Sketching with Miriam

The Bean - Sketching with Miriam in Millennium Park

We have hosted our first visiting Urban Sketcher! Miriam Ben from Munich Germany was in Chicago on a business trip and wrote to me about sketching together. I was delighted! To me half of the fun of Urban Sketching is meeting other sketchers.

I put a call out on USK Chicago FB. Miriam had some air travel delays (air travel grrrr!) and finally arrived a day late. The four of us - Barbara, LuEllen, Martha and myself - met Miriam at the Palmer House and took her to sketch to Millennium Park, to The Bean. Officially it is Cloud Gate sculpture, but I don't know any Chicagoan who uses this.

Miriam, it was wonderful meeting you! You must come back, we'll sketch some more!

Here we are sketching.

Alex, Miriam, LuEllen, Martha and Barbara

And here there are suddenly more of us!

USK Next Generation: Giola, Lucia, Robin and Pablo

A group of kids got very interested in what we were doing. Pablo discovered us first, but wanted to keep this discovery to himself. He kept sending the rest of the kids back their parents. But Giola, Lucia and Robin would not be deterred and milled around. Then they wanted to draw with us. Sheets of paper and pencils were produced and shared, and we were in business! Then Lucia wanted to paint! Then the others wanted to paint! No problem! Paint we all did.

Miriam was fast and made a delightful sketch of the young artists.

Our sketches

Tourists photographed us several times as a local curiosity: "Look, Mike! Chicago artists! Quick, take my photo with them!"

Hello Out There!

Barbara Weeks here-
I've been sketching and drawing ever since I can remember (Thank you Dad!). Being part of the Urban Sketchers' network is a great experience for me. I find inspiration in the work of my fellow sketchers as well as motivation to sketch more. Drawing regularly on location helps me see the marvelous daily beauty that exists all around us whether it's in a chaotic city panorama or the little detail in a single leaf.

Thumbing through old sketchbooks, trying to decide on my first image to post here, I came across this sketch done quite a while back. It's of a pocket park just south of the main entrance to the Art Institute of Chicago on Michigan Avenue. It seemed a good example of "showing the world one drawing at a time",  showing those little gems that sometimes I hardly even see until I sit down to draw.

And this is me. I chose it because I sketch so often while waiting…

I hope you'll join Urban Sketchers Chicago often in discovering our world!

And we are off!

Urban Sketchers Chicago blog is started! I can't begin to explain what it means to me, how important this is, how long it took to get to this point, how much self-doubt, how many sketches done alone, how many people helped, how many hopes and dreams... The tale would be too long anyway.

Urban Sketchers Chicago is here, we are on the map, in real life and online. We are off to do great things, draw great drawings, and show our world - one drawing at a time.

And in this spirit, here's my little part of Chicago. This is where I live, in one of these buildings in the background, and this beach - the Hollywood beach - is my backyard.

And to continue to introduce myself: I am an artist and an Urban Sketcher. With the help of numerous people I started Urban Sketchers Chicago group in April 2012 - one of the best things I've ever done. My thanks and never ending appreciation goes to Gabi Campanario, Marina Grechanik, LuEllen Joy Giera, Kate Johnson and most of all to our own USk Chicago Correspondent Barbara Weeks whose generous help and remarkable talent got us to this place today.

Here's a self portrait I did for The Sketchbook Project 2011 and shamelessly use since then.

Welcome!

Urban Sketchers is an international group of sketchers dedicated to drawing on location and showing you the world one sketch at a time! Gabi Campanario created the international Urban Sketchers blog and inspired us all to get out and draw! We thank him for his help and blessing in starting Urban Sketchers - Chicago blog. 

Check back here soon and meet the Chicago correspondents and see our corner of the world one drawing at a time!