Adamson House, as viewed from the opposite side of Malibu Lagoon.
across the lagoon
Tag: urban sketching
fisherperson
I joined the Urban Sketchers in Redondo Beach this morning, and while most of them were painting the historic library building in Veterans Park, I wandered down to Redondo Landing to sketch the fisherpeople.
topanga banjo fiddle contest
The thing I love best about the Topanga Banjo Fiddle Contest & Folk Festival is not the contest itself, or the professional acts, but the many folk and bluegrass jam sessions under the oak trees.
Despite the event’s name, it’s not held in Topanga, but rather at Paramount Ranch, famed Western movie set turned National Park, which suffered terrible losses in the 2018 Woolsey Fire. Nearly the entire Western Town burned down; only the church and railway depot were saved. Then COVID came along, putting a stop to the festival for the duration.
But now it’s back! It was good to return to the Ranch yesterday, and hear the music once again. I wandered from jam to jam, sketching the artists and audience while tapping my toes. Good times.
santa monica view
overcast
Behind me, a flock of Elegant Terns kept rising, wheeling and calling before settling down again. A Great Blue Heron swallowed an enormous fish after slapping it about for a while. We each did our thing, and I came home sated and peaceful. I never regret visiting this place.
la parrilla (“the grill”)
This restaurant facade is actually a garish combo of red, orange and yellow, but I thought I’d save you from getting a headache, and just serve it up in gritty city shades of grey. Every time I have to go into the deeps of Los Angeles I come home so very grateful that I don’t live there.
I never promised you a rose garden
The Exposition Park Rose Garden is a historic 7-acre site containing more than 20,000 rose bushes and more than 200 varieties. My favourite parts of it are the corners, where no roses are growing. This is the south-west corner, tucked between the Natural History Museum and the space shuttle’s external fuel tank.
at starbucks
I was attracted to the colourful vessels on the shelves, and found myself a seat facing them, at the end of a long table. It’s only now that I’ve scanned and cropped the image that I see how skewiff (one of my Mum’s favourite words) those shelves are! It’s quite comical, really. That upper shelf is ready to take off into orbit!
in the garden
In Liz Steel’s Sketchbook Design class, she shows how, even if you don’t particularly like your first sketch, you can rescue the spread by adding another one, and/or other design elements. I’m not going to win any awards with this spread, but it’s somewhat improved from where it was an hour earlier.
coyote
I sketched this coyote a few weeks ago from a different angle. There are eight mosaic sculptures in Malibu’s Legacy Park by the artist Robin Indar. Maybe I’ll eventually get around to sketching them all.
