Coffee Break Sketching Challenge #21

Kelvingrove Duck

The Coffee Break Sketching Challenge - draw anything and everything whilst relaxing over a nice cup of coffee!

This wee duck was cruising around Kelvingrove Park, in Glasgow, Scotland. He was head down, bottom up shaking his wee tail feather, and generally having a fantastic time.

I took a few photographs of him...but let me tell you, he's been a hard wee character to draw

And the starting and stopping of the sketch, meant my coffee was dragging out to the very last wee freezing cold sip, before i put the stylus down.

I think it's important though, to put the slightly less successful sketches up too, and remind ourselves that the Coffee Break Sketching Challenge aim is not to end with a completely 'finished' and 100% accurate piece. But rather to evoke the action of the piece, the immediacy of getting an image down on paper.

One of the hardest things for an artist to do is to let a piece go. There's always something we feel we could add to it.

In the film 'Mr Turner' we see all the artists in the Royal Academy putting their final touches to their works, whilst their paintings were actually hanging on the walls!

Have a look at this painting here by William Parrott, depicting Joseph Mallord Turner in the act of significantly altering his piece on 'Varnishing Day'.

So, remember - sketch to have fun! Enjoy your mistakes, because it's in our mistakes, that we actually learn and improve!

See ye tomorra, 

​Davy