Sketchbook-- St. Lawrence Market

Warm up sketches of people around me.

The man in the foreground sat right in front of me while I was sketching the man reading his paper. Serendipity? Anyways, he was a trooper and didn't fidget, look my way or show any thought to me. I'd say he made the perfect model.

St. Lawrence Market

I'm branching out from my coffee shop series and trying to capture a few other places in Toronto. This is the St. Lawrence MArket. A great people watching place and a lot of eye candy to sketch.
I thought I'd show the process of how one of these micron pen and watercolour drawings come to be. I've changed my process a bit and when I want to capture people I try to sketch them in with pencil quickly and then black line it.

sketchbook 04/24/10

While waiting for a friend at the St.Lawrence Market, I had a chance to black line this scene in of Peter's bulk foods. I had a chance to briefly talk to Peter and he told me he came to Toronto from Greece in 1968 as an 18 year old and started this store in the Market in 1975. Impressive that it's survived over all these years considering the economic ups and downs.

Unfortunately I didn't have time to colour it in and to be honest there was so much colour going on here that I don't remember any one colour other than the lady's blue jeans and her green apron.

sketchbook 03/10/10

I ventured down to the St. Lawrence Market and three separate people said sorry when I asked them if I could sketch them. What was really funny was the second lady. When I asked her she immediately put her hand to her hair and started preening it self consciously. Hilarious! So I was left with sketching people from the back.

Sketchbook 05/11/09

The big puddles of ink are covering mistakes. There I said it. One of the rules I've applied for myself for this sketchbook is not to skip any spreads. So I had to do something with the smudges. My initial action was to ignore it, but in the end I liked how these smudges sat in relation to the drawing. The addition of the date was an after thought.


I had made it an objective today to draw 2 spreads. This is the second one and the colour elements were added at home.

There is no rationale for the colour and shape of these forms other than the fact that I wanted them there. I know, I'm a bad ass, a rebel in a cardigan.
Actually, to apply a bit of arm chair psychology, I think it's a willful response to all the rationalizing i had to do as a graphic designer when I worked in an office.

sketchbook 04/11/09

I's so hard sketching meat! Gotta get down to the St. Lawrence market more often to sketch carcasses...hmmmm, dinner....

sketchbook 25/09/09

As serendipity would have it, I was grabbing a drink with a friend right by the St.Lawrence Market tonight, so as sketching habit dictates, I went down a few hours earlier and sketched. I happened to find another like minded person and decided to sketch her while she was sketching a fish (i think). I never did get the opportunity talk to her because she left before I finished my drawing, but if mame, you do happen to stumble onto this blogger account and you are reading this, I thank you for not freaking out and being a perfect model for me.

Sketchbook 29/07/09

I ventured back to the St.Lawrence Market to get another round of sketching in and I chose this staircase area mainly because it had available seating by the railing. However, after finishing this drawing, I remembered my sister telling me how she went on a ghost tour a few years back during halloween in which they visited famous downtown sites that were supposedly haunted.
As the story goes, the guide took them to the Market, and lead them to a pit stop in the basement via one of these flights of stairs (there are 4 and this image is of the south west one) As my sister went down, her vision got blurry and she felt a brief chill run through her.
After the pit stop, the guide asked everyone in the group if they felt anything weird as they went down the stairs. My sister didn't raise her hand but another girl did and mentioned the exact same feelings my sister experienced. The guide informed her that that was a ghost passing through her... wowzer! What a great way to start a ghost tour.

Sketchbook 21/07/09

My daily wandering took me down to the St. Lawrence Market where I knew a plethora of situations would present themselves to me to sketch.

The St.Lawrence is a big barn of a structure that houses independent vendors of all stripes, from fruit sellers to seafood purveyors to cheese vendors. The list is endless, as well as the opportunities to sketch.

So I settled for the Anton Kozlik Mustard shop. They've been in business since 1948, so I suspect their product "cuts the mustard". (OUCH! yes, I did throw that one out there, but fathers the world over will appreciate that joke!) The lady in the drawing, according to Jessica, a talented illustration student at OCAD as well as counter help, informed me that she's the cousin of Anton who continues the family tradition of mustard making. (If you're ever int he neighbourhood, try the samples set on the counter, in particular the horse radish mustard... tongue numbingly hot, but ohhh so worth it.)

I didn't finish colouring the image because I was sitting directly under the cold vent exhaust of a meat locker... there's only so much I will do for my art.