Say hello to Alex Zonis! Workshop 2: Fountain Pen World

Alex Zonis is a Chicago-based visual artist, an oil painter, and an Urban Sketcher.  As a painter, she participated in numerous group and solo exhibitions such as Oil Painters of America and International Guild of Realism. Her work can be found in private collections in USA, United Kingdom, Germany, France and Israel.

Alex is a contemporary realist painter working in oil paints.  Her artistic inspirations come from Dutch masters techniques, Caravaggio’s light handling, and Russian narrative painting.  She teaches Indirect Oil Painting in her studio in Chicago.

Alex is a founder of Urban Sketchers Chicago and has worked as one of the chapter admins since the beginning. She is proud to see the chapter grow from 4 people in 2012 to 1000+ members today. Alex has organized 4 Chicago Sketch Seminars starting in 2014 and is managing planning for the 2019 Seminar.  Alex was also the main local organizer for 2017 International USk Symposium in Chicago

Alex loves sketching on location and the community of artists that came together to share the joy, adventures and camaraderie that is Urban Sketching.  She hopes to share her love for sketching with fountain pens and inks and the romance of the old world mark-making tools through the Fountain Pen World workshop.

Say hi to Shari Blaukopf! Workshop 17: Bare Bones: Exploring Limited Palettes in Watercolour

Shari Blaukopf is a Montreal-based painter, graphic design teacher, illustrator and art blogger. She has a BFA from Concordia University with a specialization in graphic design, but her true love has always been watercolour painting. She began painting in her teens and is fortunate to have studied with some of the greats: Edgar A. Whitney, Frank Webb, Skip Laurence, Milford Zornes and Frederick Wong.  

Shari is a co-founder of Urban Sketchers Montreal and has given many watercolour workshops both on her own and through the Urban Sketchers Workshop Program in Montreal, Galway, New York, Portland, Barcelona, Singapore, Manchester, Chicago and Porto. Her book, “The Urban Sketching Handbook: Working with Color,” will be published by Quarry Books in spring 2019.  Shari grew up and still lives in Montreal, where she continues to discover neighbourhoods in her quest to find the best streets and back alleys to sketch.  

Shari is a signature member of the Canadian Society of Painters in Watercolour and a member of the Lakeshore Association of Artists.  You can find her online courses, Sketching Landscapes and Sketching the City, on Craftsy.com. Her watercolours are in corporate, government and private collections in Canada, the United States and in other countries.

Meet Wes Douglas!  Workshop 18: Urban Uglies: How to Make Beautiful Sketches Out of Those Areas Most People Overlook

Wes Douglas is an award-winning art director, illustrator and co-founder of the Elmhurst-based innovation agency Maddock Douglas, Inc. In addition to his creative role at Maddock Douglas, Wes also developed “Speaker Sketches” (his unique creative meeting notes which blend hand-written words and sketched pictures), concept visualizations, and package designs. He is also the primary book illustrator for the Amazon best-seller Free The Idea Monkey (to focus on what matters most) by Mike Maddock. Wes has been a co-admin for the Chicago chapter of Urban Sketchers since 2013.

Wes loves to share what he has learned about sketching and has a lot of fun in the process. In the summer of 2017, as part of his public relations duties, Wes appeared on WGN Morning News and WGN Radio AM 720 “Outside the Loop” programs to share his passion of urban sketching with Chicago listeners and to promote upcoming Sketch Seminars and the 8th International Urban Sketchers Symposium.

Wes has also lead demonstrations on urban sketching people for the DuPage Art League in Wheaton, a demonstration on marker illustration at the American Academy of Art, and will soon be leading a demonstration on urban sketching people at the Kishwaukee Valley Art League in Sycamore.

Say hello to Aaron Elswick! Workshop 1: Fake It Till You Make It: Sketchin’ Like You Don’t Care

Aaron is a Chicago-based Urban Landscape Architectural Designer and Urban Sketcher. A Kentucky native, his passion and curiosity lies at the intersection of science, art and design. His favorite places to visit and draw are all full of life and color, and range from dense and urban to vast and natural environments. To better design such types of places in his professional career, he seeks them out in his free time to explore their beauty via his sketchbook. With his approach, the drawing process is utilized to gain understanding, insight, and at times, inspiration.

Drawing is the tool and the language Aaron uses in his career to communicate, explore ideas, and to design cities of the future. Urban Sketching is how he practices. He has added mediums to his urban sketching throughout the years, but his objective has remained the same – to capture what he sees as fast and legibly loose as possible.

Becoming a member of USk Chicago has had a tremendous impact on Aaron’s life, both personally and professionally. The art of urban sketching can only be described as beautiful, and he’s looking forward to sharing it with everyone who attends his workshop.