Friday 9 February 2018

Drawing Tuesday at the Petrie Museum: small pots



 First Drawing Tuesday of the year for me - an afternoon at the Petrie Museum . As on a previous visit , I had lunch in the British Museum Members Room then visited the current exhibition' Living with the Gods'. Having listened to  all the episodes either on the radio or as downloads on my phone, it was good to see some of the objects discussed, a mixture of old items and contemporary pieces.


The final exhibit , shown above, featuring the Lampedusa Cross ;small boats made from bicycle mudguards and burnt matches ; and  plaster casts of  tshirts  commemorating  drowned refugees brought a lump to my throat.
 The Petrie Museum's cases are so jam-packed with items, it's overwhelming and difficult to choose what to draw.  Having found a reasonably  comfortable chair  with a table to spread out , my tactic this time was to  draw whatever was in front of me: small broken pots with faded markings and quirky double flasks. 
There was also the  bonus of  overhearing a curator explain to a couple of students about how to handle, measure and photograph objects and where to find further information about them - fascinating. 



I mainly used different sizes of sanguine PITT pens  and  pencil  but also experimented with some  khadi papers. I should do more of this ,it's so much easier to work on a toned background adding darks and lights ( white gel pen) and the texture of the paper adds another dimension. 



2 comments:

Sandy said...

When I saw the first image, I was reminded of the broken vase which inspired you for the Whatever Floats exhibition.
Sandy

magsramsay said...

Thanks Sandy,I still have a bit of a thing about broken pots and pot shards!