For the Win

11/12/19 sketched from photo

I don’t usually like to draw from photos, and I’m not even a soccer fan, but the Seattle Times’ coverage of the Seattle Sounders’ MLS Cup win included an irresistible image. I treated this sketch the way I would short poses at life drawing – just trying to capture the movement, determination and strength of both players as quickly as possible.

The cutline on Andy Bao’s photo reads: “Sounders midfielder Victor Rodriguez [in green] rifles a shot between Toronto FC defenders Chris Mavinga [not shown] and Omar Gonzalez [in red] that Toronto goalkeeper Quentin Westberg wasn’t able to stop and Seattle had a decisive 2-0 lead in the 76^th minute.”

Generally I ignore the sports section, but I must admit, some of the best photography of figures that I’ve ever seen has been on those pages.