Hiking about the Sydney Opera House.

Our hotel was in a section of Sydney Australia called “The Rocks” which is right at the foot of the Sydney Harbor Bridge. Some of the city’s oldest buildings are in this area. Walking through the residential area it was clear that residents who have lived there for generations are having to fight to keep their homes. Posters in windows showcased family histories of people who might be displaced by developers. It would be a shame if this historic area was replaced by glass and steel boxes. It is good to hold on to some of the city’s gritty past.

We could see the Sydney Opera House from the roof of our hotel so that became our destination our first day. Terry explored inside while I did my sketch. As I worked, I was surprised to hear someone shout out “Thor!” Orlando residents Maria Bolton and her husband walked up to say hello. Maria is an accomplished caricature artist and I’ve met her a few times at animal rights demonstrations. She is known as “Hurricane Maria” because she is so active. What are the chances of bumping into friends from Orlando on the opposite side of the world. I put the odds at about 1 in 7 billion. We took some selfies and the told me about the kangaroos and koalas they had seen south of Sydney.

When Terry got back, the sketch was finished, and we went for a walk in the Royal Botanic Gardens. We wandered the gardens in the hopes of seeing cockatoos in their native habitat. We had to leave our pet cockatoo with a friend and it would be hard being away for a whole month. We finally spotted several cockatoos in the trees. When they flew off, Terry followed. I relaxed in the shade and gave the sketchbook a rest.

Weekend Top 6 Picks for February 28th and March 1st.

Saturday February 28, 2015

10am to 2pm Orlando Sketch Tour with Kelly Medford and Thomas Thorspecken. Saturday and Sunday Each workshop day is $125, or $200 for both days Lake Eola Park 195 N Rosalind Ave, Orlando, Florida 32801 We will meet at the Red Pagoda Orlando Sketch Tours offers visitors a chance to slow
down, see and sketch the true Orlando outside of theme parks.  For all levels, NO experience is required.

All materials provided, just bring yourself.
Your sketch kit includes:
pencil and sharpener
waterproof drawing pen
waterbrush
travel sized watercolor kit
5×7 inch watercolor artist journal
a zippered supply bag to hold everything

4pm to 10pm Free. Blues and BBQ. Downtown Winter Garden Pavilion Plant Street Winter Garden FL.


6pm to 8pm Free. Energy for the Arts. 3415 Bartlett Blvd, Orlando, Florida.

Event Overview: Join us at OK.-energy’s first Annual “Energy for the Arts” Event. We will be providing you with an exciting evening of entertainment including, original artwork by local Artists, live music, drinks, food, Artist vendors, photo opportunity and more. Don’t miss this unique opportunity to celebrate Orlando’s cultural scene.

Original Artwork from:
Chris Tobar Rodriguez Tobar Art Market
Peterson J Guerrier Guerrier Studios
Morgan Wilson Morgan Wilson (Lux Nova Studio)
Miguel Angel Macillust
Brandon Geurts Brandon Geurts..
Randall Smith Randall Paints
Ginger Leigh
and more to come!

We will be holding a raffle for prizes, including some special treats from
Orlando City Soccer Club
-Orlando Solar Bears
more to come!
Cause:
In addition to bringing more exposure to this City’s wonderful Cultural scene, we would like to also help by supporting the scene with funds that will continue to allow Artists, venues, locals, businesses the opportunity to flourish as a community. Funds raised will go towards putting on the event and all the remaining will be donated directly to the Downtown Arts District.


Sunday March 1, 2015

1pm to 3pm Free. Yoga. Lake Eola Park, 195 N Rosalind Ave, Orlando, FL. Every week. An advantage to doing yoga this weekend is that you might get sketched by Urban Sketchers!

2pm to 10pm Donation. 4th Annual Lee Swimmer Memorial Benefit for the Orlando Union Rescue Mission. The Cork Room Bar and Grille, 671 South Goldenrod Road, Orlando, FL. Come Rock ‘n’ Roll to help the homeless community of Orlando at Cork Room Orlando in memory of one of Orlando’s great talents, Lee Swimmer. We lost Lee way too soon–he was, at age 17, lead guitarist for Edgar Winter–played in a number of local and regional bands including Fat Chance and Tight Shoes.
Lee wanted to use his talent to help the homeless so in his honor we do so.
Raffle prizes including guitars and more.
Non smoking event!
Last year we raised almost $3600 — lets see if we can do it again!!


9pm to 11pm Free. Comedy Open Mic. Austin’s Coffee, 929 W Fairbanks Ave, Winter Park, FL. Free comedy show! Come out & laugh, or give it a try yourself.

Birding down in Kissimmee

Terry’s niece Claire Brown was visiting with her boyfriend. The entire Brown family are avid birders and Terry has also caught the birding obsession. It has been a blessing on vacation because while Terry was searching for birds, I could sketch. This is a rather old sketchbook that has a few unfilled spreads left to fill. On these pages I drew two thumbs for some reason. Those thumbs became a block that kept me from filling up the sketchbooks. At a Mystery Sketch Theater session, I used the spread to do quick gestural studies in pencil. The sketchbook sat abandoned for years. I like a sketchbook to have an overall flow when it is flipped through. For whatever reason this spread threw the book off track.

I erased as much of the harsh pencil work as I could and reworked the sketch as my relatives birded. I only had at most half an hour, so I kept the sketch extra loose. Trying to do a sketch in a stolen moment like this is stressful, but the sketch couldn’t be any worse than the mess that was already on the page. In some ways, messing up the page a bit first can be freeing. It gets past the pristine blank page and lets me realize it is just a sketch, let it go.  I’ve shown this sketch to students and they seldom notice the thumbs hidden in the composition. You can always change and adjust a sketch to push it in a new direction. It was a lesson learned, and soon this sketchbook will be filled and join the others on my bookshelf.

Blue Spring is my “go to” place to bring out of towners .

Cornelia Thorspecken and her daughter Nini came from Germany to visit the Thorspecken’s of America. Terry and I met Cornelia in Germany when Nini was just a baby. I had done a boat load of family history research at the New York Public Library and found the boat manifests for Dr. Augustus Thorspecken who arrived in America in 1854. He left Germany from the port in Bremen, so I searched for modern day Thorspecken’s there. I got in contact with Herbert Thorspecken who was about the age of my dad, and he sent me all the family history notes he had. Herbert was my cousin, and we were related because Dr Augustus left while another brother, stayed in Germany. Herbert was a descendant of the brother who stayed and I’m descended from the Doctor who left. Terry and I visited every living Thorspecken we could find in Germany including Cornelia. Facebook made it easy for Cornelia to do the same in America.

The biggest adventure on the drive up to Blue Spring (2100 W. French Avenue Orange City, FL) was getting gas for Cornelia’s rental car. Cornelia expressed her concern that she couldn’t remember her code for her credit card. The jerk behind the counter gave her a hard time. We drove across the street and the charming Indian clerk asked Cornelia about Germany and explained what her own name meant. It was a good lesson in how intolerance and a power hungry idiot can be quickly out shined by a caring, compassionate and fun clerk.

In Blue Spring, there were a couple of Manatees in the spring. Now that it is so much colder, the Manatees return to the spring in hoards or is it herds? No, actually a group of manatees is called an aggression, which makes little sense since these graceful mammals are never aggressive. Rather aggressive humans are endangering manatees by ripping through peaceful waters with power boats that then cut open the backs of manatees with their props. Most every manatee I have ever seen had multiple lacerations and scars. The manatees return to Blues Spring when it is cold because the spring water is always a balmy 72 degrees as it rises from the earth.

On this sunny day there was a gaggle of humans sunning themselves on the lawn. No a group of humans must be a horde, a huddle, or a crowd. Anyway it was a relaxing afternoon that gave me a chance to learn more about my German cousins. The first thing Nini wanted to do in Orlando was find a Taco Bell. Terry and I were glad to oblige, but its kind of sad that this is the culture that the rest of the world expects from America.

The Mills 50 District heralds the Mills 50 Community Market.

Every Tuesday from 5:00 pm until 9:00pm the Mills 50 Community Market (between Will’s Pub and Track Shack) brings together a variety of artisans and local vendors to share food, ideas and community resources. Our vision is to foster weekly community engagement and to provide support for local businesses in the Mills 50 District and all of Central Florida. By providing this open platform, we hope to empower local residents with a more resilient, sustainable and healthy place to live.

I went right after work one night to sketch. On the side wall of Will’s Pub was the controversial mural by Dolla Short. It depicts a drunk satyr floating in a noxious cloud. The detail that a few local residents have an issue with is that the cloud is implied to have come from a fart symbolized by a word balloon and a skull and cross bones. Because of this, the city is trying to come up with a way to censor future murals. They want to create an ordinance that re-defines murals as signage which suffer strict jurisdiction. Murals keep popping up in the neighborhood like mushrooms.

The Market is a small affair with local goods. The closest vendor had meat on a stick and I was offered a sample which was pretty good. Doughn’t Be Cruel was directly across from me. Senior Baker and Artist David McWhertor was at the helm. He pointed out that we had exhibited our work together at the Falcon Bar‘s “Porn” show. David’s painting was of a nude man with a unique way of hanging his jacket. For that show, I did a sketch of 2 actors in an intimate embrace. At the opening, I sketched a guy hitting on a girl for several hours in front of my sketch. David offered me a sample of one of his doughnuts, placing it in a paper bag. The bag sat on my kitchen counter for the night and in the morning it had been engulfed in a grease stain. I couldn’t bring myself to open the bag. Perhaps if bacon was packaged in paper bags, I could give that up as well.

Relaxing at the Lake Louise Ski Resort.

In an effort to be sure all sketches are posted online, I’ve started signing sketches once they are published. This way, hopefully, no sketches will slip through the cracks. In the early years sketches often slipped by because the latest sketch and experience seemed fresher and more exciting. Looking back at vacation sketchbooks, I was surprised to find this Lake Louise, Canada sketch unsigned. That morning, Terry decided she was going on a horse back ride up to the lip of a glacier. I don’t trust horses so the morning was mine to find a sketch opportunity.

I went through the town maps and brochures and decided that the gondola ride was probably sketch worthy. It was summer however, so there wasn’t much snow on the lower slopes.
The Lake Louise Ski Resort
(1 Whitehorn Road, Lake Louise
Alberta, Canada, T0L 1E0) had this gorgeous ski lodge at the base of the mountain. I could faintly see the gondola snaking it’s way up the first slope. I went inside to check on ticket prices. After a quick deliberation, I decided the lodge would be my subject. I had to sit in the parking lot to do the sketch, so I was always looking around to be sure I wasn’t run over by a wayward tourist bus or an RV.

Every half hour or so a bus would park in front of the lodge. All the tourists would pile out of the bus, take a cell phone photo and then pile back in. I’m glad that Terry and I travel at our own pace. Back at the hotel, Terry made fun of me for not riding the Gondola. She made clucking noises to rub it in. Her morning had been a real adventure riding her horse through muddy slopes to the glacier.A little friendly competition on vacation isn’t a bad thing. I grant Terry won this round.

Getting over the hump of a long flight.

Terry and I have been traveling quite a bit this year. Back in June and July we flew to the Rockies in Canada and in October we disappeared for a month to go to Australia. Flying to the opposite side of the world is exciting until you are half way into the flight. Terry takes some medication right before take off that cuts the edge off of her fear of flying. Not only can she relax, but she can pass out on a dime. While we were waiting on the runway to take off, she got annoyed at the delay. She then fell asleep and several hours later she woke up and called over a stewardess. She asked the stewardess why we hadn’t taken off yet. The stewardess calmly explained that we WERE in the air and had been for quite some time.

I can never fall asleep when flying. This was a real curse of the flight to Australia. I watched all the animated films on the entertainment list. I believe John Hurst, a former Disney colleague got an award for his storyboard work in the opening sequence of Rio 2. It is a pretty impressive sequence with Parrots performing a complex Busby Berkeley Song and flight routine. I just saw a live action film I did early storyboards for. It was exciting to see compositional ideas incorporated in the final film. Some of the cast had changed but the action was true to what I remember.

Sketchbooks, clothes and my carry on were all used in an attempt to create a comfortable sleeping position. The delicate house of cards would always collapse and I would nod awake.

Warming up on Valentines Day at the Mennello Indie-Folkfest.

Most of Valentines Day I was running around town. In the afternoon I taught a two hour Urban Sketching workshop. From there, I drove downtown to drop off several paintings at City Arts Factory. Then as the golden hour lengthened shadows, I rushed to the Mennello Museum‘s Indie-Folkfest. I bumped into Cole Nesmith and his friends on the walk to the museum. He assured me that there were still plenty of people there. I could hear the music as I walked over a foot bridge toward the museum’s sculpture garden. The lawn was covered with people sitting on blankets and lawn chairs.

JUNOsmile was performing on stage so I sat down and immediately got to work on a sketch. JUNOsmile is a collaboration between husband and wife veteran musicians Joseph and Jesse Martins. As they performed, the sun set over the lake behind them. For a few minutes the setting sun was right behind them causing a blinding light. I believe I saw Jesse Martins perform once before with Bubba Whoop ass Wilson out behind Bubalou’s Bodacious Barbecue. She performed a mean fiddle. Children love to approach the stage. They love music and know how to celebrate it. A little girl tapped me on the leg, I suppose I was “it”. Genevieve Bernard who produced the event let me know that earlier in the day the crowds were insane. The day was an undeniable success. People discovered the museum, some of them for the first time.

Eugene Snowden and friends took over the stage at 6pm. By that time the sun had set and he needed to warm up the crowd. There is an unwritten law in Orlando that if you are a musician then at some point you will perform with Eugene. Right from the start he was pulling friends out of the audience so they could play guitar or sing with him. The kids were dancing up a storm now, doing somersaults and cartwheels. Snowden pumped up the energy to a fevered pitch. With my sketch done, I bundled up my sweatshirt sleeves over my fists to make mittens. I clapped my clenched fists and swayed to the beat. Is it odd that I should feel so comfortable being alone at this concert on Valentines day? As the children danced with wild abandon, I felt at peace. The sketch might be hampered by the cold fingers that executed it, but I was doing what gives me the most pleasure on this day by creating.

In the midst of sketching a young woman asked if I was an Urban Sketcher. She knew of my work and said it was an honor to meet me. I’m always shocked when anyone knows about my sketching obsession. She shook my hand and then left me to continue my work. That simple exchange warmed me on that cold night. The final song for the evening was “Lean on me.” Jesse and Joseph Martins returned to the stage to sing along with Jessica Pawli. You could tell that all these musicians were dear friends as they huddled close to the mics to share their love in song. On that note I decided to head home. Joseph shouted out, “Remember we have far more similarities than differences. If you make one person’s day brighter than you are making the world a better place to live. Spread the love today and everyday.”

Weekend Top 6 Picks for February 21st and 22nd.

Saturday February 21, 2015

9am to 3pm Free. The Orlando Wetlands Festival. Orlando Wetlands Park, 25155 Wheeler Rd, Christmas, Florida. The Orlando Wetlands Festival promises to be the “Best Wetlands Festival in the United States!” In addition to numerous guided wildlife and plant life tours, there will be bird-banding and mist-netting demonstrations, as well as live music and wildlife shows. IBEX Puppetry brings  our endangered species puppets to life for your family at the  Orlando Wetlands Park .

6pm to 8pm Free.  Brewery Tour. Orlando Brewing, 1301 Atlanta Ave, Orlando, Florida.

8am to 10pm Free. Robert Metcalf’s Farewell Reading. Kerouac House 1418 Clouser Ave, Orlando, Florida. Please join us in saying a very fond farewell to our writer-in-residence Rob Metcalf. He will be reading at about 8 p.m. at the Kerouac House.

Sunday February 22, 2015

10am to Noon Free. Super Joy Riders. Eastern entrance of the Lake Eola Farmers’ Market.

 Participants dress as superheroes and ride en masse around the city as they check off their scavenger hunt-like list of Do Gooder Duties; collecting litter, helping senior citizens cross the road, returning shopping carts, basically performing small acts of kindness for an hour and a half of hilarity and love.

The Super Joy Riders: Do Gooder Bike Ride is an exercise in community organizing and active engagement. We hope to use the ride as an opportunity to show how helping people can be simple, fun, and easy, especially while wearing a cape. You + Superhero Costume + Bike = Best Sunday Ever

11am to 5pm Free. Dragon Parade Lunar New Year Festival 2015. Orlando Fashion Square 3201 E Colonial Dr, Orlando, Florida. Lunar New Year is the most important festival celebrated in Asia. In countries such as Australia, Canada and the United States, although Chinese New Year is not an official holiday, many Asian organizations hold large celebrations and parades to share the culture. Cities like New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Sydney and London have already held many successful Lunar New Year Parades which attract thousands and thousands audiences.

This year, Asia Trend Magazine together with Mills 50 – Orlando Main street District, REACH of Central Florida (Recognizing Educating Asian Cultural Heritage) and Y.E.S.S. (Youth Enrichment and Senior Services) joined hands to organize the Central Florida local community Dragon Parade Lunar New Year Festival on February 22th, 2015 to celebrate the Year of the Goat. The festival starts at 11am with a community parade (begins at Orlando Fashion Square Parking lot and ends at Orlando Fashion Square front entrance) followed by a 5-hour festival which takes place at Orlando Fashion Square lobby stage. Come experience the Asian culture with cultural performances, exotic Asian food, Arts and Crafts and exhibitions. Admission is free.

You are invited to be part of this community event by becoming a sponsor, a vendor, or a participant. For vendor and parade information, please email DragonParadeCFL@gmail.com or 407-205-2808.

6pm to 8pm Free, just get a drink or a bite.  Shut Your Face! Poetry Slam by Curtis Meyer! La Casa De La Paellas 10414 E Colonial Dr Orlando Florida. The only current ongoing slam in Orlando officially certified by Poetry Slam Incorporated, IE. Send a team to Nationals as well as poets to The Individual World Poetry Slam & Women of The World Poetry Slam! $50 to the winner! If you’ve never seen or been in a slam before, it’s definitely worth checking out!

INFO: curtisxmeyer@hotmail.com

Nude Nite with a live painting by Marla E. Artist.

On Valentines Eve I went to Nude Nite to get a second sketch. I parked in the same place about a quarter mile up the road and walked to the warehouse venue. On this hike however I tried to jump over a roadside drainage ditch and missed. My right hiking boot sank into the muddy slop up past my ankle before I pulled it out with a slurp. I arrived at Nude Nite with one boot soaking wet and covered in mud. Nude Nite is a pretty swanky affair with women in high heals with sleek low cut dresses. My boot debacle made me feel like Frankenstein. I reassured myself that no one checks out a guys shoes. I tend to cross my legs when seated and drawing and that left the boot dangling out in front of me.

Enough about the slop. I decided to sketch Marla E. Artist who was doing a larger than life painting of a stunning nude model. Marla prepares her canvases with a thick gesso that makes the surface smooth as plaster. She also incorporates even thicker circular patterns that create a surface you are tempted to want to touch.  Marla actually used champagne to thin out her paints. The model had on a long pearl necklace that accentuated the curve of her back. Marla’s painting from the evening before was stored off to the left. When the model took a break, I sketched her one more time as she checked her phone for messages.

Orit Reuben had a pastel nude on display and it sold on the first night. I really should consider hanging work in next year’s show. Then again, the only time I sketch nudes is at Nude Nite. I checked out the couple that were allowing people to snip away one inch pieces of fabric from their outfits. I considered doing a second sketch. The scene was chaos and the crowd so thick that I decided to pass on the sketch opportunity one more time. I needed to get home and slip out of my sopping wet boot.