St George's Anglican Church at Farquhar Street, Penang

This Anglican Church was build in 1816 using convict labour, when Colonel J.A. Bannerman was the Governor of Penang. The church was designed in the Georgian Palladian style - that's a combination of the Georgian style, named after the reigns of King George I and IV, 1714-1830; and the Palladian style, named after the Grecian architecture of a Roman called Palladius.

The first significant event to take place at the St George's Church was the marriage of Janet, daughter of Governor Bannerman, to William Edward Philips, in 1818. Services are still held at the St George's Church twice every Sunday, at 8.30am and 10.30am.

Some extracted paragraphs from HERE.

I had done a dozen of sketch theme as "Penang Building". This will be the last one, but who knows may be I will be sketching all of them again in future.

Backyard

Does your house backyard looks like this? This is the backyard of old houses at Georgetown, Penang.

Queen Victoria Memorial Clock Tower

Sketch by using Faber-Castell and Cray-Pas expressionist Oil Pastel.

Old Post Office

This is the NOVEMBER 2008 Monthly OIL PASTEL CHALLENGE posted in Wetcanvas forum. It took me sometimes to decided whether to take up the challenge. Here is my initial sketch.



I work on the scenery outside the door first. Refers to the reference photo, I observed that scenery outside the door is brighter compared to scenery inside the building.



Well, I told myself, I gonna improve the contrast between inside and outside later.



This is final, I layered a tint of light yellow for the outside scenery for the contrast. The challenge thread is here. Thanks for looking at it.

KOMTAR and Penang Ferry

KOMTAR tower is the tallest building in Penang. It was the tallest building in Asia when the time it was constructed, but lately it is been surpassed by Seoul's Korean Life Insurance Building. Anyway, It is still a very important landmark for Penang Island.

Penang Ferry is a transporter that can carry vehicle and people from Butterworth to Penang Island. It was the only way to cross the sea, but now it becomes second option to cross the sea, because we already have Penang bridge.

If you aware of the smoothly feel of mountain, it was blended by using tortillons. This is the view before blending was applied.



Which one do you prefer?

Armenian Street in Georgetown, Penang

Armenian Street is one of the historical street in Penang, where it was preserved with various famous heritage buildings. Cheah Kongsi is one of the building located at Armenian Street. If you are interested in knowing the history of Armenian Street, check out this page.


Armenian Street, Buncho Oil Pastel on white drawing paper

I remember I bought some print Penang building sketch postcard for my friend as a birthday gift. The sketch was done by charcoal for the buildings outline and with watercolor for foreground and background. I love those building sketch, which it inspire me to try this sketch.

First, I sketch the building with gray OP, but I purposely paint the flag, the round signboard and the streetlight with brighter color for the contrast to the old building because they are all newly added in recent years. Then, I apply pearl color on foreground for the buildings and background for the sky and clouds. With some marking done in gray for the darker parts of the clouds.

At last, I work out the outline with black, as well as adding gray and pear orange for the blends and shades. This is consider experimental, because I uses pale color for foreground and background but I express the buildings with dark outline. And I use less than 10 colors for the entire sketch.

Acheen Street and the Malay Mosque

The Acheen St. Mosque in Georgetown, Penang, is also known as Masjid Melayu Lebuh Acheh (Malay Mosque) was founded by Tengku Syed Hussain Al-Aidid in 1808. The entire complex is historically and architecturally important as it reflects the earliest Muslim urban community in Penang comprising of the Malays, Indian Muslims, Arabs and the Achehnese.
Quote from http://www.hbp.usm.my/townplg/heritage/acheen.htm.

The Mosque is located at the place near to Khoo Kongsi, which is walking distance.

The composition of buildings and the street is a challenge for me, I have no confident to sketch it directly with OP. With the help of colour pencil, I have done my initial sketch. It is easy to correct the mistakes on colour pencil compared to oil pastel.


My focus is to express the historical view on entire street, which I do not concentrate on the details in very fine manner.


Finally, I had completed the sketch.

Hai Kee Chan, Penang

Hai Kee Chan (海记栈）is a traditional mansion which located in Georgetown, Penang. Not like others Chinese traditional building which likes to paint in red, this building painted in green. If you are interested for visiting it, feel free to get further information at here.

I am using cray-pas expressionist OP, and painted on drawing block's cover that have coarse surface. Not like others Penang building painting that I usually sketch the details using color pencil before applying the Oil Pastel. But this time, I sketch it directly with OP.

I started with the door, lamp and the signboard.


Then I outline the rest of the objects such as windows and lanterns.


Next, I finished off the green wall.


Final!

Kek Lok Si

I sketched this Pagoda before, one of the ACEO I had made for the exchange. I still find it hard to sketch this octagon buildings. This is A4 size textured surface, mainly by Faber-Castell Oil Pastel with some cray-pas expressionist for the blending and layering.



I am not very satisfied with this one, I think I will plan for the next attempt in future.

Teo Chew Association in Penang

Teo Chew Association in Penang is also known as Han Jiang Ancestral Temple. It is a building that won the Award of Merit from the Unesco Asia-Pacific Heritage Award for Culture Heritage Conservation like Khoo Kongsi.

I have drew the outer hall of this temple. I am using mostly Faber-Castell creative studio oil pastel, as well as blending with some cray-pas expressionist OP on white drawing paper.

This is the initial sketch that I have done by using color pencil and few stroke of OP.


My focus on this building is the roof as well as the depth of the interior part. Therefore, I start my painting from the roof.


I use a lots of dark color to express the layer depth of the interior of the building, dark color consist of dark brown, dark blue, dark red as well as black.



And finally, it is done. Here I present you the Teo Chew Association in Penang. Thanks for looking at it.

Khoo Kongsi in oil pastel

Khoo Kongsi is located at Penang Georgetown, Malaysia. It is one of the famous heritage site in Penang. The outlook of this building looks like Chinese temple, it is mainly made of wood. You will find the clay statue on the top roof and Chinese lantern in the building.

I have discovered a photo at penangart.com, which is stunning! Therefore I took that photo as my reference and started a fast sketch!



I applied the paint with Faber-Castell OP, and blend it with a little bit of cray-pas expressionist OP as well. The paper I used is coarse texture light purple A4 size card.

This is the 3rd painting about Penang building I have done.

An old auberge in Penang

This is an old auberge located at Georgetown of Penang, Malaysia. Georgetown is the capital of Penang, has been added to the UNESCO World Heritage List recently. Although this tiny little auberge is not as famous as Khoo Kongsi, but this simple aging building is beautiful for me.

This is the first time I use Faber-Castell creative studio oil pastel into painting. I am using coarse surface orange card, as well as faber-castell color pencil for the initial sketching.

First, I am sketching this building in brown.


My first impression on Faber-Castell oil pastel is the price, it is expensive compared to cray-pas expressionist. Both of them provides 36 colors, Faber-Castell gives quite interesting range of colors for me, they have many light tone which is close to white, and it gives me two gray color. Well, they do not provide gold and silver.



I realized that Faber-Castell Oil pastel is quite dusty, and I prefer cray-pas white color compare to Faber-Castel one.



I am using cray-pas silver color for the gate, as well as some dark brown for the darker area of the wood window.



And finally, It is done. This is the second painting dedicated to Penang, my home neighborhood.



I have tried applying Faber-Castell white to cover the light yellow (102 cream), but it failed to cover, it seems opaque to me. Therefore, at last I choose cray-pas white.

Well, it is still too early to tell whether Faber-Castell oil pastel suits me or not. I will do more painting using Faber-Castell OP.

Penang Cheah Kong Si

Penang island is a beautiful island in Malaysia, also known as 檳榔嶼 in mandarin. The name "檳榔嶼" is in the navigational drawings used by Admiral Zheng He of Ming-dynasty China in his expeditions to the South Seas in the 15th century.

Penang Island is full of Chinese traditional old buildings. It is now part of UNESCO's World Heritage Cities Program. I am painting one of the heritage, Cheah Kong Si (谢氏宗祠)。

This is the initial sketch.


And this is the final painting.


This is the view of the front gate, it is made of wood and painted in red. This is the first Penang oriental building I have paint, I wish to do more in the future.