Cafe Drawings

Here are my most recent cafe drawings. I have been drawing in cafes for as long as I can remember. 

Back when I was single (pre-2006) I used to go to Barnes & Noble regularly to read and draw. I don’t remember anything about this woman now except that she was intensely writing, oblivious to her surroundings. 16 years later I unexpectedly received a large collection of colored pencils so I went back to this drawing I had always loved and finished it.

Once a month Linda takes care of babies in the nursery of our church instead of attending the service. Often I will sit in the cafe on those days instead of in the service and draw. These two men were trying to keep cool by coming indoors on a very hot July morning. I don’t often have the opportunity to do a true city view with large buildings close up so after I had drawn the men I focused on that.

I was in the Bay Area to run the Oakland Marathon and was attending my daughter Chelsea’s cafe concert in the Mission District of San Francisco the evening before the race. I saw these two women in rapt attention to a particular song and took advantage of the moment to draw them. They both were actually crying.

I was at a Starbucks waiting for my car to be repaired and I noticed a very striking woman dressed in shades of grey. She was in high contrast, with dark eyes, lips, hair and nails set off against the palest of pale skin and paper. I did the line drawing quickly and used my color imagination later to create the feeling I had looking at her.

All drawings © 2019 Marty Coleman | napkindad.com