In the Lower Cast Gallery

It is quite spooky here. But on some Wednesdays you can get in & sketch battered statues.

cast-gallery-01Here’s a line up of guys – the one on the end is a hermaphrodite.

cast-gallery-02

And here are the lovely ladies.

cast-gallery-03

and some shop dummies on the way home…

shop-dummies

Wrestling the Octopus

OctosketchsmHere we go again. Every time you think you’ve got all the tentacles covered, another one springs up brandishing something surprising.

Perhaps the tactic is all wrong. Perhaps the Octopus isn’t wrestling after all. Perhaps this is just ordinary Octopus behaviour, an octopus offering. Time to shake hands with the octopus. Repeatedly.

OctoboxsmPS: If you want an octopus to wrestle with too, here are a couple of favourites…

OctoScarrypoulpe colossal 02

Colossal Head

It’s rainy. It’s the school holidays. This week we’ve been sketching a bit in the good ol’ museums of Oxford, and then eating cake.

Giant salamander & aardvark in NHM:

SalamanderSAardvarkSThe great god Sobek in the Asmolean:

Sobek…and a colossal marble head of Apollo.   Colossal headSThe cake in all museums has been very fine.

March of the Giant Insects

Sketching Weakly has been back at the Oxford Natural History Museum, & being a sucker for a nicely turned antenna couldn’t resist this mantis or this earwig:

mantisHere’s a jaunty mosquito. Drawing the larva caused problems.

mosquitoAnd here’s a skeletal reindeer.

reindeerPS: Will the CHEETAH come back some day? I hope it does.

OX NHM 04 LOST16 alive once