Day Away Zurich

 

Banana Bundt Cake (aka Gugelhupf)

It's been a while that I had a brush in my hand. Or blogged here. I have overused my arms at both home, painting, and at work, typing and handling stacks and stacks of paper. So, I have been taking it easy during the past few weeks, and will need to continue to do so.
Yesterday was the first time I did a watercolor sketch again in a long time (it felt rather wobbly).

Here it is, with the corresponding recipe!

Forest

Every once in a while, I just like to get out there and sketch what is right in front of me while birds are chirping all over and the rain is still dripping off the leaves.

Sketching at the museum

Every first Saturday of the month (as we happily found out), the admission to the Museum zu Allerheiligen in SH is free. Perfect for a monthly sketchout in these icy cold temperatures!

At the Manora restaurant, waiting for the museum to open.

The ideal female form according to people from Oaxaca, Mexico, 1st cent. BC - 2nd cent. AD. 

Urn from Colombia, 10-15th cent. BC. 

We then proceeded to the next kebab & falafel take out for something warm.

Zürich Sketchcrawl 27th Sept 2014

Hazel

We had some gorgeous weather yesterday so I couldn't pass up the opportunity to sketch outside and get away from the drawing desk.
This is a hazel tree/shrub. There are hazelnuts in the project I am currently working on, so it was nice to sketch something related to it.

Flower Bath

My poor orchid and succulents were so dry I had to give them a very long bath.
Well, I sketched them for long enough while listening to/watching the first episode of Suits and then the bath ended up being three hours overall.
I will drain the water now and put everything back to where it belongs :-).

My S8 commute

Two sketches from my commute on the S8 train today. 

When the sun is not out, everything seems so grey...

Sverige 2014

Back from Sweden. I realize I find sketching people much more interesting than drawing buildings. Also, it was very cold - sitting outside drawing buildings is something I'd rather save up for summer. 

Last Sunday, I met some of the Stockholm sketchers for a quick sketch (about 45 min) at the central train station. Next time I will need to stay for the whole thing :-)

Fjärdhundragatan.

Thank you, Anna and Przemek for a lovely week of holidays! And IKEA, of course.

Caran d'Ache Supracolor II pencils

Pentel waterbrush

Noodler's Bulletproof Black ink / Lamy Safari

HB Graphite pencil

Klingner & Rohrer Antiktusche Astoriabraun / coop fountain pen

Staedler fine liner

mostly W&N watercolors

Large Moleskine Watercolor sketchbook

Oatmeal breakfast

I am on holiday!

That means I've got a looot of time in the morning to sketch my breakfast while waiting for it to cool down 😋 Oh I am enjoying this so much!!!

...and I was sketching in my triad sketchbook, too, with just three colors:

French Ultramarine, Alizarin Crimson, Aureolin Yellow.

ZRH to AMS

I went to Holland last weekend to visit R's gran. We spent every hour with her we could before flying back again.
So here are just the airport and in-flight sketches:

That's it for now folks, I need to go now and do some homework and studying.

Cooling off in the Rhine

After a very long and very hot day R and I went to cool off at the Rhine today. It felt like the hottest day yet and the Rhine must have reached a steady temperature of 24°C by now.

I had a wonderful time sketching and hanging my feet into the water.

Niklausenplatz

I have just returned from the 4th International Urban Sketching Symposium, which was fantastic but did not quite go the way I would have liked it to. 

Early on, I just did not feel well, sleep well, and eventually I needed to stay in bed because of a fever. So, I might devote a blog post to the Symposium, but if I dont - that is the reason and I hope you understand. I attended the workshops I wanted to take (except two), and I am incredibly grateful in spite of all that didn't go according to plan. 

With all that new knowledge and understanding that I could gain over those three days, I ventured out  in my neighbourhood today to do a sketch and apply some of what I learned.

It was a lovely sunny evening and I thought I had picked a really nice spot to settle down for a while to sketch, but soon all sorts of bugs were crawling on my arms and legs, and there was no way I could avoid them.

Thankfully I was distracted enough by the "Words" episode from Radiolab, a podcast that James Gurney recently shared as one of the things he listens to during work. I have listened to a couple of episodes from that podcast, and it's highly informative and entertaining at the same time. "Words" was especially interesting from a linguistic point of view, which is what I studied at unversity. 

So there, go and listen to it! :-)

I used 3 Daniel Smith watercolor tube colors: Ultramarine Blue, Alizarin Crimson and Aureolin Yellow and a A4 Moleskine watercolor sketchbook.

In other news, I am starting a new job tomorrow, so it's bedtime for me now. Fingers crossed!

Munot tower

As I was leaving from Pilates, I had 10 minutes at the bus stop with a view of the Munot tower.

I whipped out the Mini-Moleskine and the 0.05 Pigma Micron I still had in my bag from last Saturday's sketchcrawl and completely messed up the perspective of the tower roof.

I must say it is quite unsatisfying when getting the image converted into a bloggable file of pretty data takes more time than than making the image itself.

I am just thankful that I can at least paint the sky from memory. ;-)

I need to reread Perspective for Artists again, it explained the perspective of turret roofs so well.

Black Cat

My family has a cat, and her name is Kitty but we call her "cat" (= Katze) most of the time.
Sometimes even "black cat" (= schwarze Katz).
However, she will also listen and come to you if you call her "Salami", "Spaghetti" or any other popular Italian food.

SH Sketchcrawl

The Sketchcrawl today was very cold and the actual time in town was spent on a quick sight-seeing, Chlausmärkt and eating pizza on the way. We sketched in the Museum zu Allerheiligen, which houses an archeology, nature and paleo-geology (?) department, local Schaffhausen history and a department of contemporary and older art. There was something for everyone, and if you were there to draw, you could spend a whole day. The building was formerly a convent which is very picturesque in the summer months. So, I highly recommend it for a bright summer day sketchcrawl.

Der Sketchcrawl heute war sehr kalt und wir waren im Städtchen eigentlich nur zum schnellen Sight-seeing, Chlausmärkt und Pizza essen unterwegs. Skizziert wurde im Museum zu Allerheiligen, welches eine Archäologie-, Natur- und Paläo-Geologie-Abteilung, Schaffhauser Stadtgeschichte und eine Abteilung für zeitgenössische sowie ältere Kunst beherbergt. Für jeden war etwas dabei, und man kann eigentlich den ganzen Tag dort verbringen, wenn man zum Zeichnen da ist. Das Gebäude war vormals ein Kloster, welches in den Sommermonaten sehr malerisch ist. Für einen Sketchcrawl im Sommer also sehr zu empfehlen.

Christmas decoration

Windeggstieg

This is one of the gnarliest big old trees I have seen around here.

A bit more to the left the Rhine meanders through the valley, a couple of vineyards dot the flanks, the bridge connects the cantons of SH and ZH and just behind it, the Old Town of Schaffhausen.

Dieser Baum ist einer der knorrigsten alten grossen Bäume, die ich hier in der Gegend bisher gesehen habe. Ein bisschen mehr nach links schlängelt sich der Rhein durch das Tal, ein paar Weinstöcke säumen die Hänge, eine Brücke verbindet die Kantone SH und ZH und gleich dahinter, die Altstadt von Schaffhausen.

EDM #25 - Draw a glass

Everyday Matters: the book and the challenge list

AlltäglicheDinge/Jeder Tag Zählt: das Buch und die Herausforderung

I got hit by a full-blown cold on the weekend. Time to recuperate.

Wurde am Wochenende voll von einer Erkältung erwischt. Zeit zum Gesundwerden.

Löwengässchen

The Löwengässchen in Schaffhausen. I was halfway through this sketch when I realized I could not draw all those windows facing each other at such an extreme distorted perspective. Quite a shame actually, its such a nice alley leading up to some of the nicest facades in town.