Amsterdam Inspiration - 3

Pen and Ink drawing of the facades of Amsterdam.  I loved the architecture of the Amsterdam buildings along the canals.  The row houses were deliberately built narrow and deep in order to reduce the tax burden.  Real estate taxes are levied based on the amount of canal space occupied by the building.

Just for kicks, I added an iconic metal streetlight into the mix.  Can you spot it?

Amsterdam Inspiration - 2

A quick ink drawing of the Amsterdam scenery. 

Amsterdam Inspiration

I spent a lot of time in Amsterdam this year and was inspired by the canals and the narrow buildings.  I have started a series of sketches and paintings based on my pictures from Amsterdam.  Here is one of the first from the installment.

This is a quick study of the architecture in ink, watercolor pencil and wash.

Venice study

Here are a few sketches of scenes from Venice from our trip to Europe this summer.

Rialto bridge in charcoal.  Reference was a photograph I took from one of the piers.

A quick study of one of the Venice canals with a multi-colored pencil.  I found this interesting pencil which contains a multi-colored lead.  It is one pencil with a lead with multiple pigments in it.  Unfortunately, it contains a lot of red and hence the reddish hue to the sketch.

Europe Inspiration

We visited France and Italy this summer and I was inspired by all the renaissance art and architecture.  I started making a few drawings/paintings/sculptures based on this inspiration.  Here are a few of the quick studies from the trip.

I started this sketch of St. Peter's Basilica in Rome on the train ride from Florence to Venice.  The reference was a photograph.

This is a pencil study. I will be posting more from our trip shortly.

Sculpture study

One of my bucket list items is to sit in a famous art museum in Paris and study one of the masterpieces.  But, whenever I visited the museums, I was either not prepared or did not have the time to sit down.

This month, I got to visit Paris on work and had a chance to visit Musee d'Orsay.  I saw many art students copying pieces of art (copying a painting or sketching a sculpture) and that inspired me to give it a shot.  I had some time all for myself so I could sit down and study one of the art pieces.  Unfortunately, yet again, I was unprepared.  All I had was a clutch pencil from my hotel and a few sheets of printer paper.  Nothing to scream about, when it comes to sketching.  But, I wanted to give it a shot and knock off one of my bucket list items.

I picked the 'Woman bitten by a snake' by Auguste Clesinger.  It is a marble statue of a woman writhing in pain from a snake bite.  I liked the sculpture because of the tension and torsion in the statue caused by the twisted pose.  And, there was a ledge right across the statue in the museum.  Perfect for sitting on and studying the work.

Below is a picture of the actual statue in Orsay, and a few pics of me sketching it and the final result.  Overall, it took me about 30-45 mins to complete the study.  Enough time to rest my feet before checking out more art!