Drawing Landscapes: Pencil, Ink, Watercolor and Gouache (Bushwick Inlet Park)

Join us on Earth Day at the Bushwick Inlet Park Community Center for an afternoon of sketching.

Brooklyn will be gaining many new trees – you can even request a tree to plant yourself! Following a big push to plant many more street trees in the neighborhood, we will focus this month on landscapes, especially how to represent trees in their surroundings. After an introductory slide presentation, we’ll practice techniques with a few exercises, each focusing on a different aspect of a landscape: trees, waterways, the sky, and clouds.

We’ll discuss principles such as focal point, atmospheric perspective, simplification, using space in a composition, and the importance of planning. We will practice recognizing shapes and scale, mark making, using thumbnail sketches for composition and light, and choosing colors. Tips on putting together an outdoor art kit for drawing, watercolor, or gouache for those who would like to paint and draw outdoors will also be touched upon. Bring your own travel art kit if you’d like to share what tools work best for you.

Then we will create pieces using some of these skills. Weather permitting, we might head outside to draw or paint together.

Friends of Bushwick Inlet Park will provide art supplies, but feel free to bring your own (if you have!) for this guided art project for beginners and artists of all levels. Materials provided will include paper, watercolors, colored pencils, and other basic drawing supplies.

If you’d like to bring your own supplies, we recommend:

• multimedia or watercolor paper
• watercolor paints and brushes
• pencil, eraser, ruler, tape (for masking edges)
• colored pencils, markers, or pens

No experience necessary.

Registration required.

Instructor Monica Schroeder is a professional scientific illustrator. Her work has appeared in Scientific American, countless textbooks, natural history museum exhibitions, and on the TV Show Jeopardy.

She has been an adult art instructor since 2018.

[email protected]

* Please register only if you plan to actually attend. The class size is small to ensure an intimate hands-on learning experience.

Children 14 and over (high school students) are welcome but must be accompanied by a parent or guardian.