Some more drawings of Charleroi, done in uniball / unipin pens. Images of the old pays noir town. Do not adjust your sets. Even the football team play in black and white (allez les zebres).
Category: sketchbloggery
straight out of the sketchbook
as the present now will later be past
Time travel doesn’t exist; it cannot exist. Don’t let any quantum physyicist tell you otherwise. And yet, in fact I did manage to travel through time, when I got on a train to Charleroi, my home between ’99 and ’00. I live on the other side of the world now, and was stepping back to take a look around at a life I used to lead. Now that is time travel.
Nothing had changed. Well, not nothing exactly; the shops were now open on Sundays, and there was a new little mini-supermarket right by to where I used to live (which would have been really handy back when I lived there), but otherwise, Charleroi was still the same: unpolished, post-industrial, and very familiar. This is not a tourist town; Bruges it aint, and all the better for
it. We had a classic Carolo night out; went to my usual places, rubbed shoulders with locals, had Kwak and Charles Quint at la Cuve à Bière (where the people are all the same as before), chatted drunkenly in the smoky Irish Times, staggered up to the excellent popular all-night friterie Chez Robert for a mitraillette de dinde (I am astonished I could still find it after all this time), and then a couple of Fanta Citrons in the morning for the hangover. The freezing cold sun helped too. While waiting for a train, I drew the picture above on tha banks of the murky Sambre (or at least most of it; the ink in my micron pen started complaining about the cold, so I finished it later). We walked about town, I wandered about in my memories and took plenty of photos, and drew La Vigie, the tall building where I used to live on the 13th floor when I taught at the U.T.
It was a fleeting visit, really (there’s not that much reason to stick around in Charleroi in the cold). Who knows when I’ll ever be back. I’m really glad I went though, and visited the increasingly-distant past, but it was even nicer to get back to the future.
not that pelé
Yohann Pelé, goalkeeper for French club Le Mans (who according to France Football wants a move to Angleterre), and my illustration friday entry for this week, theme being ‘pale’. Yes, Pale. And this guy’s name is Pelé, which is close enough, right? but it’s not that Pelé, it’s one who surely pales in comparison (oh please). Plus he’s wearing a pale blue kit.
I wanted to draw a footballer from my France Football paper (which I bought in Belgium; can’t get it here in Davis, but I accumulated a massive pile of them when i lived in France, best footy paper in the world). I wanted to do some sketching in pencil and coloured pencil, I was playing around with it, and I like it.
la vie est belge
A few days after Christmas, a friend and I went over to Belgium, where I used to live what feels like a lifetime (but was less than ten years) ago. I spent a year in Charleroi between 1999 and 2000, my time there culminating with the now infamous visit of the chair-throwing England fans. It was a year that has shaped a lot of my imagination, though I did little but eat frites drowned in sauce, drink and learn about beer at la cuve à bière, and play the guitar (writing songs about this, about that). That is, however, the life. We took the early Eurostar to Brussels, and walked around the busy post-noel streets, surprised to find that there was no rain whatsoever – I nearly didn’t recognise it in the sunshine. I like Brussels. I drew at the Grand Place, crowded, touristy, disgustingly ornate, but necessary for a budding urban sketcher to draw. I wasn’t going to seek out the urban grit – we were going to Charleroi later that evening, and there would be plenty of that.
I stopped in a shop I loved when I was living there: Grasshopper, an amazing store that sells all sorts of toys and books. I wanted to buy some French board books for my baby son (decided not to go with teaching him Flemish just yet). However, while I was sketching, I must have put them down and forgotten about them (very unlike me*). I went back to the store and bought some more, and asked if anybody had returned them. Non, they told me, ils sont bye-byes. Yeah, cheers. So, we took a very modern double-decker train south to the city of Charleroi, and while Roshan napped in the hotel, I ventured out into the freezing dark evening to do some night-time pre-pub sketching, and drew Le Luxembourg, a place which although very pretty, I have never actually entered. While drawing, I kept my eyes on the shadows for, er, shadowy people, happy to be back in my old town.
*I do tend to lose things in Brussels, though. I lost my favourite top here once, in 1999. I wrote a song about that too. It was white with thin black hoops. If you find it, let me know; it might still fit.
what up dog
I drew a dog. Doesn’t happen very often. I’m not a dog person. But this dog is cool, and just staying out of the way, while other dogs and a canine-loving baby (who now says “dog-gie!” very clearly) get on with it. This is my brother-in-law’s dog Nalu (I have no idea how it is spellt), drawn quickly yesterday.
sketchcrawl 21, santa rosa
I wasn’t intending on doing the 21st sketchcrawl, but i managed to go out sketching in the afternoon while visiting in santa rosa, and did a few drawings around 4th street. A mini sketchcrawl. I also wanted to try out my new REI sketching stool. It was very comfy.
Funny thing, but whenever I sketch in Santa Rosa I’m never that happy with the shading or the colours. I don’t know what it is. It is different there, very different from Davis. Different trees, different light, different air. More ‘pacific’. It is also the first place I ever went to in America. I did a couple of quick drawings in sepia, before going back to colour. The second one is of Snoopy; Charles Schultz lived in Santa Rosa, this was his town. All over town there are now these statue things of Snoopy. It’s a bit like when towns in Europe used to have those those statuesque cows everywhere, all painted differently. I remember Zurich and Berlin also have bears.
After drawing Snoopy, I walked down to Traverso’s, next to the Transit Mall. It is an Italian deli place, full of excellent cheeses and wines and biscotti and stuff. I remember a while ago I spoke to the guy who works there, maybe traverso himself, and spoke football. Calcio. He tld me all his family support Roma, but he supports Lazio. Or it may have been the other way round. Anyway, I did overhear some talk about Beckham playing for AC Milan while in there sampling cheese. I like Traverso’s. Not massively happy with the drawing though.
I finished off by supping a red top beer at the 3rd St Aleworks. Speaking of red tops, a guy and his girlfriend sat down next to me, and he took off his jacket to “show his colours”, revealing an Ars*nal shirt, complete with Fabr*gas on the back. I had to roll my eyes. Dear oh dear.
Anyway, so this was my mini-sketchcrawl. Next one (#22) is in April, so I hear…
soho continued
Part 2 of Soho sketching day. This is Broadwick Street, and that is the Blue Posts pub, which I also sketched in ’07. In the distance, Centre Point. There I am, to the left, drawing this very scene. My nephew and I chatted while I drew, then went to art shops, foreign language bookshops, football shirts shops; I lamented the lameness of 
Carnaby Street, navigated through short-cuts and alleys, reminisced about nights out I can barely remember. I do see Soho as a city with a city, and one with tiny neighbourhoods of its own, and I could draw it endlessly, but the end of the afternoon came quickly, and so we got the tube back up the Northern Line, my tired nephew sleeping much of the way back (and giving me a chance to attempt some tube-train sketching; here is the result…)
A good day was had by all!
where other broken people go
Still not finished with these sketches from London! A few weeks ago, I went out early on the Saturday morning before Christmas with my nephew anthony for a sketchcrawl around the narrow and interesting streets of Soho. It was perfect sketching weather, not too cold; did I mention that it never rained the entire time I was back in London? The entire time? In December?
It’s true. Back when I visited in Summer, it rained on every single day. I was actually preparing for rain-soaked sketching. “On a rainy night in Soho,” that might have been the title. It wasn’t even cold. So we began in Soho Square, and I did the picture above. Weekend before Christmas, steps away from the busiest shopping street in Britain, and it was calm, not busy. I grew to love Soho years ago, I learnt all its alleys and short cuts, appreciated all its quirks. In the mid-nineties, the post-club 4am stop was Bar Italia, on Frith Street (it was Italians who brought me there), the only time I ever drank a cappucinno (I am not a coffee drinker), and it hasn’t changed. Pulp sang a song about it once. There it is below, sketched as we sat in Caffe Nero (I always thought it said Caffe Nerd) opposite having soup (I know, I should have gone to Bar Italia rather than a chain cafe, but I wanted to draw the cool place; besides, going there in daylight hours without the echo of heavy music still ringing in my ears just seemed kinda wrong).
That clock is wrong by the way. And John Logie Baird used to live there. He probably couldn’t hear the telly for all the noise outside.
Part 2 to come…
hangin’ out your stockings on the wall
Today (January 6) is the last day of Christmas, although really it ended ages ago, here in America. There is this amazing Christmas house just down the road from where we live that completely decks the halls with lights and music, but turns back into a regular suburban home come the striking of the New Year. Not us, our tree stays put until the twelfth night. Laziness, more than tradition, besides we like having that festive corner to look at. We spent most of this Christmas season in London, however, and ate and drank and were very merry. Mince pies and Quality Street. Oh, and posh tea at the Waldorf. It was my son’s first Christmas, and while he wasn’t quite as interested in unwrapping presents as we thought he’d be, he still had a great time, with his London family. And this is his first ever christmas stocking, which Santa (aka Father Christmas) filled with many of his favourite things (including toy ducks, and cheerios – hey they were on his list). Drew this in his journal.
don’t judge a book just by its cover
…unless you cover just another. Burnt Oak Library, at the junction of Watling Avenue, Gervase Road and Orange Hill Road. And now, to my surprise, it has been painted black, and had a monstrous carbuncle of a tiled entranceway attached inexplicably to the front.
Which architect thought that was a good idea? “Oh it’s only Burnt Oak, nobody cares, that library is old and unwashed anyway, they should be grateful anyone wants to build anything there,” they probably thought. No, that new addition looks contrived. I thought they were new public toilets at first (as if). Yes, the additional CCTV cameras have apparently helped disperse the gangs of dodgy kids (apparently they now go just over the street). Apparently you can pay your council tax there now. There are lovely glass reliefs inside, because obviously Barnet Council has nothing better to spend that council tax on.
This is home, this is where I’m from, up that road snaking away to the right, though I now live on the other side of the planet. I spent many a day in this library nosing through the language books. there used to be these three great maps in the doorway showing Burnt Oak at various stages in history, from sometime in the 1800s when it was all farmland, to some time in the early 1900s when it was all farmland, to the 1960s when it was the metroland of the 30s, the Watling estate sprawling over red and orange hills (those are the names, forget colourful imagery, unless it reminds you of the brick and roofs). It was always rough, as long as I knew it, and it’s rough still (those phone boxes have pretty much never ever had glass in them), but it’s changed, it’s not the same, even since I’ve been gone. Everything must change. But you don’t have to paint the library black and put a colourful runway on the front of it. Just a few extra books would have been nice, and more useful.
petescully 