This door caught my attention during one of my treks to the Upper West Side of Manhattan in the early 1990s. The pattern seems to be Art Deco. Although I don’t remember much else about the doors, they seem to be gating an empty space, from the reflections on the threshold below.  The doors also, at one time, opened to an Fallout Shelter, according to the rusted sign on the keystone.

Sunrise Door

I sketched the left-hand picture with pen and ink, using small strokes in various densities, to provide the gray values. On the right side is a pencil sketch, outlined with pen and ink. I filled the space in between the sun’s rays with a Derwent ‘Cool Brown’ watercolor pencil. I completed the rest of the marble block faces with a Derwent 6B medium wash pencil.

Sketches – Upper West Side Sunrise Door