Peterborough #BenchViews 11-15

The leaves are starting to fall and there’s a few places I feel I must sketch before the flowers go over and the trees are bare.

I noticed more leaves falling on the Autumn equinox, a day I did three sketches. One on my way into work, one at lunchtime and one on my home.

I’m beginning to notice more about what shops and others show from their windows.. There’s a shoe shop who’s stacking of shoe boxes in their upper windows strangely brought pleasure to my eye satisfying my love of order.

Since our office moved I’ve not spent so much time near the market, a place I always used to have my lunch. Remembering the benches I went at the weekend and hadn’t realised how much it’s changed and is becoming a food court hub. The towering flower stands add a lovely touch of brightness to what was a bit of a dull corner.

By now I’m starting to notice how much I see and hear. How we all seem to forget others near us when we sit on benches and have personal conversations. Bench view No 15 was done from two places as I felt a need to move away from those talking near me.  I felt just overhearing their conversation was a bit intrusive of me and I found myself listening so much that I struggled to focus on my sketch.

There’s something else that happened while I created this sketch.. I decided it was a pink day.. as you do, such is the whim of the artist!

You might, or not, be interested to know I’ve worked out how many different bench views I could do from my walk into and from work and where I go for lunch and shopping in town.. Around 100 so we may be here awhile.. five bench views at a time.. Tell me when you’ve had enough..

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Peterborough Bench views 6 -10

Work-life choices, I’ve not had as much time to sketch as I’d like. Isn’t that always the way. I have been out and about a bit and now have done 12 views from Peterborough benches. Here’s the next five.

There’s different reactions to what I do depending on all sorts of things.  How much I want to engage with others, where I sit, what time of the day and which days.

I’m learning a lot more about myself, others and the town. I thought I’d learn about painting which I must be, but not consciously.

Not surprisingly, when I sat in the middle of town at the weekend when there was an Italian festival happening all around me, people were more interested in what I was up to than when I sketch at lunchtime. At the weekend festival, many sat or stood quietly near me for a long time watching how I worked.  Most commented very positively on what I was creating before they moved on. I work very fast and that seems to fascinate people.

Mothers brought their children to watch me paint. ‘See how she’s working quick to capture the people before they move away’ it was fun listening to how others see what I do. People veered from their route to pause a while and watch over my shoulder to see what I was doing. People who also paint stopped and talked to me of their work. I was most concerned by those who said there’s no art in primary schools anymore and since I can’t quite believe that, I will look into it.

Please let me know what you think.

View from Peterborough Benches 1-5

I sketch outdoors. Wherever I am and whatever I see, I’m always itching to sketch these days.

Like most, I’m not brilliant at taking proper breaks during the day and noticed I was only sketching at weekends or on holidays.  I had words with myself ‘Take your spare art materials into work, take them out at lunchtimes and see what happens.’  This is the result of the first five and now seems to be the beginning of a Peterborough Bench project. 

The results are pretty rough but I’m amazed at how differently I already feel about the place and what I’ve noticed.  I had no idea how many benches were close to where I work or why. There are about fifteen outside the magistrates court for example and these first five were all done on some of those. We’re talking over 60 benches within easy walking distance for lunch.. This might take me a while.

Next week I’m hoping to move to one of the gardens before the flowers and bedding plants get removed so there should be more colour in them.  I’m hoping to continue and do them all and have a few other projects, that have stemmed from this one, in mind.

I have noticed that there are less flowers and no hanging baskets where I’ve been sitting.  The hangers are there just as they are the other side of the road but as I move across further into town I should get more hanging baskets to draw.

Given that by the time I’d drawn view from bench No.5 I’d been sitting there each day for a week for an hour  I shouldn’t have been surprised when someone came up and said ‘so you’re the artist.’ Then proceeded to see if what I’d drawn looked like what was in front of me.  They thought there was a likeness thankfully!

All of the people are composites as they change in front of me often and each is my interpretation of what I see.

I hope you enjoy them as much as I have enjoyed my daily art routine.

Happily sketching, Lynne