sketchcrawl 27: down by the bay

May 16, 2010May 27, 20104 Comments

I took the Amtrak down to San Francisco to join the popular SF crawl. It was an early start for me, the 7:55 Amtrak that I’ve taken many times before. Naturally I just had to draw a quick sketch on the train, while reading the excellent graphic novel Preacher. I wonder if there’s a Saint of Sketchers?

The crawl officially began at around 10:30 by the Ferry Building. Enrico, the Sketchcrawl founder, came by to say the end spot would be Union Square, not Vesuvio – a good decision as there was quite a crowd. (I wished I had an iphone to update the forum, in case latecomers went there). It was a grey and foggy morning; no need for the colourful paints just yet!

There were a few familiar faces there, and I sketched while munching a chocolate walnut brownie bought from the Farmer’s Market (oh man they’re good). An annoying clarinetist provided ‘entertainment’, but seemed unable to ever get past the first bar or so of ‘old macdonald’ before calling out to passing tourists. He was incredibly irritating.

sc27: at ferry building
As sketchcrawlers started to disperse, I headed off, accompanied by fellow sketchers Jana Bouc and Sonia. I wanted to go into the Hyatt and go up to look out of one of the high-up windows. We cheekily managed to get to the members-only top floor regency club, where the staff very nicely allowed us to sketch from their 360-degree window. The view was incredible, and the sun was burning the fog and bringing out the colour.

More to come!

worldwide sketchcrawl 27

May 12, 2010May 27, 20106 Comments

This Saturday is the 27th Worldwide Sketchcrawl, a global sketching event taking place simultaneously in cities and towns and villages etc across the planet. The Sketchcrawl event was founded by Enrico Casarosa just over five years ago and quickly caught on. I will be sketching in San Francisco; if you’d like to join in, we’ll be starting at about 10:30/11 at the Ferry Building, and finishing at about 4:30, most likely at Vesuvio’s on Columbus. For details, please visit the Sketchcrawl Forum (links to the SF crawl section).

I’ve done a few Sketchcrawls over the past few years. Some of them I have done alone (sketching being a very personal activity after all), on others I have met up at the start and end but wandered my own path in between. The end is often the best bit (other than the actual sketching itself), when you get to compare everyone’s sketchbooks and see how they drew and interpreted the same things you drew. Then we all go home and scan and post on the forum, and take a look at what other people did in their cities around the world. Here are some posts of sketchcrawls (or at least, official sketchcrawl days) I’ve participated in in the past:

San Francisco Sketchcrawl, Saturday May 15, 2010:

Start: @10:30, outside Peet’s Coffee, Ferry Building (Embarcadero)

End: @4:30, Vesuvio’s, Columbus St (North Beach/Financial District) to be confirmed!

power of vito

November 22, 2009November 22, 2009Leave a comment

Second and final drawing of my short sketchcrawl yesterday, which was interspersed with getting hair cut, shopping for Christmas cards, and generally cycling round thinking, ‘oh I’ve drawn everything in Davis, I’m so uninspired’. So I stopped for lunch. A beer (New Belgium 2 Below, if you’re ordering), and a mountain of garlic fries.

I made it a little over halfway through the mountain of garlic fries – I’m still suffering, next day – before going home. A big trough of garlic fries, it’s so unlike me. But I came in here – Uncle Vito’s, on the corner of E and 2nd – to draw the bar, so draw it I did. You can see me in the mirror there. There’s a bit of beermat philosophy that was going through my head as I made my way through the garlic fries surplus.

This place is fairly new, and occupies the space formerly tken by the Davis Driving School, and a little (cheap and not particularly good) chinese place called, I kid you not, Wok and Roll. They didn’t do garlic fries, but I can’t say they didn’t do stomachaches.

away from the numbers

November 21, 2009May 27, 20104 Comments

Today was the day of the 25th Worldwide Sketchcrawl – in fact it was also the fifth anniversary of the first one. I was pretty busy today, getting my hair cut and other important stuff, so wasn’t able to really take part, but I brought my sketching stuff with me (as always) downtown and managed to knock out a couple (by that I mean, draw two pictures, not actually knock out some poor unsuspecting couple). The second one was done while having a beer and some garlic fries (some! it was a mountain, I barely ate half). The fries made me feel sick, but they were tasty. I haven’t added colour to that one yet so you’ll not see it here just yet. I didn’t manage to meet with the main Davis sketchcrawl (I forgot to check the forum before I left). It was cold today, cold and bright. My micron pens were feeling it. I managed to draw this one (very typical pete, tree coming out of the top of the frame) in a quiet courtyard on C street, behind the Davis Community Church and away from the throng of the Davis Farmer’s Market. What a wimp, I thought to myself. How can I be cold? People all over the world are sketching in colder and probably wetter places than me. But I made sure my next sketch was indoors. Am I becoming a Californian?

sketchcrawl 21, santa rosa

January 12, 20093 Comments

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…

sketchcrawl 20 (part 3)

October 29, 2008October 28, 20085 Comments

And so on to 24th Street, and to the more colourful latin-american part of town. I loved it down there and was itching to draw some spanish-language shopfront. I chose a barber-shop (yep, drawn barber-shops in SF before) which i could have simplified, but i did have lots of kids and adults wearing chivas etc football shirts looking over my shoulder exclaiming excitedly in spanish so I felt i should keep adding details. I enjoyed drawing this one. The one below, I finally got a powerline in there. Several other sketchcrawlers were at this intersection – one even spoke to me, and happened to be from England – and there were also two large cops on two large motorbikes hodden behind opposite corners, bursting out sirens screaming every time someone jumped a stop sign (presumably that was the reason, unless it was something more serious). Decided to colour this elsewhere, over a well-deserved fat tire in a little Irish bar called napper tandy’s, full of fairly well-watered and friendly Irish people. Decided on sepia in the end, give it a different flavour.

Sketchcrawl ended at Muddy’s, a cafe with pretty much nothing on the menu that I wanted (this is why I prefer these things to end at a pub, at least they have beer, but that’s just me being a Londoner; I don’t drink coffee, so all those different flavour beans mean nothing to me). There were a LOT of other sketchcrawlers there, sharing their sketchbooks – though I usually like this bit, I was a little intimidated. I did sit and swap books with a few people, all great work, some people just doing one or two pictures, others filling pages and pages with quality work. I was given some nice compliments. But I got too shy to go mingling, and slinked off for a very messy mission burrito, before heading off to catch the amtrak bus over the bridge, and the train back to Davis, tired and exhausted.

I really enjoyed this Sketchcrawl. They’re always different. I guess the next one is in January some time – we’ll see! Hope you enjoyed my little trip through the Mission District.

sketchcrawl 20 (part 2)

October 28, 2008October 27, 20082 Comments

Saturday’s sketchcrawl in SF’s Mission District continued; I drew the view down 22nd St looking towards that large insectoid alien invader tower thing. I do know what it is called, but it is funnier if I call it that. You may notice, there are no power lines in this picture, what was I thinking? Was I going to spend a day drawing in the Mission without sketching my beloved powerlines? Surely not. But I had a checklist: powerlines, victorian houses, spanish-language shopfronts, and sutro tower with a hill full of buildings. Otherwise I may as well just stay in Davis and draw trees. I got the drawing of a building with a tree in the foreground done, that’s an old chestnut for me, plus the purple pen outing and the view from the train, I am becoming predictable. Can I resist drawing a framed picture with a tree or lamp-post escaping the frame? No I can’t, and there it is above. Below, a grand old Victorian on Guerrero, the sort of place you would just love to live. I enjoy drawing these. I gave this picture a very green tint to it.

After this, I strolled down to 24th to look at murals and sketch some more. Part 3 coming tomorrow…

sketchcrawl 20 (part 1)

October 27, 2008October 27, 20082 Comments

Saturday October 25th was Worldwide Sketchcrawl #20; I journeyed down to San Francisco to join the group of about sixty sketchcrawlers in the Mission District (you know I love it there). This was my eighth participation in the Sketchcrawl, and my second in San Francisco (the others being Davis twice, Berkeley twice, Sacramento and London). For me, the sketchcrawl is another excuse to go out and draw, maybe try some new things, to see how much I can do in the time given, but more importantly to see how other sketchers work. The many different ways of interpreting the same scenes are inspirational. Plus I get to check out other people’s pens.

I got the early Amtrak from Davis; it was going to be a very sunny day, even in the city. As always, I got the moleskine out to draw the view from the train through the Valley as it crossed the Delta into the Bay. I noted the times I sketched, along with a lyric from whatever happened to be on the headphones at the time. I got off the 14 bus at Mission District and within a block trod in some dogpoo – not a good start. Thankfully I was able to clean it off easily. Having lived in France and Belgium, I am normally hyper-aware of dogpoo, but living in the US has thrown me off, still this was the first time in many years and was probably an omen for a good day (the last time I trod in dogpoo was on the way to my second date with my future wife). But enough of the social history of dogpoo (that is another blog entry entirely, perhaps on another blog), and back to the 20th worldwide sketchcrawl.

There were a lot of people with sketchbooks at Que Tal on Guerrero, the meeting point. I was pleased to see the cafe sold Barry’s tea, my favourite, but I just had a bagel and went out into the street to start the sketching along with everybody else. Sketchcrawl’s founder Enrico Casarosa was there, with copies of his new book the Venice Chronicles. I began with a building opposite, on the corner of Guerrero and 22nd. The sun was casting dramatic shadows. Oh look, there’s a tree in the foreground (for a change). A lot of sketchers were drawing people, while I’m usually fixated with architecture, but I did too, using the micron purple pen that crawls out of my pencil case every few months or so. I recognised some of the faces from previous crawls, but my natural shyness meant I just buried myself into my moleskine and got down to business. But the great thing about other sketchers is that they don’t mind being sketched, so you never have to pretend you’re not sketching them. It’s quite liberating.