Drawing in the cemetery

It's been very hot and sunny recently here in England, as I'm sure you've noticed, and I'm afraid I've neglected my blog slightly as I've been very, very busy with other important work. Outdoors lounging around and catching some rays. (sun rays, not stingrays.)

I have also been out to Arnos Vale cemetery to do some location drawing. (www.arnosvale.org.uk) It's a huge Victorian cemetery in Bristol, and it's fascinating. Its like a wilderness in the middle of the city. Huge parts of it are vastly overgrown and neglected, and many of the graves are sprouting huge trees and shrubs. It is terraced on the side of a hill, and from a distance looks like a forest. Back in its Victorian heyday there were only a few oak and yew trees, but the rest have self seeded after decades of neglect. When I first visited the cemetery some years back it was completely derelict and the two chapels were declared 'dangerous buildings.' This is the drawing I made:

                              

I also thought I'd show you another drawing from this sketchbook. The drawing below is from this book, which is an A5 Moleskine sketchbook. The houses are in Swanange, and I wanted to draw a particular house, and as I was a long way from Swanage, I cheated and used Google street view. The reason I wanted to draw this house is that I have admired it every time I have walked past it, and would really like to buy it. It's not on the market, unfortunately, so this might pose a slight problem. (And I haven't saved up enough pennies yet) So I thought I might draw it instead. The one next door is quite nice too. Hmmmm...

I drew this drawing in Biro, and used a purple fine liner around the edge. I didn't want to paint the sky, but I wanted a small amount of colour, so that's why I chose the purple fine liner. I wanted to highlight the house, but not too harshly. The purple works well as it's washable, so I smudged it with water. I also added a small amount of water to the page first, then drew over it in the purple. This gave a darker, fuzzy line, almost like drawing on blotting paper.

      

More from this book later....