meldrum artMy name is David Meldrum. I am an Artist who loves watercolour.
Yes, my Hero Calligraphy pen arrived today from China. I’m really looking forward to trying it out later, I will post the results, the prospect of using a bent-nib will be a wonderful creative challenge. Hopefully not too challenging!
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| Solvalla Betting Kiosk |
I found time to do two sketches today, one with detail and the other without. The sketch to the left I did during my lunch break. I work at the Solvalla horse trotting track just north of Stockholm and so this is why I picked a betting kiosk as my subject. I find it to be one of the more attractive buildings in the area.
The Sketch below I did on the way home from work, the sun was shining and Medborgplatsen (town square) was full of people. I needed to get home to my family for dinner so I used less detail.
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| Summertime in Medborgplatsen |
No pencil was used for this watercolour sketch, time was short so I drew it with ink and at speed in a standing position. The lines are shaky and scratchy which I quite like, I find that the faster I sketch the better the result, I learned this with my life drawing, a two minute sketch being more free and alive than a 15 minute sketch. No time to think and using ones instinct isn’t a bad thing sometimes.
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| Solvalla Stables, Stockholm. |
I forgot about these watercolour sketches I did while on holidays in Brittany last month. There is something about boats that I am drawn too, I grew up by the sea and have sailed since the age of ten so it is not so strange I guess.
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| Trawler watercolour sketch |
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| Green Trawler watercolour sketch |
Believe it or not there is a Trojan horse outside my office. I work at Solvalla, Sweden’s biggest horse trotting stadium. I used my new Moleskin Watercolour Sketchbook for this lunch time sketch (I listened to the advice of Luis from my previous post!).
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| Luis sketches in Stockholm. |
I met Nina Johansson and Luis Simöes from Urban Sketchers last weekend, It was a very inspirational meeting. We sat outside a café on Nybrogatan and chatting but mostly sketched. I’m new to this Urban Sketching thing so it was a bit difficult just drawing whatever was in front of you. In the end I wanted to draw the shop opposite but Luis was in the way so I drew him too, it was fun! Luis told me to use better paper, which I took onboard. I also learned that composition is so important when Sketching, a quick drawing will never look good if it is squeezed into the confines of a page, not given enough white space to breath in other words.
Luis Simöes is currently on a World Sketching Tour, check out his blog and see where he has been sketching and where he plans to visit.
Like I mentioned before, I was not well last week which meant I felt sorry for myself, which meant that I bought a few toys to cheer myself up, which in turn means they are starting to arrive now! 🙂
Today I received my Koi Watercolour set which holds 24 colours. Do I really need this? No, of course not! Will it make me a better artist? No, but I’m totally willing to pretend. 🙂
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| This Koi Watercolour set contains 24 colours, a tray, sponges and a Waterbrush. |
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| Sketch by David Meldrum |
Sitting on my balcony, having fun with some bright colours and my 0.70 Faber-Castell…
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| A Hero calagraphy pen. Photo: Cathy Johnson |
After reading Cathy Johnson’s article from the Artist’s Journal about illustrating with a Hero Calligraphy pen I was literally hooked.
I have been looking for a fountain pen that would encourage me to draw in a loose style. My continual personal fight is to try and forget my graphic training from my years in advertising. I aspire to a free expressive line, not easy to find when you have reached or maybe even passed middle-age. By the way, does anyone know what the official mid-life years are? When do they start and when do they end?
So after reading Cathy’s article which was published on the Artist’s Journal Workshop website I immediately followed her advice and visited eBay and started hunting for some Hero pens. I found two which I ordered from China, one for 6 dollars and the other for 12, not so expensive and I hope to have a lot of fun with them. The seller of the Hero 86 Calligraphy pen had a very impressive page on eBay, he even had a number of pictures of himself going about his export business with the help of his moped, cute, I wish him the best of luck with his business. I have been buying a lot of art related things recently; I should probably stop ordering and start drawing instead – but shopping is so much easier than scratching that first uncertain line on a clean, white page!
If you would like to see the work of an excellent pen & ink sketcher who uses a Hero pen, visit Don Low’s blog, I discovered him on urbansketchers.com
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| Hero 86 Calligraphy Pen (12 dollars) |
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| Hero 86 Calligraphy Pen exporter! |