One Week 100 People

Well, this feels like a lifetime ago. But just two weeks. When we were oblivious to the tragedy unfolding in Italy. When we didn't think it would be a big deal here, as long as we washed our hands and didn't touch our faces. When you could go to an event in town with lots of people milling about. When you could still get on the tram and feel safe.

One Week 100 People, an initiative managed by Liz Steel and Marc Taro Holmes to encourage us to sketch people, ran from the 9th to the13th of March. Full disclosure - I started a day early - it is, or was, easier to get out and sketch on a Sunday than a Monday.

8 March
Dublin Castle's "At Home" performance by Smashing Times, bringing us closer to the women of 1916. I sketched the actors and the spectators. Up close and personal. Because I could. Two weeks later and I'm still fine.

9 March
It was a shaky start - I saw someone else's sketches on Instagram that morning. And they were so good. And I thought, I haven't even started, and my people sketches will never be as good as that. A good friend gave me a pep talk. And once I got started, I couldn't stop. A couple from photos, not my best effort. Then I took a break at Starbucks and a library and filled my quota for the day! And I'm not even counting every person!

10 March - took a quick break in a café, mostly people of a certain age reading the paper. And did the rest from a photo from a book about the Harold's Cross Ladies Club. It was just a busy day and didn't have time to do much more. The Harold's Cross Ladies Club were celebrated by the Dublin City Council Culture Company recently and the book they produced had some lovely photos that inspired me.

11 March - one day before the Covid-19 measures of social distancing were introduced in Ireland. And we were still going about our lives as normal. Yes, everyone was talking about the Coronavirus, but it still felt like our lives would not be affected by it. How wrong we were! I even took two Luases to get to Inchicore. Because I wanted to sketch people! Some of my more successful sketches of the week by the way! On two occasions, I did change seat when I saw people coughing nearby.

12 March - at 11 am, our Taoiseach (that's Prime Minister to you all) announced a number of measures to slow the spread of the coronavirus and ease the pressure on our health system - school closures, events restricted to no more than 100 people indoors and 500 outdoors. Some pubs just didn't care and were jam-packed on the Friday night. So all the pubs had to close. Most restaurants have seen their business significantly drop and are only doing take-away now. And the introduction of social distancing. No more sketching people from life, then. I had to do a major rethink. A few more ladies from Harold's Cross Ladies Club. Some from Instagram. A self portrait. Some worked out. Some didn't. Hard to focus.

done from life while my hair colour was taking!

13 March - I decided not to go to life drawing. As it turned out, it was cancelled. Hard to focus. checking the numbers on Wikipedia, reading the news. But late in the day, I did manage to sit down. Sketched two more Harold's Cross ladies. I found a few photos in a brochure. Browsed Instagram And put on a yoga video on YouTube and paused it to sketch (thank you Yoga with Adriene). At this stage, I was determined to get to 100. I didn't care about practising new techniques or achieving quality. I just wanted to be done. And now, of course, I would love to go out and sketch people. But it will have to wait! ?Wishing everyone well. Stay safe.