Sketching Barcelona: Secrets of an Urban Sketcher

A visual diary of Barcelona, a real treat for sketchers and lovers of the city including the changes the city is experiencing.

Inspiration is everywhere, in all instances of city life. In this visual diary of Barcelona, a real treat for sketchers and lovers of the Catalan capital, urban sketcher Lapin creates a graphic narrative of his metropolitan surroundings to communicate a highly expressive and deeply personal vision of the city. Using vintage accounting books that he finds in flea markets, Lapin, armed with nothing more than a sketchbook, a fine liner pen, watercolor paints and his folding stool, depicts the images and phenomena of everyday city life - busy streets, bustling cafes, iconic monuments, graffiti-splashed walls, sidewalks thick with people. A sketching technique that pays meticulous attention to detail, his particular use of color and striking und humorous perspective distortions define Lapin’s journalistic-like visual style. Telling evocative stories through his drawings, he also provides a fresh look at some of the urban transformations the city is currently undergoing, including green hubs and squares, parks and gardens. The artist defines himself as a ＂mobile illustrator＂, a kind of modern-day itinerant urban explorer and documentarian who immerses himself in his environment (in this case, Barcelona) and records what he sees. The result is a graphic reportage of the city’s culture, from its emblematic architecture down to the ornamental concrete slabs used to pave many of its sidewalks and nearly everything else in between.

Lapin is a
French illustrator, an artist, a French urban sketcher based in Barcelona. He can
be defined as a mobile illustrator who carries his sketchbook and his compact sketching
gear to the street, to a bar, to a metro, to Istanbul or Tokyo. Sketching is a
way for him to record every second of his life and feel alive. He can sketch
sitting on a floor for hours or just having a beer in his hand or just during
one metro stop. Lapin already filled around 160 sketchbooks for the last 13
years and he particularly appreciates sketching on vintage accounting books
from the 70s, which he finds in flea markets. According to Lapin a good
sketchbook must contain two things; some doodles of dinosaurs and vintage cars.
Besides capturing his life in his sketchbooks, he also teaches the art of
sketching during workshops in universities, in art schools and participates
exhibitions around Europe. Lapin has published several sketchbooks about Cuba,
Japan, Istanbul, Paris, Barcelona and Carcassonne.