Taking ProCreate Pocket for a ride
So I’ve discovered that the iPad app I use for my digital urban sketching and illustrations (ProCreate) also has a pocket version for iPhone! How could I resist!
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Same boat, different takes
I rarely sketch the same subject twice, let alone three times, over a short period of time. But that’s what happened recently when I drew the Arthur Foss, a historic tugboat moored on Seattle’s Lake Union. What does it mean…
A taste of California in the U-District
International burger chain CaliBurger opened its first Seattle location last fall. It’s on University Way Northeast, the popular U-District arterial better known as the Ave. My son and I were around the area a few Sundays ago and gave it…
Extremadura via iPad
I made these sketches just a couple of weeks ago while visiting family in Spain. They show the 900-year-old ruins of a castle in Montemolin, a tiny village in Extremadura where my parents were born and returned to after decades…
Live from the ballpark
In this day and age of high-tech, instant tweets and Facebook posts, does sharing sketches live matter? Last night, I typed this post from the stands at Safeco Field, where the Seattle Mariners were winning 7-1 against the Angels in…
Sketch of Pacific Northwest painter Henry Stinson
Henry Stinson is a well-known Pacific Northwest figurative painter based in Pullman, WA. Back in April I was teaching a sketching workshop there and I met him by chance at a coffee shop. Truth is, I didn’t know who he…
I see sinking ships
I first heard of a “sinking ship” building in reference to a Seattle parking garage built on a sloping street near the iconic Smith Tower. When you look at it straight on, the building resembles the bow of a ship…
A meta-sketching experience
How do you call a sketch of something that is already a drawing or a painting? A meta sketch? If so, I did some meta-sketching for my latest column.
The spirit of urban sketching
The way I see it, being an urban sketcher isn’t merely about drawing cities, big or small, urban or rural, with a pen or with your fingers on an digital tablet. It’s about drawing places that can be put on…
Goya: ‘I’m still learning’
Reading Goya’s biography by Robert Hughes, I came across this exceptional black chalk drawing by the Spanish painter. Goya made the drawing not long before he died in 1828 at age 82. That’s an unusual longevity for its time, which…
Interview with El País: Cómo mirar a través de un lápiz
Discovering this article and video in El País today was like unwrapping a Christmas gift that got lost under the tree. What a nice surprise to end the year! Ana Alfageme, a veteran journalist at the largest Spanish daily and…
Portland memories of sketching with Gérard Michel
I did the sketch you see above the last day of the Symposium. We were sketching right outside PNCA, the art school that hosted the event. Just a block up the street, a band played at a restaurant and we could hear…