Seattle, Part 1 of 2

I was in Seattle over the weekend to teach two workshops. And what a weekend it was! Spectacular sunny days that made me suspect that all that Payne’s Grey weather Seattle is said to have is just a rumor Seattleites spread to keep the rest of us away! I started my Friday morning with some location scouting and warm-up sketching at my workshop location, Pike Place Market.

The Gum Wall was slightly gross, but fun to draw. It’s a long, dark alleyway with a lot of cat drawings and huge amounts of gum. I had to wait a long time before I saw someone stick a piece of gum up on the wall. Most people just come through and take photographs.

How could I not draw the famous Fish Stand? That’s the great thing about being in a new place: you can be unabashedly touristy.

And a few brush-pen drawings from around the market. This man selling balloons: I could swear he was in this very same spot when I visited almost 8 years ago. And the Pike Place Pig is never without a bunch of people posing for photos.

The quickest of sketches from an afternoon with Gabi Campanario after we got a quick little tour of the Steamer, the Virginia V.
.And a few photos from my workshop. I never remember to take any, so thank you Gail Wong for taking some and sending them my way. I am always amazed when people come out and enthusiastically draw in the super-crowded locations. I love that they just plop onto sidewalks anywhere and squeeze into little corners and even the shyest of them throws caution to the winds and sketches people up close.
Can you spot the sketcher sketching the musicians?

And a little bit of quiet as we review our sketches in the atrium, “under the squid”.

I’m leaving you with a quick brush pen sketch of that squid sculpture hanging in the atrium

And the demo piece I did in the market.

More from Seattle soon…