Abstract Butterfly at Jimi Hendrix Park

The last summer sketch outing with the Seattle Ad Hoc group! This is one of Seattle's newest parks, the Jimi Hendrix Park in the Central District. The red sculpture is supposed to be a sort of abstraction of a butterfly. There are many references to flight and wings in Hendrix' songs, and Little Wing especially has butterfly imagery in the lyrics. Some of the other sketchers drew the whole form and their sketches show this better. I imagine the park will also become a good performance space.

Jimi Hendrix Park

8/25/17 Jimi Hendrix Park

Seattle’s newest park, opened earlier this summer, honors one of the city’s most well-known musicians – Jimi Hendrix. The Seattle native’s memorial at Greenwood Memorial Park in Renton is visited by many fans each year, and his bronze likeness in front of the Blick Store on Capitol Hill is also popular. Now there’s finally a public park in his name.

Several urban sketchers at yesterday’s outing featured the bright orange sculpture that forms the park’s visual centerpiece. Apparently when it rains, water collects at the top and then pours out from one end, creating a natural waterfall. Thankfully yesterday, however, not a drop of rain was nearby, and we all enjoyed a beautiful morning in the sunshine. Quotations from Hendrix’s songs are engraved on pavers on the park’s walkway shaped like a guitar. I chose one I thought was fitting to write on the sketch.

8/25/17 The same sculpture from a different angle.

I felt like my first sketch (above) came out a little fussy. After taking a brief break to walk through the Northwest African American Museum inside the historic Colman School on the park grounds, I tried a more abstract approach (at right) from a different angle. 

Statue of Jimi Hendrix



5/3/13 Sailor fountain pen, Stillman & Birn sketchbook

I’ve never been much of a rock fan, but I know the influence that Jimi Hendrix has had on rock music, and even I can listen to his riffs and appreciate his innovation.

 

The bronze statue of Hendrix on the corner of Broadway and Pine on Capitol Hill has been on my list of memorials and monuments that I want to sketch. Sculpted by local artist Daryl Smith, the statue captures the intense passion that I imagine Hendrix must have expressed during concerts. Leaning up against a wall of the Blick Art Materials store as I sketched, I felt that passion, too.