The end of the Rio milk bar, Summer Hill, Sydney

RIP George Poulos, Summer Hill
I heard yesterday that George, owner of The Rio milkbar, died last week. He was an icon in Summer Hill. He had worked in his shop for 63 years, and always wore a shirt and tie. I drew his shop for the last time recently, to capture the Christmas swag hanging above the front door. In the olden days the shop was open until 11pm to capture the theatre crowd coming out, and George was famous for his milkshakes. Apparently, people like Johnny O'Keefe used to visit the shop. Despite ill health and even at the age of 92 George  still opened his shop until late. I will miss looking at this little bit of history when I drive through Summer Hill. Someone will come along and buy it,  paint it and spruce it up,
and it will lose all its character!!

Urban Sketchers Sydney - Sydney Hospital Sketches

Following is a collection of sketches created at Sydney Hospital on 2 May 2015.

Mike Botton

Rooi Lim

 

Clover Goa (left)  Tricia Kress (right)

Liz Steel

As organiser for the day, finding quiet time to sketch is always a challenge. I did three sketches, none of them were completed. The first (on the left), in brown ink, was my warmup while waiting for everyone to arrive. 

 

The second (on the right) was of the round corner turret that I have only noticed recently - I have been in this courtyard many times but never saw this part of the hospital. I really liked the green stairs at the base but it started raining when I was only halfway through - umbrella was put up and I continued, but my flow was disrupted. I keep working rapidly to reach the bottom of the page and then abandoned the sketch. Ironically the rain stopped so I would have have plenty of time to finish this according to plan- oh well, that is one of the joys of Urban Sketching.

Liz Steel

My third sketch was going well until the ink ran out… I was hoping to sketch an overall scene of the courtyard …It wasn't to be!

Chantal Vincent

There are many interesting features of the Sydney Hospital to sketch but I could not go past the fairy tale like turret set on the side that looks out to the gardens of the Domain. Secondly, the bronze statue of the wild boar 'Il Porcellino' - great to sketch and entertaining to watch so many passers by stop to rub his snout. 

Urban Sketchers Sydney at Sydney Hospital

The Urban Sketchers Sydney events just seem to get better and better. Despite Saturday's 'rain- heavy at times' forecast we had a fantastic turn up of 34 people  to the Sydney Hospital courtyard.It is always great when we are all sitting together in the one area, so this courtyard was ideal. And a nice roomy cafe was a good base!


Everywhere you looked, there were sketchers!




Once again the work done by the group was amazing- so much variety even though we were all sketching the same thing.


And here is the group photo... there were 34 people in total (some had already left before this photo)


It was very special to have Cecily and Khim from the Penang USK group join us for the day. I love the way Urban Sketchers makes meetings like this possible!

A collection of some of the sketches will follow later in the week