Timberyard Old Street: show extended

The group show of drawings, including four by me, and Urban Sketchers Thomas Corrie, Isabelle Laliberté, Jhih-Ren Shih, Katherine Tyrrell and Zhenia Vasiliev at the Timberyard cafe, Old Street, London, has been extended for another few weeks – the final closing date is Saturday 12 July.

Timberyard, 61-67 Old Street, London EC1V 9HW
until 12 July
Open Monday to Friday 8am-8pm, Saturday and Sunday 10am-6pm
www.timberyardlondon.com
@jameshobbsart

Town hall to cemetery: a Stoke Newington drawing tour

Last Sunday, as part of Stoke Newington Literary Festival, in the part of north London where I have lived for the past 23 years, I was joined by an evolving cast of about 50 artists as we drew our way along Church Street, the neighbourhood's epicentre. This was partly to publicise my book, Sketch Your World, but also because it is such a good place to draw: it is historic, crumbling, gentrified, leafy, literary, organic, unstuffy, siren-filled, unrelentingly urban and many other things, too. And the arrival of summer was timely.

The great thing about this kind of event, of course, is that although you can stand on your own and draw any day of the week, doing it as a group means you stop and look at things and in places you may not otherwise. It's never easier to sit on a kerbstone and draw than when you're in a group. The usual fantastic range of abilities and experience were among us, but for those of us new to drawing on location, this was a chance to blend in and feel confident as we worked. For about an hour and a half, as we worked our way along from the town hall, people seemed to be drawing everywhere you looked...

Our mission, in blazing sun throughout, ended in the shade and birdsong of Abney Park cemetery, where we cooled off, and shared and compared our endeavours – thanks once again to Seawhite of Brighton, who kindly supplied its Eco sketchbooks for the event.

Thanks for coming, if you did. And thanks to the team at Stoke Newington Literary Festival for inviting me to do this. Sketch Your World is a book about getting out and drawing rather than sit around discussing, and there's a chance a similar event may take place at next year's festival.

Drawing event at Stoke Newington's literary festival

Stoke Newington Church Street

I'll be at the Stoke Newington Literary Festival on Sunday 8 June from 12 noon for a special free drawing event. To take part, simply come to the town hall foyer with your drawing equipment – a limited number of free Seawhite sketchbooks will be available while stocks last – draw the many hotspots of Stoke Newington, meet other artists, share your drawings online and find out more about the burgeoning Urban Sketching community. It's relaxed, free and you can come and go as you like. It's good for adults and children, all abilities, all levels of experience, all everything, in fact. Find out more about it here.

Signed copies of my book Sketch Your World will be on sale.

Many thanks to Seawhite of Brighton for generously providing the sketchbooks.

There's more information about the literary festival at www.stokenewingtonliteraryfestival.com. There are plenty of great events taking place from 6 to 8 June.