Davis Community Church sketched from Central Park. Click to make big.

Last Monday was Presidents Day here in the U.S. It is also the celebration of George Washington’s birthday, which is actually a week earlier than his actual birthday presumably because everywhere was booked on the 22nd so it was easier to have it on the three-day weekend before. Of course while we’re pondering over the first president’s birth certificate you’ll notice he was born in a different country. News pundits didn’t really care so much about that back then. But anyway it was Presidents Day which meant a day off, which meant an afternoon sketching. Well, a couple of hours anyway. My son was playing with his friend in the new playground in nearby central park and I stood in the shade and sketched a panorama of Davis Community Church, from the side. It’s only this time of year you can really see this view because those trees will soon be getting their leaves. I sketched in the Seawhite of Brighton book, and I coloured it in a few days later at home. The weather is gorgeous here in Davis right now, t-shirt weather, low 70s, sunny. In the rest of America however, the picture is very different, unbelievably cold, so I’m sending you a little bit of our Davis sunshine.

Now, I have sketched this scene before, but a long time ago. August 2006 to be precise, as shown below, sketched from a little further up the road with my first Davis bike in the foreground. In those days I preferred to sketch just with the paint, which I don’t do any more, but I like the effect. This is one of my earliest Davis sketches, sketched in a WH Smith cartridge paper sketchbook.

The same building sketched in 2006