Artists can have greater access to reality; they can see patterns and details and connections that other people, distracted by the blur of life, might miss. Just sharing that truth can be a very powerful thing.
— Jay-Z
Everybody knows about Richmond’s impressive street art and rightfully so. You can find 150+ larger-than-life murals throughout RVA on the side of restaurants, factories, turn-of-the-century homes and public gathering spots, all canvases for creativity and self-expression.
Street art is not the only game in town, however. There is another relatively new, but little-known art form that is gaining traction in Richmond — urban sketching.
An urban sketch is a drawing created on location, indoors or out, capturing what the sketcher sees from direct observation, not from memory and not from photos. Urban sketchers use any kind of media to tell the story of their surroundings, the places they live and where they travel. They capture the world as it lives and breathes in the pages of their sketchbooks.
This type of sketching tends to focus on architecture or street scenes but also includes drawing people in cafes or on their daily commute and anything in between. As long as the sketch is done from life and outside of a studio setting, that can be considered urban sketching. You capture a moment, recording your unique artistic impression.
Sketching is not about creating a perfect piece of art, it’s about documenting an experience. Sketchers record the life and energy of a city and often work quickly to capture the essence of the scene before it changes. They were there, they know what happened, they know how it felt and that’s what comes across in their art. The drawings produced as a result are often done in a loose, expressive style — a quick reminder of an event, a holiday, a trip out.
The Urban Sketching movement started in 2007 on image sharing site Flickr by a journalist and illustrator in Seattle. It is now an expanding, global organization with 350 chapters in more than 70 countries.
One of those chapters is here in Richmond. RVA Urban Sketchers started in March 2019. The group’s purpose is to “connect people who would like to get together in and around Richmond to draw on location with other like-minded folks.”
Mary Larson started the Richmond group. Five years ago, she became aware of and curious about various forms of sketchbook art, including urban sketching, so she started looking around to find a local sketching group. She was surprised she couldn’t find one, especially given VCU’s nationally-recognized art program and the many museums and galleries in town.
She heard about an urban sketching workshop in 2019 at the Baltimore Washington Pen Show, and decided to drive up and check it out. It was a great introduction to the practice. She came home fired up to start a group in Richmond, which she did the very next day. They had their first event within two weeks.
Today, the group has between 30 and 40 active members, some are skilled artists, some are newer to the practice. It’s growing every year.
The group usually meets weekly on Wednesday mornings at 10 a.m. They also try for at least one weekend event every month for folks who cannot attend the weekday meetups. The get-togethers are free and open to anyone.
At the events, members gather briefly at the beginning, disperse to various spots around the location to sketch, then reconvene within an hour or two to share their work. A group photo of the sketches — and sometimes the sketchers — is usually posted online in their Facebook group HERE.
The meetups are an opportunity to get out, socialize and most importantly, practice sketching. There is no judgment, Larson says. “I like the opportunity and excuse to get out and make art. Sometimes it’s hard to find time to do that. Setting aside a dedicated time helps prioritize and keep that practice alive, and helps the sketcher continually improve. As with any artistic effort, the keyword is practice,” Larson says.
Regina Tune joined the group when it started, attending meetups twice a week at the VMFA.
Growing up in New York City, she spent a lot of time on subways, buses and trains so she began drawing the people around her.
Now that she’s retired, she enjoys having a scheduled weekly time to practice, something that she previously didn’t make time for. She has worked hard on improving her ability to work quickly and efficiently to capture a rapidly changing scene. She enjoys getting together with others who are focused on their own practice and seeing the variety of sketches they produce.
“Urban sketching is so wonderful because your ability to be present in a moment, pay attention to what is around you, and convey that information is not that dependent on your ‘artistic’ ability,” Tune says. “Learning to draw a car, a chair, a dog, a person, just takes interest and practice. My sketches are truly just another page I can turn and start anew. They are not precious except for the time I was present.”
Another member of RVA Urban Sketchers, Monica Lewis, has a background in art, studying it and art history in college and currently teaches art at a local high school in Henrico. She went to the group’s early gatherings at the VMFA and loved how it reignited her own drawing practice. She found meeting with the sketchers was more fun than plugging away on her own projects.
Even with an art world background, Lewis enjoys working in a sketchbook and posting online. “For me, it is about the fun of discovery. When I draw, I like being out in the world and noticing things and creating a drawing. The process is very relaxing and I enjoy what I call the “flow state” when working. It is one of my favorite things about urban sketching.”
While creating a finished work of art involves a more refined process, sketches are typically quick drawings that capture the basic forms, shapes and compositions of a subject.
“Painting can be solitary and stressful as we expect a finished product that we are proud to frame and display,” Tune says. “When I do urban sketching, I am just immersed in a moment and only focused on reproducing what I see around me. I have no expectations and therefore, I’m rarely disappointed.”
There are global guidelines that every urban sketcher knows and follows — the “Manifesto” — to define the practice:
- We draw on location, indoors or out, capturing what we see from direct observation.
- Our drawings tell the story of our surroundings, the places we live and where we travel.
- Our drawings are a record of time and place.
- We are truthful to the scenes we witness.
- We use any kind of media and cherish our individual styles.
- We support each other and draw together.
- We share our drawings online.
- We show the world, one drawing at a time.
Lewis expands on a few of those tenets. She adds that a drawing must have a caption and illustrate something, whether it is “quiet morning in coffee shop” or “protesters outside police building” and it’s necessary to document specificity, not sketch a general landscape. Draw verbs, not nouns — an activity, not an object. She says that it’s important to be accurate, don’t add things that aren’t there and don’t leave out anything like utility poles or trash cans in an effort to “clean up” the scene.
The urban sketching movement sees itself as an antidote to today’s high-tech, fast-paced society. A photograph is taken quickly and often forgotten while sketching is a mindful, restorative activity that compels you to pay attention and immerse yourself in the moment.
“Sketching forces you to slow down and really see what’s in front of you,” group founder Larson says. “It makes you notice little things you may have never seen otherwise. It engraves that scene on your mind, much more than a photograph might. You’ll never forget a place you’ve sketched. It’s a great practice to help remember amazing places you’ve been when traveling.”
Inspiration for urban sketchers is everywhere and in all situations of everyday life. The artists draw the cities where they live and visit from the windows of their homes, from a cafe, at a park, standing by a street corner, and always on location.
“We are lucky in RVA to have so many great places like the VMFA, Monument Avenue, and views of our skyline from parks,” Lewis says.
Tune loves the local Richmond neighborhoods such as the Fan, Cary Street, Shockoe Bottom, Church Hill, Maymont and all the other lovely parks the city has.
A sketcher needs just the basics to start: a sketchbook, pens, pencil, markers, colored pencils, watercolors, ink or whatever medium they prefer. A natural curiosity about the world and developing a power of observation and interpretation of a scene helps as well.
The beauty of the practice is that it does not require any skills, other than perhaps being able to stay still long enough to do a sketch, Tune says. You only need an interest at whatever level you want to participate.The sketch is a page in a journal or sketch pad. It is a practice, not a product. All our members will tell you how much they have improved, no matter where they started, she adds.
The art teacher Lewis offers advice to newcomers. Learn a little bit of perspective and figure drawing (from classes or books and online tutorials) to help you feel more confident. Pick simple scenes that do not involve complex perspective. Once you fill a sketchbook, you will feel great looking back through it and remembering each drawing session, she says.
Tune encourages prospects to attend the group’s weekly meetup to get a better feel for what urban sketching is. “We are not a class, we do not typically sketch the same ‘thing’ at the same time in the exact same location. We are just sharing what we did and recording it for our Facebook page, a fun way to track where we’ve been. We are a supportive group, willing to share our knowledge with those who are starting out in their practice.”
