Urban Sketchers South Wales was launched in August this year. The brainchild of David Masters, inspiration for a Welsh sketching collective was found at the Urban Sketchers’ 7th International Symposium in Manchester last July.
The group follow a fairly standard pattern for such organisations. The 20 or so members share images of their drawings online and regularly meet up to sketch on location.
David has been running successful monthly sketch crawls since August, meeting in both Swansea and Cardiff.
Jules Woolford, who runs a chapter in Bristol, and who helped David set up his group, says, “Meeting up, connecting and sharing adds a whole new dimension to the sketching process.”
This is at the core of the Urban Sketchers’ manifesto. Hoping to make sketching a less solitary pursuit, they were established as a not-for-profit organisation in 2009. They have since built a significant community and now have chapters across the world which all aim to raise the artistic, storytelling and educational value of location drawing,
Clara Kohler, an architecture student and keen sketcher, has said that one of the most interesting features of these events is tied to collaboration. Clara elaborates, explaining that you can ask people how they achieved certain effects and therefore get ideas for your own drawings and sketches.
The group is free to join and open to new members of any ability. David adds that in order to become an official chapter, “There’s a process we need to follow, and the first step is to have a thriving, active group.” With events planned and a collection of active members, it seems they are well on their way.
In the video below you will find a few ideas of where to get sketching in Cardiff. The best place to start is with David’s group at the Cardiff Central Library on 19 November.