My urban sketching group met at the Minneapolis Central Library recently. Although it was a fairly new amazing modern-looking building, a couple friends “in the know” zipped with me up the glass elevator to the fourth floor. On the right side was this enormous archway, an entrance to the James Hosmer Special Collections (rare books and such). Unfortunately, it was closed, but we sat down at computer tables to sketch the arch. This arch is historic, and was from the original library, part of a fire place, made of mahogany. It was immense, detailed, and very beautiful. I didn’t measure particularly well, so it’s a little crooked, but who cares! I sketched in pen, then put in watercolor. The wood was very ornately carved and I just suggested most of it, I would have been there three days if I tried to sketch every detail. The right side of my page was blank, so I decided to sketch a sleeping man in a blue jacket. I had noticed him while walking around the library. He was a nice addition to my sketch! Below are the variety of the three sketches we all did, you can see how we approached the same archway very differently. I love what they did with their sketches!
