Contact: e-mail Isabel: isacarand@gmail.com for information and a registration form.We have organised six different locations for the 3 day workshop and you would be experiencing them all, from the quirky Oxford University Natural History and Pitt Rivers Museums to Radcliffe Square within the Bodleian Library complex, the Oxford Covered Market, scenes from Broad St by the Sheldonian Theatre and St Aldate’s streets and the views from Christ Church Meadow.
Join Urban Sketchers Isabel Carmona, Miguel Herranz and Swasky for 3 full days workshop that will get you to know Oxford intimately and to develop your personal urban sketching techniques.
The workshop will be hosted Museum of Oxford http://www.oxford.gov.uk/museumofoxford where we will start and end each day and we will put up a developing exhibition of our work created during each day in their gallery space. After the workshop, the exhibition will continue at the Museum until the end of July.
It will be fun but hard work, as you will be enjoying learning and experimenting all the time, trying out different ways of drawing, sketching and using colour without fear, sharing the work we do and discussing our findings intensely. There are no mistakes in urban sketching only lessons.
Each of the instructors will explore different themes of urban sketching.
Colour in the eye of the beholder (Isabel)
Isabel’s theme is Colour: we all see colour different, as colour is light reflected and perceived by us on the back of the eye and stimuli sent to our brains.
How many times have you argued about What colour is this?
Using watercolour as the main medium, we'll explore the idea of colour and contrast as the starting point of a sketch.
In this workshop we'll start with colour (in watercolour) to abstract what we see, using colour boldly and with strong contrast. Drawing can take place later either with more colour more linear marks or with pen if preferred.
colour shapes first - linear marks later
The process will help participants to think about a sketch from the general (capturing your vision of colour and the big picture in blocks) to the particular (adding detail and focus gradually). Key points are contrast, strong complementary colours, light and shade, colour marks.
Capturing the picture in big blocks of colour
As the main working tool is watercolour, we'll experiment with creating various marks using brushstroke and varying our marks from broad strokes of colour to fine lines…
We will talk about colour, perception, abstraction and individuality.
Don't worry if you have not used watercolour before, the basics will be covered. If you've used watercolour before, be prepared to use strong colours!
Exercise of building up layers of colour in watercolour
Thin line, bold sketch (Miguel)
Miguel’s theme is Line.
Following the line to see what it shows you over the paper, to wander between life and drawing, to see how your hand, your pen and your line give can give themselves another different life to the drawing.
We will experiment how to sketch spaces with no reference or erasable tools (no rulers, measures or pencils) in order to be able to put invisible reference points, add or divide dimensions, checking depths, heights and tilts on your paper just working with your eyes and mind. This will allow you to draw much slower but to finish the sketch much faster.
The second exercise will be spiral drawing, which do not mean drawing spirals, but taking a main favorite little focus point that takes our attention and to draw it on the center of the page. Then drawing everything around following a spiral movement to avoid losing the reference of the focus point but letting it grow to all the page surface in a some kind of “organic” way.
Drawing people from Lilliput to Gulliver’s (Swasky)
Drawing people is the most scary topic, even if we assume we know how to draw buildings. It is the most difficult for everybody, even for me. So let's go a bit further, we will work most of time in the middle of nowhere, there where nobody doesn't want to go. Unpleasant feelings will be our first sensations but after a little bit of theory we will see that it is not so difficult. The human body is just a question of how we see things. Exercises will focus in drawing crowded scenes or locations where people are gathered. Little by little we will increase difficulty, following a push and pull learning strategy.
6 or 10 seconds sketch. Starting up our approach to draw people.
While capturing people in motion is often a challenge, this workshop will begin with some indicators about how to let go of the fear of drawing people, how to identify the body language. We will also notice all the stories that are behind each place in relationship to the people.
From the body to the face. People on place and context.
We will work hard and on location, drawing as much as we can and trying to capture body language and face expressions.
Drawing commuters on the train. Face expression.
Learning goals
- Pushing participants out of their comfort zone, at their own level. From beginners starting to sketch to more confident participants, we aim to teach you something new and push you outside your boundaries, helping you experiment.
- Experiment with different techniques and ways of approaching a live sketch situation, helping you find your own self expression.
- Using and trying different approaches - line drawing with pens and pencils,watercolours and colour in different media, textures, light and shade, mark making tools
- Using more colour and texture and making you think about how do you represent what you see and to develop your own way of representing what you see in colour with confidence
- Losing the fear to draw people
- People, context and the story underneath.
Workshop Schedule
Tuesday 7 July
Welcome in the Museum of Oxford in our meeting space, in the evening at 4.30pm.
Wednesday 8 July
9.00am -9.30am Welcome at the Museum of Oxford
9.30am-12.30pm Isa, Miguel and Swasky workshops
12.30pm- 2.00pm Lunch
2.00pm - 4.00pm Isa, Miguel and Swasky workshops
4.00pm -5.30pm Review and exhibition pin up
Thursday 9 July
9.00am -9.30am Meeting at the Museum of Oxford
9.30am-12.30pm Isa, Miguel and Swasky workshops
12.30pm- 2.00pm Lunch
2.00pm - 4.00pm Isa, Miguel and Swasky workshops
4.00pm -5.30pm Review and exhibition pin up
Friday 10 July
9.00am -9.30am Meeting at the Museum of Oxford
9.30am-12.30pm Isa, Miguel and Swasky workshops
12.30pm- 2.00pm Lunch
2.00pm - 4.00pm Isa, Miguel and Swasky workshops
4.00pm -5.30pm Review and exhibition pin up
Works' exhibition Opening. Exhibition continues to end of July
Saturday 11 July
10.00pm -5.00pm Sketchcrawl in Oxford - USk London will join us
Participants30 attendees maximum, 18 minimum. Any level of drawing experience is welcome
http://www.visitoxfordandoxfordshire.comhttp://www.universityrooms.com/en/city/oxford/homehttp://www.airbnb.co.uk
A list will be provided for participants - generally bring what you normally draw with.This is what Isabel and Swasky work with:
Registration fee
£ 225 - (£180 concessions - 20% discount for students
or unwaged -with proof of concession status)
To book - e-mail Isabel: isacarand@gmail.com for a registration form.
Cancellation policy: All fees are fully refundable if cancelled prior to 22 June 2015. If cancelled after 22 June, a £25 cancellation fee will be retained. In the event of too few registrants, all monies will be refunded.
Workshop map
Oxford 2015 Worskshop map
About the instructors
Registration fee
£ 225 - (£180 concessions - 20% discount for students
or unwaged -with proof of concession status)
To book - e-mail Isabel: isacarand@gmail.com for a registration form.
Cancellation policy: All fees are fully refundable if cancelled prior to 22 June 2015. If cancelled after 22 June, a £25 cancellation fee will be retained. In the event of too few registrants, all monies will be refunded.
Workshop map
Oxford 2015 Worskshop map
About the instructors
Isabel is Spanish but studied in UK where she practices as an architect and artist. Her passion is watercolour, easy to carry around and sketch on the go and likes experimenting and mixing media to get interesting effects. Isabel started sketching in 1993 as part of her architecture training and continues to this day. She joined Urban Sketchers Spain in 2011 and USK London in 2014. As an artist she is part of West Berkshire and North Hampshire Open Studios scheme and joined the Oxford Printmakers Cooperative in 2013.
Miguel.
After a long career as advertising creative in Spain and Italy, Miguel becomes a freelance illustrator a few years ago. Working all day with digital media drove him back towards the live touch of the sketchbook that had finally grown to become his main medium of expression.
Swasky. Born and raised in Barcelona, Swasky has been drawing most of his lifetime, but when he finished his BFA he left drawing because he tried to start working. Then he decided to start again a degree in Audiovisual Communication. Once he fulfill his second degree he worked in an advertising production company, RCR, disappointed with a job so stressful and invidious he left his job and run a shop. With a new life he started drawing again.
