Beale Street

I can't make the March meeting, and I hate to miss painting the riverfront with everyone, but I've been doing a little downtown painting lately. I hit Beale Street one recent, gorgeous afternoon, and it was great fun to sit at an outside table, drink a Diet Coke, chat with the tourists, watch the flippers, and paint. I forget how much fun it is to play tourist in your own town sometimes, so I'm grateful that a commission request took me down there. I'd like to go back soon and do some more painting. The signs are especially fun.

March Sketch Group at the Riverfront

Next sketch group

Saturday, March 3

Riverfront - Confederate Park, corner of Court and Front Street

10:00 AM

We'll meet in Confederate Park and walk around some for more great views!

Please comment here or on our Facebook page if you plan to attend.

Hope to see you there!

Downtown Stables

My neighbor and fellow urban sketcher Stuart Lacey has been suggesting we go draw at the stable that houses the carriage horses just north of downtown. I finally got it together to join her yesterday, and it was fabulous. Fortunately, we showed up just as the owner dropped in, and he very hospitably gave us the run of the place and told us to come back when more was going on and bring a group. It would be a great group outing sometime.

Stuart watched the farrier shoeing a younger horse, but I was drawn to the whole line of stalls and settled down almost immediately to do the above watercolor.

It was getting noticeably colder by the time I finished, so I didn't start another one. Instead I did several quick pencil sketches waiting for Stuart to get done, and then we headed home for a little warmth. I definitely want to go back and paint more, though. What a fun afternoon.

Sketching at the Peabody

We had a great February gathering of the Memphis Urban Sketchers. It was a rainy day, so we were grateful that an indoor location was already planned. Because of the recent newspaper profile of the group, we had a huge number of first timers, and everyone enjoyed connecting with other artists, comparing our traveling art kits, and talking about our work habits and hopes for our art.

We had about 21 people overall, and it was a far more rewarding session than the last one I facilitated (where exactly two people showed up in 99 degree temperatures at Overton Park). Lots of people lingered for a good while to talk even after we'd compared our sketches and wound down on the actual drawing.