no colours any more

April 25, 2008April 25, 2008Leave a comment

The silo, yet again, at lunchtime, encore une fois, in sepia, for a change, today. Hey. it’s at a slightly different angle. I sat on my little stool beneath a tree (it was a lovely sunny day). The last time I drew it though (a month ago, in sepia) the tower was bare, now it is full of leaves and a luscious summery green (um, as you can see in this very brown picture).

Brown…when I was a kid, I used to think Bran Flakes were actually called Brown Flakes, because they were brown, and we were from London, that’s how you say it. Bran Flakes. Similarly, whenever Americans would talk of what we know as cling-film, Saram-Wrap, I thought it was called Surround-Wrap (again, makes sense, ‘cos it saraands it), because my accent said so. Quite a surprise when I found out. Maybe my way makes more sense.

illustration friday: primitive

April 23, 2008April 25, 20089 Comments

I still have all the postcards i’ve ever been sent. I still love sending postcards myself, from all the places I visit.

These days, fewer people bother. One friend told me he doesn’t send them any more, since there’s email and texting and facebook, but that misses the point of the postcard. Another friend, on the other hand, he sends me postcards from various places he visits in the UK on his acting tours, and I love it. You don’t collect those emails in a dusty old shoebox that you come across many years later (one of the postcards in the picture was sent by my oldest friend, tel, from a holiday in devon when he was about 13 or 14, when it was the furthest he’d ever been; now he lives in korea). You can’t stick those facebook wall entries to your fridge. Writing and sending postcards does take a little effort, but it’s an enjoyable effort, and brings a little more sunshine into the world than seeing “inbox: 1”.

Here’s my illustration friday entry for this week, theme: primitive. Here’s to the more primitive forms of communication. Answers on a postcard.

the day breaks, your mind aches

April 14, 2008April 25, 20087 Comments

I’m in California, but this is Aix-en-Provence. I spent a year there from 2001 to 2002; I met my wife there, and she met me there too. I drew this last night, Micron Pen 01, and intended to add a wash, possibly in a warm sepia; I still might, but quite like it as it is.

Aix is art country. I did draw a lot while I was there, and paint, but I wish I could go back and draw and paint more, in the way I do nowadays. The light is amazing there – like in California, but possibly better. You have toi watch out for dog-poo though, and dog-people. Et les nains de jardin au parc jourdan, bien sur.

a song outside my window

April 13, 20085 Comments

I would open the window, look out towards the tall trees of the park, smell the dewy morning air, listen to the birds, watch the streetlights slowly flicker off, one by one.

modern love walks on by

April 12, 2008April 12, 20081 Comment

it got very hot today in Davis – 88, 90 degrees? felt like more – and in the afternoon I went cycling, and drew this house on B street. So hot for April, when in England I hear it’s raining. Rain? Is that the one where the water falls out of the sky?

from the pencil of young pete

April 8, 2008June 24, 2010Leave a comment

I drew this 19 years ago, when I was just thirteen. 19 years ago!! The Berlin Wall was still up! Nelson Mandela was still in prison! George Bush was the new President of the USA!

I was digging through my old drawings from when I was a kid recently and thought I should share them with you. I remember drawing this (I still use the ‘mechanical’ eraser I used in this very drawing, there’s continuity for you!); I was a huge Beatles fan, and trawled the record stores and junk shops of London for old original LPs (plus a load of old albums my uncle gave me). Note how I’ve given Macca his real first name too.

I did another version of it at 16 (below left), in 1992, with stronger values and less chin, but I prefer the first one for its innocence. I was doing my GCSE art in ’92 and several of the other pictures below are from that time; below right is a watercolour copy of Cezanne that I did at 15 or 16, from a postcard picked up at the National Gallery – I used to go down to London most weekends to go to the galleries (and the record stores).

Ten years later I ended up living in Cezanne’s town of Aix-en-Provence, which is where I met my wife (and therefore how I ended up living in the US). Funny old world.

Below is another from 16-year old Pete in 1992, an unfinished one of Jesus from some other painting I can’t remember. An interesting choice for such an atheistic lad as I, but even though I’m A NonBeliever I know aestheticism sometimes trumps atheisim; years later I did a one-person art performance piece at university about being drunk on the underground, which ended up with me on a crucifix (supposed to be King’s Cross).

The pencil one below left is a pastorly Peter Cushing (looking more like the Crow Man), also from 1992. I seemed to have an easier time with light and dark values back then than I do now. It’s from one of my horror-movie books; I was really into old Hammer Horror films (I have another sketch of Christopher Lee too), and in 1992 I wrote and performed an eight-song musical called “Dracula AD 1992” (an homage to the 1972 Hammer movie), which included such classic songs as “This Motel’s Giving Me The Willies” and “Freshly Impaled Village Maidens”. Below right: a later picture, 1995, 19 years old and obsessed with oil pastels. Doesn’t look massively like me, but you get the idea. I didn’t wear glasses very often back then.

Originally posted at 20six.co.uk/petescully

still seeing davis

April 8, 2008June 18, 2010Leave a comment

I bet you thought this series was over…well I said I’d make it to 24 and I will. This is number 21 of 24. I apologise for the hiatus; it was due to the recent writer’s strike.

Originally posted on 20six.co.uk/petescully

E – A – D – G – B – E

April 7, 2008June 23, 2010Leave a comment

My guitar, the hohner acoustic i’ve had for eleven years now, bought at macari’s on charing crosss road in january 1997 when i worked at a chocolate shop on oxford street, been with me to several countries, now here in california. That orange plectrum attached to the strings there is the same one they gave me when i bought it, it’s still the only one i’ll use. The wood is matt, and browner than it looks here. I do have another fancier electric, but this is the one i grab the most. I played some soothing songs to my baby son today, he seems to like the sound and the shape of the guitar; one day, in the future, I will buy him his first guitar. He may even get this one. This wasn’t my first guitar, however; my first proper one that worked (not including the bad car-boot acoustics i had) was a westone electric that my brother gace me, I loved that guitar, though it’s clapped out now. I passed it on to my nephew just before moving to america. Boys and guitars, important allies.

(purple micron .01, w&n cotman watercolour, moleskine watercolour paper)

Originally posted at: 20six.co.uk/petescully

april is the cruellest month

April 5, 2008June 23, 2010Leave a comment

Sketched today at lunchtime, while on my lunchbreak, after eating lunch. Orange flowers by the arboretum, uc davis; that i believe is the law school there, that building type thing like. They love lawyers in america. If you’re not a lawyer or a doctor, or maybe a cop, then you cant get into a tv show.

originally posted at 20six.co.uk/petescully

illustration friday: ‘save’ (or ‘i’ve got a pocket full of pretty green’)

April 5, 2008June 23, 2010Leave a comment

I am so glad i scanned this before adding the wash. Yes, i added a bad greeny-blue wash to it, and it looks bad bad baby, bad as in not good mate. So while you might think that the theme for illustration friday ‘SAVE’ refers to the money supposedly saved here, it actually refers to the fact i saved this before going on to deface the original with sea-green. So there.

Don’t go giving me evils!

Originally posted at 20six.co.uk/petescully