We had an all day staff meeting today at our co-director’s home. It was a wonderful opportunity to catch up with each other, celebrate our accomplishments over the past year and plan for the huge amount of work we’ll be doing over the next year. It was also a chance for some sketching.
The gentleman above rests his finger just below his nose when he’s listening with concentration. (Just had to explain since it looks like he’s doing something else).
I really like the way the woman’s foot in this sketch turned out. She’s quite petite but I think I should have made her legs bigger since they were closer to me.
It felt inappropriate to take out my sketchbook (even though I know I listen well while drawing, I didn’t want others to think I wasn’t paying attention) so I drew in the same cheesy notebook I was using for notetaking. Of course everyone knew I was sketching anyway…
Last year we had our annual all staff meeting in a stuffy conference room. It was so much nicer gathering in a home where we could eat pizza in the backyard and sit in comfy chairs in a pretty living room and kick our shoes off.
Jana Bouc, Artist 
11 replies on “All Day Meeting Sketches”
dar Jana:Nobody in a staff meeting around here would have allowed me to sketch.Egos are super egos inacademic circles.So I amdelighted to know
that you are given carte blanche.Good for you and praises to you for those
unflattering sketches!
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Hi Victor, We are mostly what could be considered academics in our group too (though not me), but nobody has big egos. I work for a non-profit that focuses on adolescent literacy. Despite Masters degrees and Ph.Ds, most of our staff were classroom teachers at one time and as a result probably had their egos deflated. We work very well together for a common cause and we’re also supportive of each other as individuals, so they support me as an artist. I just didn’t want them to think I wasn’t paying attention. Jana
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dear Jana: My comments have twice been criticised for “you have already
sent that comment(I haven´t).I am puzzled.
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Hi Victor, I don’t know where that message came from and I’m so sorry. May you just hit Enter a second time because it was taking a long time to be load but it had actually already been submitted but hadn’t registered yet? Sorry! Jana
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Excellent sketches Jana! I can’t imagine how you managed to do these without upsetting the subjects, but you did a really fine job.
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Hi Rita, We’re all very close in our work group and either nobody noticed when I sketched them (unlikely) or they didn’t care. But more important, nobody asked to see the sketches (which might have upset the subjects if they had seen them as my renderings weren’t terribly flattering. Jana
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The sitting woman’s face is really lovely – I never thought of it before but maybe drawing a face on lined paper helps get the proportions right??? I will try it.
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I hadn’t thought of it either until you mentioned it, but it did seem to help. I try to picture “plumb lines” from one feature or body part to another to see what lines up with what, and having some already drawn in the notebook paper is pretty handy. Maybe quadrille ruled graph paper would be even better? Jana
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The woman in sketch #2 was reading blogs. You can tell by the look on her face.
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Ha ha. If it was anybody else that would probably be true, but she was actually taking notes of what people were saying, and like the rest of us, were interested and enjoying hearing each others’ thoughts, ideas and questions. Jana
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