life is never dull, in your dreams

April 22, 2011April 21, 20112 Comments

I left the Mission district with ages to spare (BART being a lot quicker than I thought, for some reason) and hung out by the Embarcadero for a while, watching the sunlight fade, and sipping an Anchor Steam beer on the outside terrace of the Americana hotel. Proper San Francisco beer for the end of the day. I sketched the Fery Building, glowing in the evening sun, and as the lights went on on the Bay Bridge I sat by the water’s edge and used the white gel pen to capture it.

On the Amtrak train coming home, I read the comics I’d bought and flicked through the day’s sketches. there was time for one more; so I looked at my reflection in the window and sketched that.

all the people, so many people

April 21, 2011April 21, 20112 Comments

The meet-up at the end of the sketchcrawl is always a lot of fun, a great chance to see and ‘wow’ at new work, and the San Francisco group being so big and varied it’s always a pleasure. We met at 4:30 back at the very crowded slopes of Dolores Park, as the Mission sun shone, and fog drifted around Sutro Tower above us. After seeing a few incredible sketchbooks, I decided to catch up on my people sketching. There were some familiar faces (see Jason above with the beard, I have sketched him a couple of times before) and lots of new faces. You can catch up with everybody’s great work on the Sketchcrawl website.

I realised that apart from a little orange and a brownie, I hadn’t actually eaten. So I ran off to a taqueria, El Toro on Valencia, and got myself a grilled salmon burrito (which was great, though next time I’ll not get so much refried beans). Gotta have a burrito in the Mission, eh. I do like a burrito.

I left the Mission by BART, passing down the piss-stenched escalators at 16th & Mission, and heading back to the Embarcadero. I kept sketching on the way home…more to come…

a thousand things i wanna say to you

April 20, 2011Leave a comment

Valencia Street is full of art and artists, drink and drinkers, food and eaters, and interesting folk. Strolling down on the way to Mission Comics and Art I was striuck by these great message posts up and down the street, places where people can post their flyers without getting all over the telegraph poles. Each was decorated with a different colourful headpiece. A little further down, some Mexican musicians were taking a break to tune up their instruments, so they got sketched as well.

Mission Comics and Art on 20th is a great store, one I had not been to before but whom I follow on Facebook. I had a good nose around there, and loved the gallery of Mission comic images at the back. I wanted to get one of Joey Alison Sayers’s zines; I love her stuff, it is hilarious (see her site here) but have had bad luck finding her zines (and I gave the first one I bought years ago to my nephew). When I met her at her stall at SF ZineFest last September, I had already spent most of my money on other (less interesting) zines so only bought one then. I was pleased then to find another one at Mission Comics, “Just So You Know”, which was a lot of fun to read on the train home.

And then into Mission Street itself. It’s a little bit rougher here, but it’s funny, because it reminds me of London a bit, Kilburn High Road or somewhere. Not the Latin-American feel – you can’t get good proper Mission burritos in London, for sure – more the rough edges. Definitely not the palm trees. I sketched the old Mission theatre, and then a corner shop. I wasn’t finished sketching for the day, but it was time to go and meet up with the other sketchcrawlers at Dolores Park… (to be continued)

gets me to the church on time

April 20, 2011April 20, 2011Leave a comment

Mission Dolores. It’s the oldest building in San Francisco, and gets picked first in all the football teams. It was very windy by this point in the SF sketchcrawl, and so I hid beside a postbox to sketch it, nestling it on the page between two drawings of local fire hydrants (I’m back! first hydrants I’ve drawn in months). Using the magic of photoshop I have surgically removed them from the drawing so you can read them on their own merit, but if you are interested in seeing the page as it is in my sketchbook, the unaltered piece is at the bottom of the post.

I like the fire hydrants with the little bobbles on top, you see those in the city. It reminded me of an albino smurf, so I had to add this to the collection. I also like those big fat hydrants SF has, like the one on the right. You’d want one of those on your side in a fight, I’m sure, stocky little things.

After this I walked over to Needles and Pens, just down the street, an excellent zine store. I bought there a copy of the Comic Book Guide to the Mission, which I’ve been looking forward to. I love the cover by Chuck Whelon! I was going to wait until I got to Mission Comics and Art (which was my plan for later that day) before picking it up, as they have the original cover drawing on their gallery wall, but I just could not resist. Anyway, the drawings continued, many more to come…

hanging small in a pale blue sky

April 19, 2011April 19, 20112 Comments

Moving on with the SF Sketchcrawl, I walked up past Dolores Park towards the Castro neighbourhood. I happened upon a particularly interesting and colourful old Victorian, and so I climbed some steps on the building opposite (whose windows were boarded up; I doubted anybody minded) and sketched from a higher elevation. This old house is very cool.

As I sketched, I was myself sketched by fellow sketcher Jana Bouc:

: pete sketching in the mission, by jana bouc

More sketching to come… plus added fire hydrants!

man on a mission

April 19, 2011April 19, 20111 Comment

Sketchcrawl 31, continued. Well, this is where the actual sketchcrawl began: Dolores Park Cafe, on 18th St. I went there last year with my friend from London, Simon, but this year I didn’t try any mango smoothies, I just went straight into sketching gear. I stayed in sketching gear all day long, barely stopping to breathe; quite literally on a Mission. One of my missions however was to visit a couple of great zine/comic stores, and I wasn’t disappointed. There were quite a few sketchers there already, many of whom I’d met on previous sketchcrawls – it was nice to see familiar faces. Above left is the cafe itself, and on the right, the ornate domed tower of the Mission High School, directly opposite. I think everybody drew that one.

Here are some sketchers, drawn in my small ‘quick people sketches’ moleskine: Enrico Casarosa in the green, with the hat on, he is the founder of Sketchcrawl and the leader of the San Francisco group. On the right, long-time sketching inspiration Jana Bouc of the Bay Area Urban Sketchers, who accompanied me sketching my long-winded route around the Mission district (always a pleasure to sketch with her). I also met (but didn’t sketch) fellow Urban Sketcher correspondent Gary Amaro, and met up again with fellow Davisite Allan Hollander, who I’d sketched on the way down from Davis. More sketches to come; we’re only on page 2 of 7…

and i think my spaceship knows which way to go

April 18, 2011April 18, 20113 Comments

The 31st Worldwide Sketchcrawl happened on Saturday, and I was at the ‘crawl in San Francisco, sketching away like crazy. Whenever I sketch in the city I try to cram in as much sketching as possible, in the most area-covering route possible, which along with the travelling down from Davis is pretty exhausting. I caught the early train, and another Davis sketcher Allan was also there at the station, which was a nice surprise. We rode down together as far as Richmond, and I was able to grab a sketch of him sketching away, and had a look through his sketchbook of antennae which is particularly cool (I want to sketch antennae now myself!). I went on and caught the Amtrak bu from emeryville over to the Ferry Building, where I like to pick up a chocolate walnut brownie (traditional sketchcrawl substenance), and I also sketched the large installation ‘Raygun Gothic Rocketship’, with the Bay Bridge behind it. My son loves rocketships.

And then I hopped onto a Muni to the Mission… more sketches to come!!

crossing bridges

April 6, 2011April 6, 201112 Comments

When I first moved to Davis at the end of 2005, my wife told me about this cool thing she’d read about called ‘Sketchcrawl’, and that it was happening all over the world on the same day, and that there would be one in Davis organized by some local sketchers sketching the ‘Arboretum’ (another word that entered my vocabulary). I shyly met with a group of sketchers all buried in sketchbooks at Mishka’s cafe on a chilly morning and followed them to the Arboretum, by the creek, where evryone panned out and sketched away until it was too cold to do so. It was great, and though I didn’t draw outside for several months afterwards, and didn’t join another sketchcrawl for even longer, it was my first ever sketching day in Davis – the first of a great many. So for this latest Let’s Draw Davis sketchcrawl I was eager to show other people what a great place the Arboretum is to draw, but also to see for myself how my sketching has changed in the past five and a half years.Below is the same scene as above, sat in almost the same spot, but with my now differing styles.

: the same scene in december 2005

And below, here I am with Moleskine #7. More sketches to come!

it’s raining; let’s not draw davis…

March 18, 2011Leave a comment

The rain is coming down heavy, and so tomorrow’s sketchcrawl at the arboretum is postponed…

…and rescheduled for Saturday April 2nd, when I am told we will have lovely sunny weather (we can hope!). So if you’re in Davis, join us on April 2nd! Everyone is welcome to sketchcrawl with us, even if you’ve never sketched before and justa want to give it a go. What better time than with others who love to draw? And at the Arboretum in the springtime, there is much to draw.

Of course, I’ll still sketch tomorrow, just at home, in the dry…

let’s draw uc davis!

February 5, 2011February 4, 2011Leave a comment

And it’s time for another Davis sketchcrawl… this time on the UC Davis Campus! Join us on Saturday February 19th for a day of sketching. We will meet at 10:30am on the corner of 3rd and A Streets, just outside the Social Sciences Building (the ‘Death Star’). We’ll sketch from there all the way down to the Silo (Hutchison & California Avenues), where we’ll finish up at 3:00pm to show each other our sketchbooks.

There was a great turn-out for the the sketchcrawl in January! (see here for photos and sketches, and here for Aggie TV’s coverage of the event). Let’s spread the word and get more people out with sketchbooks!

Pete

Let’s Draw Davis! Flickr group

Facebook event