A large part of my first year in Cambridge was focused around Downing College (above). I went there for lunch very often and worked next door to it at the Downing Site. Now though, I’m based next door to Homerton college (below) and have a few classes there as well. Having spent quite some time now walking past both buildings, buildings that I found very beautiful the first time I saw them, I’ve come to realise that when looking at them in recent times, some of that initial magic has been lost. I miss the feeling of seeing them and feeling joy and awe. I want it back. I want to be able to look at old buildings, that I’ve seen numerous times, with fresh eyes. I want to be able to soak in new, simple, beautiful experiences from my walks throughout the week.

So, I’ve devised a plan based on an amazing feeling I had after drawing a church from a photo reference earlier this month. After drawing the church, drawing its lines, shapes, circles, worn out brick in sketch, I walked past it again a few days later. Walking past it that time though felt different… I felt that ‘magic’ again. I looked at it and thought, ‘I remember drawing that line’, ‘Oooh, yeah, I remember studying that circle around the glass’, ‘It looks so magnificent and intricate’, and I gained an appreciation of the effort put into designing and building the church, the beauty of it, that I had never experienced before. Suddenly, that church that I’d walked past and seen so many times before looked new again… there were so many features on it that I’d never paid attention to before when looking directly at it… and I got the urge to walk up to it, take a picture of an even smaller portion of her architecture, and then study it bit by bit.

I was so surprised by how happy the church made me feel that I suddenly wanted, with a renewed vigour, to draw areas all over that I had walked past multiple times and had gotten bored of. So, I thought, yup, let’s try to draw places more… but not just draw, but to put different filters on them in photograph and try to see them in a new light. I think that it’s working. I’m enjoying being a ‘baby’ again and seeing things afresh. 🙂

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