The Glimpse

 

The people of Matera are white, all of them, even the tourists are white, there were no Asians, South East Asians, Blacks or Latinos; in this city of all white people I was the lone exception. I was looked at with curiosity each time I entered a shop  and then after a pause and an overcoming of diffidence, I was asked where I was from.

Then one day suddenly out of the blue, I saw this young lone Black woman walking along one of the streets with a lilt in her step. She had none of the tourist accouterments and she seemed very much at home. Her appearance against the pale, bleached walls of Matera was striking. And then I saw her yet again from the balcony, walking somewhere. I wonder who she is and what her story is.

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#matera #materasketchbook #italy

So Much Beauty

Matera at 5.30 am, shrouded in mist, slowly revealed itself to me layer by layer. My camera became an intrusion into something sacred so I kept it aside as it was useless trying to capture what I saw anyway. Here was probably the most powerful and memorable moment I will ever experience in my life: Me alone in the world with the force of nature making its presence felt so strongly and serenely around me as a living breathing entity. This was God. 
I was thankful over and over and over again that I was alone, that I had been blessed with this privilege of being alone, and then I simply stood there in humility experiencing this phenomenon that I had been blessed in this lifetime to see.

Matera, every step of the way, every turn of the head, so much beauty.

#matera

The Ancient City

La Citta

Click on the images for bigger pictures ~

I have not told half of what I saw for I knew I would not be believed.

~ Marco Polo

Do head over to Hello Every Sunday for more and bigger pictures.

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Pure abstraction.

A section of Matera's breathtaking landscape captured in my sketchbook.

Landscape by itself is meaningless, but it works on our feelings in profound ways, arousing in us a sense of ourselves in relation to the outside world. What does it feel like to stare up at the night sky or to confront a mountain?

A picture which mimics the appearance of natural phenomena will miss the point, not just of their essential nature, but of ours too. Instead, some equivalent has to be found: an equivalent of the way in which they act upon our sensibilities.

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Christopher Neve, Unquiet Landscape

On the train to Matera

These are some drawings in my sketchbook of my train journey to Matera.

When I saw the Italian countryside landscape for the first time, I understood better what the old Renaissance masters had painted.  My usual bold charcoal drawings did not work very well for these landscapes. I felt it needed something softer and more poetic. Derwent graphite with its muted tones worked very well for the rolling hills and Olive trees. However I wanted to experiment with other media so I tried ink, my first foray into wet media.

My initial attempts at ink are reminiscent of how I use charcoal, my approach was the same, I let the fountain pen ink that I used literally gambol on different kinds of paper. It was pretty much hit and miss every time, some worked but most did not and there were many, many trials and errors for about two weeks (below). 

Then on a suggestion from a friend, I used a bottle of Sumi ink that had been gifted to me last year (one of those rare, thoughtful gifts that I could actually enjoy). I used tiny rectangles of cheap paper from a small notepad I had and strangely and much to my surprise it worked. The pictures had a print like quality to them which recreated the atmosphere that I wanted (below).

My long journey to Matera which began at 5 am went like this : Trastevere to Rome, Rome to Bari, Bari to Matera. Here are some of the sketches of my co passengers.

I felt compelled to redraw the sketch of the schoolgirl with red streaked hair and distinctive features into something larger. Her face reminded me of a Renaissance portrait. I think I should title the drawing of her as Sleeping Madonna (above).

While making these drawings I recall the sense of anticipation I felt sitting in the slow train which glided leisurely through the Olive groves and towards my destination.

There is a resumption of daily drawing over at Hello Every Sunday. We even have a brand new website with large images. Do meet us on Sundays to see our daily drawing progress at
HELLO EVERY SUNDAY.