riding along in my automobile

October 5, 2011October 4, 20114 Comments

More classic cars from the Antique Automobile Club of America, who were showing off their golden oldie vehicles at the Sonoma County Harvest Fair in Santa Rosa last weekend. I had some nice chat with some of the car owners, who were all very excited about these cars, as was I. I’ve said it before, you think of America, you think of cars like this, big and swanky, not the beige Toyotas that everyone here drives (including us). These aren’t simply ‘cars’, they are Automobiles. It’s worth saying all those extra syllables. I even recognize the sparkling whitewall tyres (thank you ‘Cars’, or rather thank you my three-year-old-son). The blue automobile above is a 1955 Ford Fairline Sunliner, ah 1955, I remember it well from Back to the Future. (Actually I saw an actual DeLorean a couple of months ago, on the Freeway, I’ve never seen a real one before! It was heavy) While sketching, someone did ask me why I chose to draw this one, and not, for example, the more interesting looking car next to it (a green Kaiser Dragon). This one, he said, was one of the less interesting of the cars on display. I told him, well it’s pretty interesting to me, but mostly it’s because I could see ll of it; the Dragon was partly hidden by a display board (and by this car). I tell you what I found interesting, there is only one wing mirror, on the driver’s side.

This however was the car that everyone seemed to rave about, and it’s easy to see why. The big, powerful red 1936 Cord is like something out of a retro sci-fi fantasy, less of a car than a comic book come alive. Those metal pipes coming from the side make me suspect that this is in fact a Time Machine, what Doc Brown would have made if he had a better budget. How could I resist? I must admit, I’d never heard of Cord automobiles before. This looks like a Cord 812, though I may be wrong. As someone who usually can’t tell one car from the other (having been stuck in car parks full of beige Toyotas looking for a beige Toyota), I love the variety in design of the old cars. They don’t make ’em like they used to (but we probably get better mileage nowadays).

you better slow your mustang down

October 4, 2011October 3, 201110 Comments

We went to the Sonoma County Harvest Fair at the Santa Rosa Fairgrounds this weekend, to see the Grape Stomping (some people are very serious about that), the Pumpkin Tossing (actually I didn’t see that this time, but my son did some pumpkin bowling), make scarecrows, and of course draw old antique cars. I love drawing old cars, but don’t do it very often – last year’s Harvets Festival was in fact the first and last time. I chatted with some of the car owners, one of whom was an artist of cars and buildings himself. I started off drawing a red 1967 Ford Mustang. It reminded me of 1970s cops, on the edge. Even though this is so very American, I kept humming the theme tune to the Professionals. You really need to screech up a kerb and knock over some bins before sliding across the bonnet and taking out some crook with a couple of right hooks with a car like this, don’t you. You see all these SUVs and Hummers and trucks these days, but those are just compensating, macho nonsense; none of them say ‘tough guy’ like a car like this does. Anyway, it was fun to draw.

the little house downtown

October 3, 2011October 3, 2011Leave a comment

I’ve wanted to draw this pretty house downtown, on the corner of 3rd and E, for some time now, and last week after work I finally did so. A few people spoke to me as I sketched, fellow admirers of this gorgeous building, and I told them that this is part of a series of Davis urban sketches I am doing for my upcoming show in December… It’s a lovely building, but I have to admit that the feature which excited me the most to draw was the TV antenna, you don’t see them too often nowadays.

the wizard’s tower

September 30, 2011September 30, 20111 Comment

As I said before, lunchtimes are more crowded now that the students are back in town (such exciting daily reporting from Davis, California! Tune in tomorrow when I tell you whether there were any chocolate croissants at the coffee shop or not) Anyway, seating being limited I sat out in the shade with a different view of the Silo, and one that I could not resist putting into the sketchbook. Yes, that’s ivy covering the Silo tower. With a few more windows that would be a brilliant place for a fantasy-story wizard to live. The Wizard of the Silo, sounds like a mystery novel already. Well, NaNoWriMo is coming up, why not write it? Here’s the plot: in the hot, hot valley there lived an old wizard, who despite the heat always dressed in a long thick robe, and wove ivy into his long flowing beard. (I know what you’re thinking, ‘another bloody hippy’, but let’s carry on with the story). Anyway, this wizard had grown tired of all his magic and all his crows (that’s a thing, there used to be loads of crows in Davis but you don’t see them any more, where are they all? Sorry, back to the story) and … actually you can finish the rest, I’m bored of this epic tale already. Never mind NaNoWriMo, I’ve given up before it’s even October. Well, I have a lot of drawing to do for my December show…

school boards

September 29, 2011September 29, 20111 Comment

It’s a new year on the UC Davis campus, thousands of students new and continuing all over the place, eager enthusiasm abounds and so do bikes, clattering into everything that moves or stands still. All around the campus are the frat-boards, advertising frateernities, sororities, societies, fellowships, brotherhoods, sisterhoods, political groups, you name it. Maybe I should get one for “Let’s Draw Davis”. Our next Sketchcrawl is on October 15th, downtown (exploring the ‘hidden spots’ of downtown, it should be fun, and it’s our first anniversary of Let’s Draw Davis too). I gave out a flier to a fellow sketcher who spotted me drawing the same frat boards (it’s always great to bump into other people out with their sketchbooks!). One other thing about the new academic year on campus is that after a summer of not having to queue much for lunch, suddenyl you’re back into spending ages in line (at least the beloved Thai soup is back), meaning there’s a lot less time for filling sketchbooks. So I only had ten minutes to do a very quick sketch (I had to add the colour later). But I think I caught what I needed to catch in those ten minutes.

my young apprentice

September 27, 20114 Comments

I forgot about this sketch, I did in July, of my three year old son Luke painting with his winsor and newton paints in his own sketchbook. He likes to draw. The other morning, he woke me up early putting a pack of crayons and some paper on my bed. He drew a shape, and then told me to trace over it with a red crayon. He wasn’t impressed with the results though. “No no, daddy,” he said, “triangles have five sides!”

across the tracks

September 27, 20112 Comments

Attempted Davis Amtrak station again, from a different angle this time. Went downtown on Sunday morning to do some sketching, and it rained! Not much, spitting really, but it was difficult to sit and draw in the rain. Sure I’ve done it before, but under shelter, not when the drops are getting on the page. So I gave up and did most of this back at home.

d’you wanna pizza me?

September 25, 20112 Comments

I don’t eat pizza very often, and I don’t ever get pizza from here, but Woodstock’s is one of those Davis staples, and a student favourite. On Friday lunchtime I was not sure what to sketch, and in the end I left it too long to decide. I stopped on G Street and drew a quick ten minute thumbnail of this well-known pizzeria, with the intention of coming back and doing a bigger drawing. I came back downtown this afternoon and sat out on G Street sketching. That’s a sushi place next door, very popular. I don’t eat sushi.

Here’s a note. I drew this on Canson Montval watercolour paper (the main one; the thumbnail was in my watercolour moleskine), with a micron pigma pen, but decided to use the very thin nibbed uniball signo for the bricks. I’ve used it recently with drawings that were subsequenty given a wash and had no problem, but this time, my initial issue with the pen happened again and it bled. I don’t mind too much because it toned down the bricks a bit, but nonetheless i had not expected it. I guess when you leav it for a few hours, it doesn’t bleed, but when you add a wash right away it does. Interesting to know.

hoe does your gaarden grow

September 23, 2011September 23, 20114 Comments

Beer. A great thing to drink on yet another very very hot day, when work has kept you busy (also a very good thing to drink while the season opener of Gray’s Anatomy is on in the same room). I used to like drinking Hoegaarden when I was in Belgium, and in fact was given a set of Hoegaarden glasses and beers, from the various types they make, as a parting gift by some Belgian friends. Wow, that was more than eleven years ago. This is one of those very glasses (though the beer is newer). Drinking it does remind me of Belgium, of Blokker and Inno and Champion (they’re shops, not greyhounds), of squared paper notebooks and crazy drivers, of warm cosy pubs and freezing cold rainy walks home, of phonecards and mitraillettes de dinde, of sitting on trains and trams just for the pleasure of reading a book. You can imagine me at a beer tasting festival. “Ah yes, this one has a fruity aroma, with a hint of waiting half an hour to use a cashpoint and then stepping in dogpoo.” Funny thing is, I didn’t drink Hoegaarden that often, I usually drank Fruit Defendu (made by them, though) or Leffe, perhaps a nice cold a Maes or occasionally my favourite, Charles Quint. I love a Kwak too. Mmm, that one has a nutty palatte, an aroma of that time when my mate Tel came over and downed one too quickly, and the room started to spin and he spent the next hour and a half in the toilet before wandering home in the snow. Happy times!

Sketched in my ‘bottle and glass brown paper sketchbook’. That name has nothing to do with cockney rhyming slang, by the way.

…but some of us are looking at the stairs

September 22, 2011September 22, 20113 Comments

Lunchtime, and I decided to draw this building (back of North Hall, UC Davis) again, having done some of it last Saturday. This time I used to uni-ball signo brown-black pen on creamy Canson paper. It makes it look almost wintery, doesn’t it. Your eyes can decieve you, don’t trust them (I heard a wise man say that somewhere, far far away). This week, though they are calling it Fall, Summer is giving us a last hefty whack, with temperatures in the upper 90s and low 100s. Some days it’s too hot to draw. On this day, I found a nice spot in the shade. I always do though.