Having been inspired by John Kannenbergs ‘Museum Listening Sketches’, I decided to do my own live listening drawings around my city. I went on several sound walks and found myself in areas that were more tucked away or not as obvious to the daily commuter. Some sounds were more unpleasant, others very discrete but beautiful. I sat at four different spots, and with my sketchbook I listened and drew for 10 minutes at each location. Particularly paying close attention to those hidden sounds, I started with ink pen, and let my ears do the drawing. My first sketch was in my back garden, tucked away on a cul-de-sac, but still in the heart of the urban centre of the city. The sounds that stood out most in this recording were the birds and insects. The birdsong was captivating and there was a stillness and tranquillity to the 10 minutes of drawing, which I had rarely noticed when I am usually preoccupied in my garden. The interruption of a random motorbike or vehicle actually made the birdsong much more apparent, and it wasn’t fighting for dominance over the mechanical sounds of the city in the backdrop. I took a video of the live sketch below, followed by the final sketch.
I did two more live ink sketches and in two different urban spaces. The first was on the top of a four-story car park and the other in a busy student café at midday. These produced very different drawings. The abrupt and cluttered chaos of the café sketch felt overwhelming to capture and create and on reflection I think this is obvious from the harsh, jaggedness of my drawing.
My Car Park sketch had a very different feel. There was more of distant hum of industrial sounds and as I was high up, so the wind was the dominant sound in the 10 minute period , however it was much softer than I expected, and I enjoyed the feeling of the light breeze whilst drawing, so this sketch ended up being much softer, with lighter strokes and smoother more fluid curves.
I did one more sketch, however this time I wanted to experiment with colour, so I sat in the middle of zebra crossing point and listened to the sounds around me the roads, trying to not just focus on the immediate loud vehicle sounds but also the more distant and hidden sounds. Particularly at ground level, such as footsteps, rolling rubbish, crunching leaves, pushchairs and suitcases wheeling and laughter etc.
