Sketch Crawl : Baltic Front Room

Baltic Front Room
(markers in A5 sketchbook)

My first Sketch Crawl (AKA SketchMeet) with the Urban Sketchers Tyne Wear and Tees in something like three years. It took me a while to find the main body of Sketchers because I wasn't aware of the Front Room. When I was last at the Baltic, that space was a restaurant. I think they made the change when they decided to provide a Warm Space for those unable to afford heat for their own homes. Anyway, a good day out, great to catch up with some old friends and put faces to some of the names encountered on the Facebook Group.

As usual, I found the architecture of the Tyne Quays too much for me and after wandering round the Baltic aimlessly, eventually just sat down and drew what was in front of me. Works every time although it's often necessary to ask people not to sit down across the table from you because they'll block the view.

Another Short Walk in the Ouseburn Valley

A beautiful day on the Tyne today, with wispy white clouds high above in the bright blue sky. At last a day out with the Urban Sketchers Tyne and Wear after months of Lockdown! Last year, as my Regular Reader may remember, I attempted to meet up with the other Urban Sketchers to get some drawing done in the Ouseburn Valley. As luck would have it, I didn't manage to meet any of them and got no drawing done.

This time was better. On arrival at The Cycle Hub, I found Richard on the cafe terrace, drawing Mark who was sitting in front of him apparently drawing the Blue Circle Cement factory across the river. 

After a bit of catching up, I figured I should make an effort to first of all find some of the others and maybe try to overcome what I recognised as the growing inertia that would probably stop me from even opening my sketch book. So, next stop: Allan, who'd already done a very nice drawing of some railings and was just started on another. After catching up with him, I felt guilty about stopping him from getting on with his new drawing, so I moved on up the burn, making a detour up some steps into a little area of commercial units. I was really taken with the colours and ridged metal walls of the units and I can see me making paintings of these fairly soon.

Coming out of the commercial unit area, I found I was on a grassy bank above the path that runs by the burn, and sitting on the grass, his back up against a convenient tree, was Andy, working away at a sketch of a boat on the water, with some of the run down buildings on the opposite bank. Cue : Catching Up.

And so, onwards upstream to my favourite musing bench, opposite the Ouseburn Farm with the wonderful Byker Viaducts in the background, where I sat for a short while listening to the ducks and the running water.

Were I in a properly-established sketching regime, I'd probably have just opened my sketchbook and started on this interesting subject, but it's a complicated thing and I wasn't ready for it. Up again then and I headed up to the area below some of the concrete supports of the Metro Viaduct. 

I knew there was a couple of stone slabs there that might provide a seat while I drew something simple like those concrete supports and when I rounded the corner, I spotted someone already sitting there who I thought at first might be one the sketchers I've not yet met. I smiled at him. He didn't smile back. It took me a moment or two to realise that the paper in his hand wasn't a sketchbook but possibly a bunch of betting slips and the bottle of Hobgoblin by his side, coupled with his continued stare, suggested that he might prefer to be left alone.

I turned away as if distracted by my phone beeping, then crossed the path to busy myself with a photo of some sheep grazing under the concrete supports I'd intended to draw. Kevin, who had indeed just made my phone beep, suddenly appeared round the bend in the path and it was time to wander back downstream.

What was left of the day? Only the chance to lean over the railings and photograph a swan sleeping on its not very elaborate nest on the muddy banks of the Ouseburn, and a brief goodbye to those still sketching at The Cycle Hub.

 Kevin and I tried to get a pint on the Quayside, but the pubs were either heaving with thirsty Geordies or set up for table bookings, so no luck there. 

Nonetheless, I great way to spend a few hours away from home and hey! rediscover the art of talking to people after this traumatic year.

 

Sketch Crawl - Bowes Railway Museum

Bowes Railway Museum

(0.8 marker over two pages of A5 sketchbook)

Allan picked me up at 12.30 yesterday and we drove in unaccountable sunshine (can this be Summer at last?) to the car park of Bowes Railway Museum, just at the edge of Gateshead. I'd been wondering if we might be a small party of sketchers this time, as response from our regulars had been lukewarm or absent when the venue was proposed. ("Oh, railways!" said the ladies.) But my fears were groundless - in the end we numbered eleven, with many a new face.

Pessimism is always rewarded, of course, and we found that the Museum site closed an hour earlier than we'd thought and even worse, the cafe closed an hour sooner than that. Recognising that there'd be no time for a coffee break or a bit of the usual show & tell at the end, we decided to just get on with it, after an initial tour of the buildings.

Straight away I could see there was a huge amount of things to draw,  especially inside the workshops, so after a short walk I picked on the first view that caught my eye that also benefitted from being out of the light wind. I toyed with using my A4 sketchbook but decided that I'm really no longer comfortable with standing holding that size and weight for any considerable time, so took out the A5. And that proved to work well for me, especially utilising a two page spread to take in a couple of coal wagons and one of the long sheds. OK, the railway lines are wobbly, but that's an effect of standing holding the book and doesn't honestly bother me to any extent.

I realised there was only about an hour left of the session, so after checking out the inside of one of the sheds where Bob was drawing a forge of some sort, I decided to stay out in the sunshine and see if it was worth drawing wagon No.939 (see the drawing above) again, but from further inside the yard.

What clinched it for me was finding that Mark was now painting the same wagon and presented me with an opportunity to capture a relatively stationary figure. 

Bowes Railway Museum

- Mark paints his wagon.

(0.8 marker in A5 sketchbook)

Mark deserves an apology for the sagginess of his arse and the shortness of his legs in this sketch, but as I say, we were running out of time. I'm happy to confirm that in fact he's a reasonably well-proportioned human being; corrections might have been made if only he hadn't finished his sketch and moved away.

With no time for a proper winding up of proceedings, we had a bit of a natter and Allan took this group photo. After that, well ... we dispersed.

Urban Sketchers Tyne and Wear

26th May 2018

(Photo: Allan White)

Next time: Provisional date 23rd June. Venue to be decided.