Part Three Landscape Project 2 Landscape Exercise 2 Sketchbook walk

As Cotonou is not the safest city to walk around as a woman, doing sketches, I opted to sketch during our short overnight stay at a resort and then to sketch scenes from my third storey apartment window. As I explain in my research in the following post, Cotonou has a thick layer of either dust or a dense cloud layer from the high humidity of this tropical costal city, so there is very little change from day to day in the weather conditions and the lights and darks have less contrasts than what you would expect, due to the constantly diffuse lighting.

This first sketch was drawn from the step of the little villa we stayed in at Casa del Papa, Benin. The placement of the miniature palms and the fully grown palms created a pattern towards the vanishing point. I started this sketch with aquarelle-markers, to which I added watercolor washes. I found that it was very difficult to include everything in this picture, as the layers on the right-hand side were very ambiguous, due to the perspective.

I loved the way the light filtered through the trees. I tried to show this with the streaks of washes I used towards the palms and the vanishing point.

Casa del Papa, Benin.

My next sketches were of the corner that I regularly watch from my dining-room and kitchen windows. This corner always has people working or sitting under the three umbrellas placed there. I used to think that there was very little activity there as it seemed as if everyone was just sitting around. However, on trying to sketch this corner, I was struck by how active the corner is, even on a Sunday, which was when I drew these sketches. The people were constantly moving. Some would leave, others would join and always there were people getting up or sitting down. Quite fascinating!

I was so fascinated, that I did another sketch immediately below the initial one, to try to give the idea of the similarities, and yet variety, in the scene. Both of these sketches were taken late afternoon, towards dusk. The depth of the shadows under the overhanging trees and the umbrellas, made it hard to pick out areas of interest and detail. I do like the pattern formed by having two similar, but not entirely different scenes on top of one another.

The street corner opposite our apartment.

My final sketch was drawn from the back of my couch, looking out of the lounge window across the roofs that zigzag the confined space between our apartment and the school where I work. I have often thought that I would like to record the zigzagging lines formed by the various structures. The scene is very monochromatic except for the odd touches of color from the greenery, washing and water tank. So I tried to show this by adding touches of marker and crayon to the relevant areas. I washed a mucky light wash to indicate the hamatan dust that hangs in the sky for months on end.

Scene from lounge window.