India 2024: Fishing Boats and Markets

Fish markets might be smelly and messy but they’re also one of the most fun places to catch a lot of action. These three sketches are from three completely different fish-related locations.

In Mumbai, I spent part of my day off sketching with workshop participants at Sasson docks and breakfasted on egg-kheema-pao after that. I know I’m having a fabulous time when I happily spend my time off drawing with the group, and I was thrilled that they wanted to get up super early on their rest day to sketch at the wholesale fish market.

This next sketch is of small fishing boats in Kochi and was part of an exercise where we integrated people-sketches with an interesting composition of boat shapes. That stand-with-hands-clasped-behind-back is such a classic Indian man pose, I love capturing it everywhere. In the background are the famous Chinese fishing nets you see around Kochi.

And this last sketch is from Goa where I spent the evening with Urban Sketchers Goa. I sketched it just before I did this quick sketch of the fishing boat unloading giant marlin. We ended the evening as all USk meets should end: with chai and bhajiya at a local joint.

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More posts in this series from India coming up soon. You can see earlier posts in the series here:
• The Study Hall of Dreams and Hopes
• Crawford Market
• Washing Linen, Fishing Marlin
• Small Spaces

Gateway to India is a 10-day workshop based in India that I run with my co-instructor, Zainab Tambawala. The next session is in late January 2025. Workshop details will be announced by March 2024. If you are interested in joining us, write to me at suhita@gmail.com and let me know!