Isabel Carmona

Delighted to be part of USk- London, I've just realised that I should have introduced myself as part of the "meet the correspondent" series. So here it goes a bit about myself, my work and where I draw and paint...
I am Spanish but have lived in the UK for a long time, having come to study architecture in the early 90s.  I've sketched all through my student and professional life, with colour and watercolour specifically as my main medium - colour is very important to me and it is likely to be the first thing I do in a sketch - although not always.


Sketching/painting and drawing is for me the best way to remember where I've been on my trips and the memories of place and time will always rush back when I see an old sketch - one of my first experiences of drawing on location was a inter railing trip in 91 with a friend. I remember little of the trip except for the places I drew, that is the power of paying that little more attention to things when one sits down to sketch.

More recently, I have taken art more seriously and take part on my local Open Studios Scheme - in Newbury (West Berkshire) where I exhibit locally every year and have taught watercolour classes locally.
As a Spaniard, I joined the Urban Sketchers network in Spain first and attended the Barcelona symposium as a translator.  In 2014, I organised the Urban Sketchers workshop in Oxford with other urban sketchers and was pleased to coordinate the 44th sketchcrawl with the London team.
I leave you here a couple of my view of London done in 2014 - a couple on the Portobello Road sketchcrawl and one from the Thames North Bank looking towards London Bridge and the Shard.

Portobello Road by the Castle pub

Portobello Road at Charlie's cafe

South Bank view from North bank of Thames - Southwark and Shard

My work can be seen in various places:
website - www.isacarmona-art.com
personal blog, mainly about urban sketching - www.isacarmona-sketches.blogspot.com
flickr - issi carmona 

Isabel Carmona

Meet the correspondents: Nathan Brenville

I first came to London as a student in 2001, and I fell in love with the city immediately. Although I grew up in the North West of England, I think of London as my home. Apart from a brief sojourn in Baker St, NW1, I've lived the best part of ten years in South East London, in various places between Camberwell and Lewisham (as the drunken crow flies), and consequently the places that are dearest to me are mostly scattered around the South East.

It wasn't until around two years ago that it occurred to me to draw any of these places however, but once I discovered location drawing, I couldn't stop. The excitement of capturing places - their architecture, their atmosphere, the colours, the shadows, the people flowing in and out, having on paper your own emotional response to being somewhere at a certain point in time, when that happened there was no going back. The camera and I didn't speak for quite some time, I was pretty angry that it had kept me dependent on it for so long.

The first few sketchbooks I kept of location drawing were mostly all of trips abroad, I found it a wonderful way of engaging with your environment intensely, to soak up as much as you can before having to leave it behind.

But after nearly ten years of living, working and commuting in London I was looking to reconnect with my home environment too, and I decided the best way would be to go back to all of my favourite places around the city and begin to sketch them. I soon discovered there were far more than I'd realised, and sitting there, really looking at places I thought I knew well opened my eyes to much more. I began to investigate the history of the locations, to find connections between sites, to discover just how intertwined all of London is, in its personalities, its fashions, its parks and streets.

The Horniman Museum, Forest Hill

Even better, with living here, I was in no rush to finish my sketches but had the luxury of coming back, of finishing drawings at a later date or drawing it again in a different season, weather, or time of day. I'm three quarters of the way through my London sketchbook (or more accurately, 'My London' sketchbook), slowed down mostly by being back at university, but I feel more excited than ever to be living here; it's fuelled my desire to draw and it's helped me rediscover the city afresh. On top of that, and perhaps best of all, through drawing London I discovered there are other people out there drawing London, or England, Europe, Asia, America, all over the world, one drawing at a time - being part of the Urban Sketchers community continually provides invaluable inspiration and encouragement, so contributing to this blog is really exciting for me.

I will share some of the drawings of my favourite places and their stories, but also other sketchbooks of the new places I find or familiar, unassuming spots that suddenly leap out at me and demand to be drawn. The more you draw, the more you find to draw.

Dulwich Park in summer

I like to sketch the places that don't normally get a lot of attention, the places people pass by without giving a second glance. I usually prefer the everyday London to the tourist London, and delight in drawing (literally) out the hidden histories of ordinary looking buildings, trees and spaces.

You can find a lot of my location drawings on Flickr.

I also have a blog in which I post more general artwork, from comics to animations and various other pieces, at www.tinmouse.com.

I'm currently studying for an MA in Animation at Central Saint Martins.

I'm looking forward to meeting all the other London artists out there on our future sketchcrawls.

Meet the correspondents: Nathan Brenville

Meet the correspondents: Zhenia Vasiliev

For me, both a graphic designer and illustrator, drawing is rather a process of thinking rather producing a finished piece. I love to think about how things look like, and drawing helps me with this, so sketching is a big part of my profession.

Regrettably, my full-time work schedule does not allow me to do full-scale sketching sessions too often, so most of the time I do a sketch on the go, whenever I am - so any place around London will suit me as a sketcher. I love working on along Regents canal, sketching birds, trees and people in the parks, or make a quick street scene from a cafe window, especially when it's cold outside.

I love trying all of the art materials and exploring how different materials work together in a sketch. When I go out of the house, I just grab something that lies on my work table - a bunch of colour pencils, a waterbrush, a watercolour box or just a ballpoint pen. All the materials are worth exploring and give a new dimension to my work.

Visit my blog and check out my flickr.

Marble Arch, waterbrush, india ink

Traffic jam, colour pencils, from an upper deck of a double decker bus.

Upper street sketch, North London, watercolour

Meet the correspondents: Zhenia Vasiliev

Meet the correspondents: Barry Jackson (Professor Shorthair)

I love drawing, and making pictures. I've been drawing for more years than I can count, but it's only in the last few years that I feel like I'm making some slow progress. Towards what? I'm not sure. Perhaps my goal is just not to be too bad.

Much of the time my interest is focussed on urban themes, and I draw on location in an urban space. A few years ago I found the Urban Sketchers blog, and this provided an opportunity to share some of these works with an audience that has a similar set of interests. It's been a real stimulus for me, to see such a variety of urban drawing from all over the world.

Drawing at Alexandra Palace

Sometimes I draw when I'm traveling. Unlike many Urban Sketcher members though, I find that travel and drawing don't complement each other well. The kind of drawings I like to do work best when I can spend time on them, without wondering what I might be missing around the next corner.

Drawing places that mean something to me is what I most enjoy, and much of my work therefore is focussed on London, where I was born and brought up. Hence I was delighted to be invited to be a correspondent for the new London-based blog.

St Anne's Limehouse, charcoal,  50x60cm

I often sketch, in a sketchbook, wherever I happen to be - which means cafe and pub sketches fill a lot of pages in my books! But if I'm out specifically to draw then I'll have a particular location or theme in mind

I don't have any  favourite places in London that I repeatedly draw, although I do find myself returning beside the river or around the Regent's Canal  quite frequently.  I also don't have any favourite subjects or themes - these continue to change and evolve - sometimes it's spaces, or the movement of people, or solitary trees, or water, or as in this drawing, particular buildings. (This is St Anne's church in Limehouse)



 

St Paul's from Surrey side, graphite 29x84cm

If I'm going out to draw I'll be carrying a whole range of kit with me, because I like to play with media and techniques. The drawings will usually be bigger than sketchbook size, occasionally ending up very large. (The St Paul's drawing on the right is made up of 4 sketchbook pages)


Occasionally I have periods of trying to use colour, but on the whole I find it difficult to make satisfactory drawings when I'm using colour. At the moment I love using ink, particulary Quink, and carbon pencil, as in this drawing below of a spectacualr weeping ash tree in Rosemary Gardens, Islington

Weeping ash, ink + carbon pencil, 30x40cm

Meet the correspondents: Barry Jackson (Professor Shorthair)

Meet the correspondents: Adebanji Alade

My hands start shaking, I can't keep them still, my eyes have seen a face, an interesting face. One that I cannot afford to miss. I'm on the train, it's packed full of commuters, everyone is staring at me! But I must sketch! It's an addiction, it's a compulsive habit. Something I have developed by wild practice over the years. London Public transport has every face in this world to enliven a sketchbook and once I turn to a plain page in my sketchbook the possibilities are endless. I may catch a beautiful lady putting on make up, I may grab a city workaholic stealing a nap on the 30 minute journey on the Southeastern trains to Canon Street or the faces all around me just to keep my hands busy. This is everything about me when it comes to sketching. My artillery consists of a Bic ball point pen, an A6 Daler Rowney Sketchbook and a number 75 Tom Bow wash pen(light grey).



Me and my son sketching on the tube

Other things fascinate me while I walk on the street- the homeless people carry the greatest weight. They are the real Londoners, they've seen life! They know the city and can tell you everything you need to know. I can't resist recording these people in my sketchbooks, sometimes they are sitting and begging, some have a good job of selling the Big Issue Magazine, some are just asleep on the road side waiting for the wake up call of a Policeman who doesn't like their positioning.....all these wrap up my desire and Inspiration behind sketching!




My Public Transport Sketches

Then comes my love for architecture, I would have been an architect if not an artist. But my God directed me where He wanted me to be after asking Him for guidance way back in 1990 when I first met Christ. Yes, architecture, the play of light on architecture is amazing, I simply love it and I love to include trees and people into my architectural scenes just to have a good contrast of the organic and inorganic.




Architecture-Oil and Pencil

I love using pure graphite, coloured pencils and the wonderful oil base pencil for these and an A4 Moleskine sketchbook.

I also do oil sketches in location too.

This wraps it up for me! I'll be sharing my sketches of London and Londoners with you! I hope you'll enjoy and subscribe to USK London!




Homeless Scenarios


Lest I forget
My website
My main blog about my art and passion for sketching
My blog where I convert the sketches to paintings
also
I'm currently a provisional member of The Royal Institute of Oil Painters
and a member of The Chelsea Art Society

Meet the correspondents: Adebanji Alade

Meet the correspondents: James Hobbs

James Hobbs, Great Eastern Street, Hoxton, London

London is, of course, many different things to different people, as this blog will no doubt prove. Each of us has our own view and our own islands within the huge whole that we know particularly well. For me, this means Stoke Newington—where I live, which is an ancient inner north London village with a history of dissension that has become perhaps a little more gentrified than I would prefer—along with Hackney, Hoxton, Islington, the South Bank, the City and West End. I’m not so at home in most areas with postcodes with a “W” in them (apart from NW11) or, I must now confess, most places south of the river (apart from The Oval cricket ground). I still draw in these places when I get a chance.

To have a bicycle and a sketchbook is, for me, the way to be. My drawings are often A6-sized or perhaps A5, and made with permanent marker pens. I’m quite happy to work on the back of an envelope. Taking quiet, off-piste cycle routes can lead to unexpected pleasures, usually unfrequented by tourists and yet gloriously cosmopolitan and multicultural, which is how I like my London to be. London can be ugly and violent, but it’s usually not, and I love to live here and have my children grow up here. Drawing it is a kind of hymn of praise to the city, warts and all.

James Hobbs, New Oxford Street, London

I show at Skylark Galleries, an artist-run gallery in the Oxo Tower Wharf on the South Bank, and the Art Agency, Esher. I was for a while the editor of Artists & Illustrators magazine, and am now a freelance journalist. Five of my images of London scenes have just gone on sale as A5-sized art cards at IKEA stores worldwide.

You can see more of my work at www.james-hobbs.co.uk, visit my blog or follow me on Twitter.

Meet the correspondents: James Hobbs

Meet the correspondents: Katherine Tyrrell

I've been sketching on a regular basis for about twenty years. I now carry a sketchbook all the time and use pen and ink and coloured pencils to record my sketches of different places in London.

Six years ago I started to post my sketches on my blogs, then in October 2008 I became a member of Urban Sketchers. I'm now very proud to now be a founder member of Urban Sketchers London.

Burlington House, Royal Academy of Arts
pen and sepia ink and coloured pencils, 11" x 16 in Moleskine sketchbook
all rights reserved Katherine Tyrrell

The best bit about sketching for me is the way it helps to remember a place so much better than any photo I could ever take.

I also sketch because it helps me to 'see' pictures everywhere I go. It also gives me a better record of colours than photos and helps me draw fast - which means I get to sketch more and more!

I love the challenge of creating composite sketches out of the people who come and go in galleries and cafés.

Fish! supper in Borough Market
pen and ink in Moleskine Sketchbook
all rights reserved Katherine Tyrrell

What I sketch

I'm primarily attracted to finding the green places in an urban environment....

Syon Vista, Kew Gardens - from the Palm House
coloured pencils, 11" x 16" in Moleskine sketchbook
all rights reserved Katherine Tyrrell

....and the views and heritage associated with the River Thames — like the view of London and the Thames from Greenwich Park in my photo - and the views of the Thames at Bankside outside Tate Modern below.

The Thames at Bankside
coloured pencils, 8" x 10" in Moleskine sketchbook
all rights reserved Katherine Tyrrell

The spine of my London sketch trail is the River Thames. My sketchbook blog - Travels with a Sketchbook - has a record of recent sketches of London in four groups:

1. the River Thames from Richmond and Kew Gardens in the west, through central London to Greenwich in the east
2. Parks, gardens and green spaces in London
3. Interiors in Central London - mainly art museums and galleries and places to eat and drink
4. Interesting buildings and architecture in London

I also enjoy sharing information about the places seen in my sketches and the practical aspects about good places to go to sketch on my blog. I'm using it to create a virtual sketch trail about different areas I've visited.

Where you can see more of my sketches

You can see more of my sketches in:

• My sketchbook blog: Travels with a Sketchbook (featured in and recommended by "The Times" newspaper 25.2.11)
• My online sketchbook on my website

I also love botanical art - and you can see one of my drawings at the 2012 Annual Exhibition of the Society of Botanical Artists - at Westminster Central Hall next month - 20-29th April 2012.

You can also read more about the art galleries and museums and the exhibitions I visit (and sketch) in my main art blog: Making A Mark - which is #3 in the top 25 art blogs in the UK

Meet the correspondents: Katherine Tyrrell