof burned. Firefighters have saved the cathedral from total destruction. There are no confirmed deaths. The fire is being treated as an accident.

As news of the fire blazed into my studio via social media, I immediately started to alter the sketch I had created in 2012. I painted the fire and smoke darkened the scene. Seeing the cathedral towers on the western facade engulfed in smoke of course brought back memories of September 11 when the twin towers collapsed in New York City. Thankfully the firefighters saved the twin towers on Notre Dames Western facade. The interior was blackened yet a golden cross remained suspended above the damage. The full extent of the damage is being assessed.  The phoenix must now rise from the ashes.

Church of Saint Paul – Saint Louis

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Terry was using a Foders map to navigate various walking routes through the city. The map of Paris never seemed to show the name of the street we were on. I was almost bowled over by a baby carriage and an elderly lady as I searched for my bearings. We were walking on Rue Saint Antoine when we happened across this church which I recognized from Ronald Searle‘s sketch from 60 plus years before. I pulled his Paris Sketchbook out of my art supply bag and I searched for the exact spot he had sketched from. It was exciting when every line and angle matched up. In his day this was a working class neighborhood with vendors pushcarts and shops. Today the neighborhood has been gentrified with upper class fashion and jewelry shops along with some smaller bodegas.

As I sketched, an elderly man in ragged clothes and a boy stood in front of me speaking in French. I didn’t understand a word, so I shrugged my shoulders and kept sketching.  They persisted and the man pointed at the pens clipped in my bag. I decided to give him one of the dried up pens and satisfied, they walked away. If I knew some French I could have asked them to pose. Like everyone else, they seemed in a hurry. It was threatening to rain and there was a light drizzle, but not enough to stop me. Victor Hugo had his first child christened in this church. Everywhere we went, we seemed to be walking in Victor Hugo’s footsteps.

Daumier Studio

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Ile Saint Louis, a small island in the Seine River, is the geographic and historical heart of Paris. To help in my exploration of Paris, I consulted a Paris Sketchbook, illustrated by Ronald Searle and written by his wife Kaye Webb. My Paris map had a series of stickers marking the spots where Searle had sketched. This quiet Parisian street, Ouai d’Anjou was my first stop. The green door, number 9, was once the entry to the home and studio of one of my favorite artists, Honore Daumier. A small plaque next to the entry commemorated the spot. His loose spontaneous sketches of politicians and Parisian life are stunning, satirical and still relevant today.  At the Musee d’Orsay, I had seen some wonderful sculptures Daumier did of politicians busts.  They were exaggerated and lively. Of all the art I saw in Paris, I believe those busts were my favorite. I sat very close to where Ronald must have sat when he did his sketch. He didn’t sketch any cars which made his sketch rather timeless so I also ignored the automotive clutter. Ronald had added architectural details like extra chimneys to his sketch and I began to understand what he found appealing and lively in the scene. Over 60 years had passed, but I was learning from a master.

School children hurried home along the cobbled walkway. An elderly man was out for his afternoon stroll. While the rest of Paris rushed and hurried, this little island seemed serine, except for the tourists looking for Notre Dame. Life ebbed and flowed along with the river current, much as it had hundreds of years ago.  Terry had wandered off to explore the rest of the island and to walk among all the shops. She got a little lost trying to find her way back to this spot. I was so lost in the sketch and the moment that I didn’t notice the time fly by. We went to a bustling cafe and then continued to explore.