Stavrovouni: Initial Concepts

Here is a page of concepts for my first travel poster which will depict the famous monastery of Stavrovouni located in the Larnaca district of Cyprus.

When sketching my concepts for this poster I tried to explore different angles and viewpoints of the Byzantine monastery (which dates back to 328AD). I have also included a few quick studies of a monk. I am keen to try and depict how the mountain looked before two large rocks at the east-end of the building collapsed in 1963.

A more detailed study in graphite

This study took about 2 hours to complete. Once again, I am exploring alternative techniques with my pencil markings trying to represent the soft and rough textures of the surrounding landscape and the building itself.

I worked overnight on these drawings using only HB, 2B and 6B pencils to try and render different tones, textures and shading. I also switched from cartridge paper to hot press watercolour paper just to see how the pencil would react with the tooth or grain of different paper.

I’m pretty happy with the results so far. The next challenge is sketching and illustrating the final drawing for my poster.