A Quick Glass

Recently I treated myself to a white gel pen, as I’d been seeing how useful it can be for watercolour sketching when there’s intricate highlights to be added. It sat on the shelf for a few days, biding its time. One evening I noticed how beautifully the light played on the cut facets of this wineglass. However, the glass was both too full and too empty for sketching at the time. So the next day I sat down to sketch the (now clean) glass, and obviously I was in the right frame of mind because the picture just tripped off the end of the pen.

What was most exciting was drawing actively with highlights rather than shadows. I also enjoyed the fact that the pen could give me different degrees of stroke, from a very fine, slightly transparent line, to a nice strong bright white. All round it was a very refreshing experience. I’m looking forward to exploring this further, perhaps combined with chalk or Conte pastel for broad sweeps of white. Hmmm, that’s got me thinking…