An exhibition of the Urban Sketchers international community of artists began its work at the Mining Museum in St. Petersburg. The exhibition presents paintings in the technique of rapid drawing, depicting the interiors and exhibits of one of the largest natural science museums in the world.
According to the organizers, the Mining Museum was not randomly chosen as a platform for creative works. For the St. Petersburg branch of Urban Sketchers, this was the first official exhibition in the city in five years of existence.
“We hold sketch sessions twice a month and have been to many cultural institutions in the city, but the Mining Museum caught our attention above all. It is all thanks to the diversity of exhibits and thematic rooms, as well as the presence of old interiors and architecture, preserved in its original form,” shared the head of the St. Petersburg urban sketchers community Nadezhda Naumenko.
Organized fourteen years ago, today the Urban Sketchers community brings together over 400 thousand participants from 62 countries.
“Sketching, or drafting in other words, is an essential part of creating any work of art. Often the majority of sketches remain in the shadows and are never brought to life. Although it is from sketches that one can trace the author’s thoughts about the creation of the drawing and first impressions of the object,” says Nadezhda Naumenko.
Among the museum objects depicted in the artists’ paintings are mineral druses, individual crystals, paleontological collections, mining machines, as well as the interiors of the halls. The exhibition is intended to show how vast and multifaceted the concept of sketching can be in the modern world.
“Today the sketch is no longer just a sketch, but primarily a tool used not only by artists and designers, but also by engineers, geologists, and mineralogists. The sketch as a way to quickly visually express an idea, both on paper and a computer monitor, has become extremely popular in many fields,” explained Mikhail Shabalov, Director of the Mining Museum.
