that’s what i’m trying to tell you kid, it’s been totally blown away

December 11, 20127 Comments

These lunchtime sketches are the last drawings ever of the old UC Davis Boiler Building. I made a point of getting there today to see what was left, and met a wide open space and a sad, defiant little corner. I just had to sketch straight away. As I sketched, big machines heaved and huffed and knocked away segments. Large cracks appeared accompanied by deep thunderous booms. It’s nothing personal, they said, we just want a place for the music to happen. The old external boilers, which originally drew me to the building (I sketched those back in 2010 as part of my hydrants and pipes NaNoDrawMo series), were holding out. I moved to the other side, to excitedly grab another sketch from a different angle. Such a thirst for the creative powers of destruction! When I came back a couple of hours later, all that remained were the boilers and a small section of wall. Oh, and a lot of rubble.

I am not done, of course. I’ll chart the new building as it grows, the new Recital Hall. I don’t know what it will look like yet (I don’t want to see any of the plans, I want the surprise).

Fare thee well, old Boiler Building! Rest in Pieces!

but i need a friend and i choose you

December 9, 201214 Comments

We happened to be in Midtown Sacramento today, buying art supplies and stocking stuffers at the University Art Store on J Street. I decided to stick around and sketch a building I last sketched back in early 2007, the Parish Church of St.Francis of Assisi. It was a cool day in Midtown, and I had a long walk to the bus afterwards, but it was a good walk. I always forget how much I do enjoy Midtown Sac, how many great sketching opportunities and interesting little stores there are. I remember when I first discovered the area, my wife had dropped me off to check out that record shop The Beat one day and I was hooked, it became my favourite place to escape to from Davis (other than the Bay Area of course). I was amazed I had never been there before; I generally avoided Sacramento in those early days, having only seen its rougher edges, but Midtown was cool. On those long Sundays when my wife wanted me out of the apartment, I’d be there somewhere between J or K or L, sketching. This building was in fact the first thing I ever drew in Midtown, so when I stopped there today it felt like I was sketching an old, old friend. I don’t go to this area very often now, maybe a couple of times a year, but it’s an interesting area, and has well-stocked art stores, comic shops, record shops and a British pub – what more do you need?

Incidentally, here is the version I drew nearly six years ago… different angle, different light, different pens, very different days.

it’s party time

December 7, 20124 Comments

Yesterday was our department’s (Statistics, UC Davis) annual holiday party. In all my years there I’ve never sketched any of our department events, but this time I felt the need to. I usually decorate the whiteboard for the party in dodgy dry-erase markers (and did so again, with snowmen – easy to draw – and a leafless tree – took a bit more time), but I don’t have a decent photo of that so you’ll just have to imagine it. Technically it’s my largest piece of public art. I had meant to bring a trifle too, and I went to the store and got all the ingredients, and quickly cycled home eager to put together my favourite favourite dessert, and realised I had forgotten one important thing. No sponge cakes. Back home I’d use either Jaffa Cakes or basic trifle sponges, but here, among other things, I’ve taken to using Twinkies. Well you all know Twinkies are now consigned to the big bin-bag in the sky, but I had cleanly forgotten to look for an alternative (Ladyfingers I’m told are good, but I can’t ask for them without thinking of Alan Partridge gyrating around a pole), and so it slipped my mind. I won’t make a trifle without this aspect of it, so the trifle did not get made. I considered burning the other ingredients ceremoniously, but I decided to keep them and make a trifle on a different day. I will probably use Pims (a near-equivalent to Jaffa Cakes, not the stuff you drink on a hot day in Surrey). Still, the food at this potluck was amazing as always, and I particularly enjoyed the vegetable biryani. Very festive!

bring it on down

December 6, 20124 Comments

Back to the old Boiler Building, and the machines are really tearing it down now. The whole east side has been turned to rubble, leaving a sad, draughty, haunted shell. A small crowd of people with young, construction-machine-loving-aged children (you know the age, parents!) to see the mighty mechanical dinosaurs at work, and to wave goodbye to a historic part of UC Davis. Back at work, I spoke about this sad demise of a much-loved campus sight to some of the professors who have taught there for the past few decades. “Where’s this, then?” they said. “Boiler Building? Is that downtown somewhere? Don’t know that one.” Well, I’ll miss it. Even if I too had no idea what it was for until recently.

go on, go on, go on, go on, go on, go on

December 3, 201210 Comments

This is a true story about when I blew up the kettle (accidentally) when I was nine. Probably long forgotten by everyone else, but something I remember every time I plug the kettle in. I drew this, my kettle and tea-making equipment, here in my kitchen in Davis, and it is part of the Pence Gallery’s ‘Teapot’ show, being displayed until the end of December upstairs at the Pence (D st, Davis: visit www.pencegallery.org for details). I do love a good cuppa tea. I don’t use a teapot (no point unless there’s a few of you) and I don’t do none of your fancy nonsense, just a working class cup of tea, thank you, lovely. Fortunately I can get my normal teabags here in America, so I can have my typical four or five cups a day. I would not have lasted long here otherwise. I remember being nonplussed when my American mother-in-law first came to England and remarked at how cute our little ‘tea station’ was (it was the kettle and jar of teabags), now I live here I know it’s not actually typical to have an electric kettle in every single household- in Britain and Ireland it’s so essential, we get a kettle before we get a bed or a roof or anything. A cuppa tea back home is a language we all understand. I won’t drink anyone else’s tea here in California either, not even in cafes, I only drink my own tea, made at home, perfect and unbeatable in every way. And when I discovered you can get chocolate Hobnobs here in Davis, well my cuppa tea experience moved a little closer to perfection. Now I’m just waiting for my son to get old enough, and that’ll be his job, just as it was mine. Hopefully, of course, he won’t blow up the kettle.

at the holiday sale

December 1, 20121 Comment

This weekend is the Davis Art Center’s annual Holiday Sale, a big and popular event at the DAC featuring art, crafts, jewelry and many other lovely hand-made products. They are also selling cards with a selection of my Davis sketches on them, which look great! I came by this afternoon during a lull in the stormy weather (having spent the morning getting very muddy chopping down a Christmas tree), and after watching Beckham’s last game for LA Galaxy (they won the MLS Cup). After perusing the stalls, I whipped out the sketchbook and drew a scene in the main atrium. It was bustling with people, a friendly family atmosphere. If you are in Davis, tomorrow (Sunday Dec 2) is the last day of the Holiday Sale, so why not pop by and check it out? The Davis Art Center is on the corner of F St and Covell, by Community Park.

Davis Art Center

nanodrawmo 2012 – part 5

December 1, 201210 Comments

I finally finished the NaNoDrawMo challenge, with time to spare. Here are the final posts, with nice drawings and rather inconsistent / incoherent writing exercises beside them.

Phew! Here are all 50 drawings, altogether in one place…

Well done to everybody else who took the NaNoDrawMo challenge this year (I think you’ll particularly enjoy my cousin Dawn’s inspirational drawings of fishing gear). There is some great stuff out there! You can check out the rest of the NaNoDrawMo Flickr group at:

http://www.flickr.com/groups/nanodrawmo/

the way we used to be

November 29, 2012November 30, 20124 Comments

While I’ll be posting the remaining set of NaNoDrawMo pieces altogether shortly, I thought you might like to see #50, the final one. It’s a self-portrait, although admittedly a few years have passed between the photo being taken and the drawing being drawn. I have had a haircut since then, and wear glasses, and I’m sure those dungarees don’t fit any more. No this is me aged about three, demonstrating why I keep my hair short (so as not to look like a diagram of the Atlantic Summer Hurricane Season). Hair is a bright red, eyes a bright blue, cheeks a bright pink; nothing’s changed there! I’m still as sweet. I still remember this face though, having to stand on the chair to see it in the mirror. This face makes me think of the Mr.Men theme music, by far my favourite show when I was a little one. Drawn in uniball signo um-151 pen (two sizes, 0.28 and 0.38) in a big Moleskine.

when it’s raining, it’s raining

November 28, 201212 Comments

Big rain storms rolled into California today. Late November can be a very colourful time of year, when the trees are bright yellow, fiery orange, deep reds, and leaves flutter down on every breeze. When the storms come it blows everything around, meaning what would otherwise be a grey and dismal day was in fact a beautiful, I mean really beautiful stormy morning. I walked to a meeting mid-morning, and could have walked on all day in the rain. The ground was covered in bright leaves, like a dusting of golden snow. I don’t have a window in my office so I can’t gaze dreamily out at the rain (I have to draw a picture of it on my whiteboard), but I can hear it on the skylight, tap-tap-tap, and by lunchtime it was pounding. I couldn’t wait to get back out, find a sheltered spot, and draw the colourful storm while it lasted. I listened to a history podcast about England’s medieval conquest of Wales and drew in the Moleskine. It’s funny, whenever it rains here people are often, oh no, rain, I don’t want to get my raincoat slightly wet in the brief dash from my car to Target, whereas I’m like, oh it’s just a bit of rain, grrr. So I scribbled down this cartoon in my notepad this afternoon. Thought you might like it.

will soon shake your windows and rattle your walls

November 27, 20122 Comments

I can’t get enough. I’m not obsessed or anything. Here is the UC Davis Boiler Building again, still in the same state of deconstruction as in the previous two sketches. It’s looking so sad and beaten, yet triumphant as well, as though it’s saying, come on, do your worst. Another demolition machine has lined up beside it now, like a warrior preparing for more hyperbole. I drew it from the back this time, another angle, in fact the same angle as I drew it from in August, this one here:

It was sunny today, too. I just didn’t show you the blue sky. It just didn’t seem appropriate.