Lacey Cultural Celebration

My address is Olympia, WA, but we live right near the border of Lacey, another city rich with natural beauty, known by me for its parks, Amtrak station, suburban neighborhoods, grocery and big box stores. But last weekend I got to enjoy some of it’s rich cultural diversity at the Lacey Cultural Celebration 2022 with Taiko drummers, Irish dancers, bagpipers, dancers and musicians from Thailand and Alaska Kuteeyaa Dancers!

 

ink and watercolor in 5X8″ Canson Mixed Media sketchbook

Since I never got around to joining the #oneweek100people challenge this year, I was happy to at least get some practice sketching the moving performers! 

pencil, w/c pencil, w/c. Thai drummer

In general the musicians were a bit easier to capture. I added dashes of color at home at home to finish some of them, still trying to keep the energy of the quick sketch.  

 

pencils and w/c

This dancer was sketched later from a picture. Can you tell?

direct watercolor and w/c pencil after

I had to stop sketching when this tribe came on stage and the elders invoked prayers and blessings for the land and its people, so many of whom were lost to Covid. When I later painted these two elders I hoped to convey my experience of this moving event.

Jane Wingfield was there also, finishing up her week of 100 people sketches – You can see her sketches from this event and earlier in the week on Instagram

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