My Current Hood

Can't get enough of sketching this new place where I live. It's only 5 minutes away from my office and I love the fact that I can sketch bits of it before the sun sets for the day! This is the view from one of the wooden picnic tables under the big mango tree. It's the usual hang out of the ang mo cyclists. So I was happy to get this view for sketching since they weren't around then. It was almost dark when I started sketching this straight with pen and ink. And the only waterbrush on me had about 5 drops left :( So here is is slightly dry-brushy. 

First time trying out the Calligraphy Brown Ink on my trusty old Airmail Wality italic ground fountain pen.  Stillman and Birn Alpha. 

Lorong Chuan, Singapore

Urban Sketchers Symposium!

It was an amazing experience being one of the correspondents for the 6th International Urban Sketchers Symposium that happened in Singapore last 22-24 July 2015!

Here are the posts that I did in the four days... 

http://www.urbansketchers.org/2015/07/usksingapore2015-day-1.html

http://www.urbansketchers.org/2015/07/day-2-usk-singapore-2015-fun-continues.html

http://www.urbansketchers.org/2015/07/day-3-usksingapore2015-time-flies.html

http://www.urbansketchers.org/2015/07/usksingapore2015-its-wrap.html

Dharma Ashoka: How Graceful Can A War Be?

 

Yesterday I went to a rehearsal of Temple of Fine Arts Singapore's Dharma Ashoka dance drama. They were working on the war scene. It's amazing how movement can be so poetic and graceful even in the context of war. Must give it up for these dancers working out their routine and how their action/reaction and personal exploration of movement become the choreography.  

This production is happening on the 

27-29 August 2015 at 8PM, TRCC Theatre, Republic Polytechnic. 

If you haven't gotten your invites yet, you can get them at 

Temple of Fine Arts Singapore

6535 0509

20 Havelock Rd, 01-01 Central Square 059765

admin@tfasg.org

www.tfasg.org

GISTORIES: Anand and the Sitar

Gistories: Anand and The Sitar

I met a Sitar teacher at Temple of Fine Arts Singapore. His name is Anand, originally from Coimbatore in Tami Nadu, South of India. On his last day before moving back to India, I made a video of him and got to know him a little better. It has been a few years since but on days I remember him there's a slice of this day captured in a little movie that I can replay.

Hi and Bye For Now Virginia Hein

I totally missed Virginia Hein's workshop at the 6th International Urban Sketchers Symposium in Singapore . I was at another location covering the workshops there which was far from her location. Today she is flying home to Los Angeles. Some sketchers met up with her at lunch and went with her to Waterloo. Managed to join Francis Theo, Chris Ng and Parka with her for some drinks and ice kachang and headed over to the Chinese temple to sketch. 

Before going back to work I did a super quick sketch and got her to sign it.

Felt good to meet her and bask a bit in her sunshine  before she left. Safe travels, Virginia Hein and hope to learn more from you and see your sketches online via your blog. See you again someday :) 

My First Ever Sketchwalk

The day I met the Urban Sketchers in Singapore, I knew that I have found my tribe!  It was my new year's resolution for 2013 to do something I really love and but just never gotten around to allowing myself to go for it. It was the January 2013, the first for the year.

I came in at show and tell so it wasn't valid but I made connections and caught a whiff that there was a regional sketchwalk at Chao Praya in Bangkok. It was good enough to get Madam Tia Boon Sim's email address and I emailed her about my interest! Bam! So I went and that was my first sketchwalk!

I missed my flight and took the next flight out. No one could pick me up but Mr Asnee Tasna told me where to go and I dove right in to the temple of the Reclining Buddha and sketched my heart out.
I was hooked!

Back in Singapore, the wild sketchers here are so fired up there was always someone sketching and if the weather was bad, we virtually sketched together! The interest for sketching here was like a fever that you would never want to be cured of! Haha!

DRAWN TO LIFE

drawing is like a big big connection and connector to reality... almost like tracing life itself and our movements.. and lines do connect those dots and those days into one thread that puts it together into a weave to our future selves.

i love that feel of ink on the paper... some pens and pencils are like lipstick.. some are like figure skating on the paper. i love the act of harvesting these little moments and gestures before they completely slip away. it's like catching as much from a passing wind.. and everything is on the paper... all my waiting time has turned to great opportunities to observe and look at things intently even just for a brief moment of total connectedness to an act of seeing and feeling and sketching which i can truly call my own. they're like nuggets of my day.... and it's totally addictive and immersive. i am so happy that you have expressed it in such a way that i feel i am not alone and what a gift it truly is. you're a great inspiration, as the entire sketchbook skool is.

the biggest thing i love about drawing and drawing more is the fearlessness and zen of committing that line into a fresh page. that act of boldness gets better at each attempt without an eraser. i feel a lot braver. i also somehow relate to and cultivate less lines that can equally speak the truth.

HH SWAMI SHIVANANDA

His serenity reminds me of soft pink petals. 

the color of their robes.. 

peaceful, sweet and sublime. 

such quiet resonance. 

a quiet room. 

a room that welcomes you 

and you know you're home.  

ACHIEVING STILLNESS WHILE MOVING

Mumbai is a busy place. It's big but it's filled to the brim.. I am convinced that it makes me think that it is running out of space. People carry a lot. The vehicles are tiny. The streets are beyond 3 dimensional with full-on colors, textures and honking going on. However, in the midst of this bustle, I managed to find a stillness so timeless I could stare at the sea for hours, draw to my heart's content and get some peace in a vast, moving city. It was so unexpected it was almost a miracle to be doing this here. If I were at the beach, that would totally be predictable but achieving it here gave me hope that peace and light and calmness are things you can find within and anywhere you choose to be.