life gives you lemons

May 31, 2023May 31, 2023Leave a comment

I saw this old beauty parked opposite my building at work, and raced downstairs one lunchtime to check it out. It’s an old Plymouth, rusty in places and decorated with stickers, one of which was for the “24 Hours of Lemons” race, which I’ve heard of before, a long time ago when I drew an old car in Davis that the owner told me took part in that race. Here’s the blog post about that one. Wow, that was 2013, ten years ago? Life moves on you fast.

Here is that car from ten years ago. Looking at the Flickr post, there was a comment from my olf German sketching friend Florian Afflerbach, aka Flaf, an expert and much loved car sketcher who sadly died in 2016, far too young. Seeing his comment again made me a little sad, but also glad to have known him. I still think of him when drawing old cars, he was supposed to teach a workshop at the Manchester symposium on sketching cars, but he was killed in a road accident shortly before, so Gerard Michel and Lapin who both knew him well and sketched with him often, taught the workshop together instead. Lapin always said that every sketchbook needs an old car and a dinosaur; this sketchbook (the Fabriano one, #46 in the official list) has this one plus a Lego dinosaur, so that’s the quota filled.

Here is some info about the 24 Hours of Lemons race: https://24hoursoflemons.com/. There’s even a photo of this very car on that webpage. I have never been to one of those races, but I’d like to go and sketch some of the cars in them some day. There’s one at the Sonoma Raceway in December…

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every sketchbook needs a race car

April 5, 20232 Comments

On one of those many ridiculously rainy days in January we went down to the California Automobile Museum to look at the old cars. I only ended up drawing one of them this time, and of course it had to be a race car. The 1988 March, driven by Steve Saleen in the 1989 IndyCar world series, was a cool little vehicle I just had to sketch. What I really want to do is sketch a Formula One car. I am more than a little bit obsessed with Formula One, and have been into it since I was a kid, my dad would watch it, back in the days of Mansell, Prost, and of course Senna. I’ll never forget the weekend Senna died at Imola, because I was watching the Qualifying the day before when Roland Ratzenberger died, and it was pretty shocking. I couldn’t believe the Sunday race went ahead, but when the greatest driver himself then died also? I still feel shocked and stunned by it. I still followed Formula One through the 90s with Hakkinen, Hill, Villeneuve and the other great Schumacher, everyone’s favourite loveable villain, who after a glittering world-beating career on the track ended up suffering terrible injuries in a skiing accident and has not been in public since. He was a classic racer, extremely annoying and easy to dislike early on, but by his later career you couldn’t help but be in awe. Then there was Alonso, who somehow is back and has three podiums out of three this season already, and along came Lewis Hamilton, a real British superstar right from his rookie season. When he won his first title with McLaren in his second season, on that final race in Brazil, I was watching on a terrible feed with no sound on my TV in California, and while I was delighted for Lewis, I was very sad for Felipe Massa who thought he’d done enough to win it, but it wasn’t to be. Lewis of course won loads more with Mercedes, and though at the time it felt like a gamble to switch teams to the Mercs, it really paid off. In between though we had the Vettel dominance with Red Bull, when my son was very little and that cocky young’un Seb was his first sporting hero (followed by Luka Modric and Gareth Bale), and the 2012 season I remember as being one of the greatest. Back then he loved his toy cars and we would draw these huge race tracks on poster board, one for each F1 Grand Prix, and play with the cars on them. Then the years of Lewis becoming all powerful, and even though some years it felt easy for Mercedes (that’s the nature of the sport, a great driver needs a great car, it felt like that with Schumacher and Ferrari, it feels like that now with the Red Bull and Max, even when Hakkinen was winning that McLaren felt unstoppable) there were some high drama years and I watched as avidly as ever, and I’m a big big fan of Lewis, and I hope he still has another good challenge in him. I am still feeling gutted and angry about how the 2021 season ended, when he’d done so much to come back and lead the title, only to be stitched up by the FIA on the last couple of laps of that race. That had been an amazing and dramatic season, the Max v Lewis, Horner v Toto, Red Bull v Mercedes season. And then the cars changed, Mercedes created a dud, and Red Bull got it completely right, and with Max Verstappen steaming away at the front they look like they will be unstoppable for a few years. Our nickname for Max is ‘Waluigi’, he reminds us of that Mario Kart character. (Side note, I love Mario Kart, and it was my F1 obsession that led me to buy the original Super Mario Kart not long after it came out, as it was the greatest racing game, and me and my brother will still play the original version all these years later). I’m not particularly a fan of Max, I don’t like his character much, but I do have admiration for him as an unbelievably determined racer, and the lad’s got talent. He may well be another Schumacher, if this Red Bull keeps developing. I’ve not even mentioned Jenson Button, who was one of my favourite racers, and the season he unbelievably won the title in a Braun, that white car with the neon yellow bits on it that looked amazing, in a year that felt like Formula One was turning upside down a little bit during the global economic downturn (remember that), that was still one of my favourite seasons of all time. Now, a lot more people over here are getting into F1, thanks to the popularity of Drive to Survive, which has for me at least brought the less well-known racing battles into greater light, the midfield drama that we often overlook when focused solely on the podium places. Formula One has always been a soap opera for me, and unlike football, where I only really love Tottenham, mostly indifferent to everything else (though I’ll sometimes watch Serie A) except for the kits which I’m obsessed with, and of course the World Cup, which is enjoyable except when watching England when it’s agony, or Ireland when it’s 1994. I don’t support a particular team, or even a particular driver, I just like the sport and the characters and the drama, and I just want good racing, although I have always loved Lewis. Here’s my sketch after he won that first title back in 2008, right before Obama won the presidency. I’ve not watched a lot of IndyCar, to be honest, whenever I do it’s really just to watch the few former F1 drivers taking part (like when Alonso was involved for a bit), but that’s usually a lot of fun as well.

chasing clouds on the banks of the thames

August 16, 2022August 15, 2022Leave a comment

On the first day of June, which is always a good day in the calendar, I took the tube down to Battersea to meet up with friend Simon, who was flying over from Dublin that morning for a few days. I say I took the tube down, well this being classic London, I left in good time only to find the Northern Line was down, so I had to get a bus to Queensbury to jump on the Jubilee Line. Can’t escape the Jubilee. Incidentally that Jubilee Line was named for the Queen’s 25th (Silver) Jubilee, which is why it is coloured in grey. This year it was the 70th (Platinum) Jubilee, and they named the new Crossrail after her, the Elizabeth Line (that was actually her mum’s name, Elizabeth Lines-Bowen) (I think they missed a trick by not renaming Crossrail as “we-are-not-amused-rail”, ok maybe not). Anyway silly jokes aside, I was hoping to see the new London underground station on the Northern Line, Battersea Power Station Station. That is actually its name. It is the tube station for Battersea Power Station, so therefore it is Battersea Power Station Station. However, once me and Simon met up, at Vauxhall Bridge, we never found it, as we were catching up on three years of silly jokes. It was a fun day out we had along the river, and then up into Chelsea, and the clouds were incredible. He’s a pro photographer and got some great shots – follow him on Instagram at https://www.instagram.com/naderissimo/ – and I started some sketches, very much in the ‘finish these later’ category. I had not drawn Battersea Power Station before, I do want to draw it from the other side of the river sometime, but it has all been redeveloped in recent years and is all a bit fancy now. I notice that the Urban Sketchers London had a sketching event down there recently, part of the ten year anniversary, as many Battersea Power Station sketches kept popping up on my feed, making me want to go back down that way. I haven’t really explored there before, so it was an eye opener.

We walked down through Battersea Park, where I have not been for many years, until we took a rest by the Albert Bridge (above). I drew this bridge as an illustration for a book years ago, the “London Walks, London Stories” book in about 2008 or 2009, so I was keep to draw it in person. Not super easy, so I drew the main bits, the main outlines, and drew in the rest of the details later. We were busy chatting. Albert Bridge is named after Queen Victoria’s dead husband Prince Albert (I mean they are all dead now aren’t they, the Victorians), and is one of the best and most charming bridges in London. Lots of things are named after Prince Albert, you’ve got the Albert Embankment, the Albert Hall, the Albert Bridge, the Albert Memorial, Albert Square, and of course the Prince Albert, which I won’t elaborate on further. We crossed Albert Bridge and wandered about Chelsea, looking for one specific pub that Simon knew about, and I can definitely say I got my ten thousand steps in that day a couple of times over. Still at least we got to look at some cool shops and see loads more colourful Jubilee displays, including this union-jack-themed mini. Simon used to have a very beloved mini, so I just had to draw this, though now he lives in Dublin he probably wouldn’t drive this particular one about. There were so many interesting floral displays along the Kings Road, we spent a lot of time taking photos (and being silly of course) before resting with a pint in the old pub he was looking for, and then heading over to Harrods (I got some delicious cannoli). One thing about this trip, I did explore a fair bit of London I either hadn’t been to before, or not been to in years. It’s like a book you can keep coming back to and learning something new, but because it’s the city where I’m from there’s always a connection.

in rust we trust

December 9, 2021December 9, 2021Leave a comment

This old car has been parked in old north Davis for years, I’ve passed it many times thinking, I must draw that some day. That is definitely a thing to sketch. And then days pass into weeks, weeks into months, months into years, years back into months, and then months gives weeks a miss and jumps right back into days. So finally, on the day I ran the Turkey Trot, I took the afternoon to sketch around town. I decided to finally draw this old thing. It’s nice with the autumnal leaves all about. I saw fellow sketchers Allan and Alison while drawing this, they live nearby now. It was a nice afternoon, it had been a nice morning. I had a good race, I shaved 2.5 minutes off my previous 5k race time which I’m still well pleased about. For the first race back since early 2020, I didn’t feel rusty at all. I felt pretty good afterwards too, runnin’ makes you feel good. I ain’t ‘fraid of no ghosts. I do want to draw some more old vehicles. There are at least a couple I’ve had my eye on sketching for a while, one near my house which never moves and has a lot of cobwebs on it, I’ve just never sat outside drawing it. I like the ones that just sit there getting rusty. I like rusty.

ol’ bobby dazzler’s

December 8, 2021December 8, 2021Leave a comment

Yeah I know, these ones are from just before Halloween, and it’s already December. Halloween, alright grandad, that’s so fifty years ago, we’re decorating gingerbread houses now. The Friday night before Halloween, some of the players from our youth soccer team went to a pumpkin patch (we had a tournament the next day in Roseville, in which teams traditionally wear costumes; we had Spider-Man uniforms, many of the others were really elaborate, one team we played were dressed as Pac-Man ghosts, others dressed as robbers, one team were all cow-girls (the coaches had inflatable horses), one team were aliens, and there was even one team all dressed as Jake from State Farm (the coaches dressed as Flo form Progressive) (they were popular; people like adverts. One team even got the current zany Spurs away kit and all dressed as that. If I hadn’t been coaching that tournament, I would have enjoyed sketching everyone. Unfortunately our team ended up being drawn against some high-level opposition and we lost all our games, but at least the costumes were fun to see. I say high-level, because two of the teams were two divisions above us, while the other one literally play in the foothills of the Sierras, at a higher altitude than Davis. A bit like playing Bolivia, or West Brom. Anyway, the night before we went to the pumpkin patch and I drew some pumpkins, and this big old hearse, which was being driven by a skeleton. Bobby Dazzler’s is the place, it’s just outside Davis. Here are some pumpkins I drew as well. I had to draw them quickly because they were going to turn back into carriages. I’d never been to Bobby Dazzler’s before, it was pretty good. I suppose it made me think of Bobby Davro, a TV light entertainer and panting mimer from the 80s in England, and also leader of the Daleks if memory serves (nope, memory doesn’t serve). Bobby Dazzler is the sort of thing people would say in the old days up north, “he’s a reet Bobby Dazzler” they’d say, in the working mens’ clubs. Also, they are both the names of X-Men characters, Bobby and Dazzler. Maybe Bobby Dazzler is the younger brother of Adolf and Rupert Dassler, the founders of Adidas (short for Adolf ‘Adi’ Dassler) and Puma (Rupert’s spin-off which is short for for Poo, Man) (actually Puma was going to be called ‘RuDa’, true story, after Rudolf Dassler, but everyone said that sounds RuBbish). Maybe Bobby was the youngest Dassler and maybe he could never have a voice with his siblings so instead he voiced his sibilants. Ooh that was a stretch. Anyway enough rambling. They also have a Christmas tree farm in November and December and so I might go back up there again. I won’t get a tree though, because our Cat Overlords don’t allow such things, we just re-use our old plastic one.

old beemer

April 25, 20211 Comment

This old BMW was parked on a street near us, and that means it needed to be drawn. What a beauty. My parents had a white BMW for a while when I was a kid, not the sort of car we’d usually have but it was nice, and I loved telling people at school we had a BMW because those cars were always cool. Before that, my dad even had a white Mercedes for a while. Those were the nicest cars we had, but my dad would go through cars a lot when I was young, often buying and selling. I wasn’t drawing cars back then, I wish I had been. I wish a lot of things.

two jags in laguna beach

March 16, 2021March 15, 20211 Comment

Recently we decided to finally get out of Davis for a bit and took a pre-birthday trip to Southern California, pre-birthday for my wife that is, post-birthday for me. Roughly equidistant between the two. We were headed to San Diego, but on the way there we spent a couple of nights in the lovely seaside city of Laguna Beach. We hadn’t been there since before my son was born, and the very first time we went was back in 2002 on y first trip to the US, and it was perhaps the prettiest place I had ever been. Sunset over the ocean from the cliffs is like something you wouldn’t believe (and something I cannot draw). Lot of rich people live here though, so a lot of flash cars. I personally love to see a Jaguar (there’s a house near us in Davis that has three old Jags outside, one of them, an E-Type, is kept in a special inflated plastic presentation box, I kid you not). Well there was a cool looking Jaguar sports car parked opposite out hotel, an XJS, that I just had to sketch. It was a schoolday when we were there so my son still had to go to remote school, taking his classes on the balcony overlooking the Pacific, with that Jag on view below. I was working too, inside the hotel room on my laptop, eager to get stuff done and get down to the beach in the afternoon sometime. After we took a long walk downtown, I spotted this incredible old Jaguar Mark 4 parked along the Pacific Coast Highway. It looked like something a 1940s gangster might drive. “Meeeah, sheee, wise guy huh?” I said to myself over and over while drawing. People stopped and took selfies with the car. More than one person asked if it was mine, and I laughed hahaha, no, because obviously I don’t look like a 1940s gangster. I did like Bugsy Malone when I was a kid (my big sister used to watch it a lot) but I’m not sure I could pull off the look. I can do the voice though, “Myeeeeaahhh, sheeee?” Because that is how 1940s gangsters all talked, as we know. This was a pretty beautiful vehicle though and had some little metal British logo thingies below the grille, ‘RAC’, ‘AA’, ‘BARC’ and a special one for the Queen’s Coronation in 1953. But the car’s steering wheel is on the left so this is definitely a car for the US. What a beauty, not something you sheee too often.

Now this is part of the very long Pacific Coast Highway that stretches all along the west side of America. I like the quirky looking architecture along this road in Laguna Beach, so I had to stop and draw some. Click on the image to embiggen it for a closer view. I have to say this road was very noisy. Cars zooming up and down, it felt like a bit of an adventure when we drove downtown to pick up our dinner later that evening. I think I listened to a podcast rather than to the sounds of the city, but I can’t remember what it was I listened to now, probably something to do with Formula 1, which would have been quieter than this road. I do really like Laguna Beach though (despite the fact it sounds like the word ‘Gooner’ and we can’t talk about that since Arsenal beat Spurs this weekend, grrr), and here is the sunset from our balcony. I’m not quick enough to paint sunsets like this, so I just looked out and enjoyed it.

Laguna Beach Sunset 2021

Alleviating All Anxiety of Amsterdam

March 11, 2020March 10, 2020Leave a comment

Moving on to the next day and the final day of the Symposium, I woke up Saturday morning definitely feeling the heat exhaustion. I decided to skip my final workshop (I did go and let them know so they wouldn’t be waiting for me) and find a spot to sketch peacefully. I hadn’t yet drawn the dancing houses along the banks of the Amstel from Groenburgwal, so I found a nice bench and drew away. I met another sketcher doing the same. It was quiet, the weekend heat had not yet started cranking up, and my stress-headache was clearing up immediately. I didn’t need to be in a class, stopping and starting and rushing, being “on”, I needed to be in “breathe-in, breathe-out, sketch” mode. It worked. I had met Lapin earlier the morning, and I was going to go and sketch with them (as it turns out he and Gerard and co went to sketch my hotel), but I decided to draw the Dancing Houses. They are impressive. Many houses seem to ‘dance’ in Amsterdam, leaning this way or that – my perspective tip of following the windows to find the vanishing point on the horizon doesn’t work as well here, where the windows follow lines more suited to more Marty Feldman’s binoculars (Young Frankenstein reference). Crooked buildings are fun to draw. By the way I did overhear one sketch instructor scoff at counting the windows on houses in Amsterdam, but counting the windows really helped the composition of each element, and also helps get the scale right. Besides, in Amsterdam they are usually three windows across as a rule. The patchwork nature of the architecture breaks up the monotony you find in many cities, it’s just so fun to draw. Looking back I probably could have had the energy to do some more group sketching and plough on, be a bit more sociable and awake, but mental health came first and I look at this sketch and immediately I feel more relaxed. Breathe in, breathe out, sketch.

I wandered about a bit more, bumping into the occasional sketching friend, I met Nina Johansson (long term urban sketch idol of mine since the beginning) teaching a class nearby here, the tall Montelbaanstoren. It was pretty peaceful over here too, a couple of blocks from my hotel, in fact the workshop I had skipped was being taught close by, but I decided not to join late. I sat by the canal and drew the tower as best I could, with a bike in the foreground. I was going to add full colour, but stopped at the blues, it just felt right for the relaxed mood.

After doing a few sketches of the hotel (I posted those already), I wandered over to Niewmaarkt to enjoy one of my favourite discoveries in Amsterdam – poffertjes. Little mini pancakes, from a friendly guy called Tony Benson. I spoke with Tony and a woman who was with him, we talked about Belgian footballers (maybe because I was wearing my Belgian shirt again), she was really inot Eden Hazard and asked who my favourite Belgian player was (Super Jan Vertonghen obviously!). The poffertjes were small but delicious. I could eat some of those now.

In the afternoon, there would be another sketchwalk, over near the NEMO center, culminating in a huge group photo (the ones I usually miss at every symposium), and then the final reception over at the Muziekgebouw. I was going to meet up with everyone there, but at the hotel I realized I really needed more rest, not more rushing around in the heat. Here’s how I rested:

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I also rested by spending an hour or so in the amazing blue-tiled pool in the hotel’s basement, and relaxing in the hot-tub. Best decision I ever made. Matt Brehm was right, you don’t have to draw.
The sketchwalk was nice, and although I turned up too late for any sketching, I did meet up with a lot people I had not seen during the symposium. Many of the local groups got together for their local group photos – I am one of the Californians, but I wasn’t quick enough to get a photo with them. I did at least make the final group photo, but there are so many people in the picture that I obviously can’t be spotted, even with my bright red Belgium 1984 shirt. Actually though, in this photo of the whole group (by Belgian friend and photographer Marc Van Liefferinge) I can be spotted near the middle of the back. Proof I made it there.

You know what, there are loads of sketches you can find from other symposium attendees, if you go to Flickr and search through the tag “amsterdam symposium“. Of course most people now just bounce them out on Instagram and so on too. There are a LOT of Amsterdam sketches to be found. I went over to the final reception (a very very long walk, I went with Mauro and Fabien, though Fabien stopped on the way for a beer and to wait for Gerard, they were not coming to the reception but actually driving back to Liège that night). At the reception I caught up with all the people I had not spoken to as much so far, such as Gabi, and Liz (we snuck up on Paul Wang and got our annual symposium pic of the three of us, guerilla-style), Elizabeth, James, and of course Rita, and did a little people sketching, but mostly chatting. I also got to meet Danny Gregory for the first time, he was there with all the Sketchbook Skool lot, that’s a big thing now. I had been a chapter in one of his books years ago, the one with my drawing of Vipins ont he cover, and we’d tried to arrange a video interview to go on his website but it was always dinnertime in my house and we never did it, so it was nice to finally meet. (Though I suspect I he didn’t remember who I was). I also met a number of people who I’ve since started following on Instagram, it’s what these whole events are about really. And then in the end, it was the gathering off for dinner, I went off with a big group of the usual sketchers, and we had a great evening. The best bit though was finishing off with some late night or early morning) car sketching. A bunch of us led by Lapin sat in a narrow street by a canal and drew a couple of classic Citroens. This is apparently a tradition at the Clermont Ferrand festival. My habit of sketching fire hydrants at 3am when I travel does not seem so odd now; these are my people. One of though people though, Hugo Costa, nearly fell in the canal when his stool broke – lucky escape! Here’s what I drew, and a photo of some of us sketching in the darkness of Amsterdam.

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Now this little fire hydrant I actually drew at night on the first night in Amsterdam, but I’ve saved until now because why not. As for the blog post title, “Alleviating All Anxiety of Amsterdam”, I mean it says it all but seriously I might come back and change all these titles some day.

And that was it for another Symposium. I have more Amsterdam sketches to share here, plus a bit more Belgium, a bit of Disneyland Paris, a few from London, and then loads more of Davis, then some from Santa Monica, and Portland again, and Hawaii. But after this long day of relaxful sketching Citroens by lamplight, I had a well-earned lie-in on Sunday. After all the heat, there was a little rain coming, but so were my family.

Alive Actually, Amsterdam

March 10, 2020Leave a comment

When I posted my sketches from Porto in 2018 every post had an alliterative “p” title, and I am doing something similar for Amsterdam, but making far less sense. I could put more thought into it, but that would not be indicative of how my mind was completely melted by the heat there. I was all over the place. Some people go to Amsterdam and do that on purpose of course, through other means, but for me it was just the heat making me feel continuously confused. Also the streets – I love bikes and am a cyclist myself, but wow they are everywhere in Amsterdam, and sidewalks are super narrow. When it is busy it feels stressful. On the second morning of the symposium though I felt quite good, raring to go, I had even got up and had a run around the emptier morning streets, before I marched along to the Zuiderkerk to meet up with my workshop group, chatting away to people I hadn’t seen in a year, today was going to be great. However I had mixed up which workshop I was supposed to be doing, thinking that I was in Ian Fennely’s class. When it came time for roll call though he made it very clear my name was not on the list for the workshop, “no, you are not on the list.” Ok, I’m not trying to sneak in, maybe I wrote it down wrong. Turns out I had got my days mixed up (first sign my mind was not functioning at capacity), and that I was going to Shari Blaukopf’s workshop. That cheered me up as I was really looking forward to her class on sketching boats, which is why I thought I had selected it to save for last. She is an exceptional watercolour painter and I of course am not a painter, though I use watercolours to colour in my drawings, I am all about the lines so I really wanted to learn from her, and while my results weren’t where I wanted them to be, I came away with lots of new knowledge and wanting to try some new things – such as drawing with brush pens.

Shari encouraged us to bring along brush pens and do some quick sketches of the boats with those. Of course I also drew her talking about the boats. Drawing in brush pen is not something I do a lot of – I realized that drawing people is super fun, especially adding a little watercolour – but those dark shapes and thick lines of the black and white boat drawings really helped to focus in on the values.

Drawing boats is good practice for perspective, and really good for shading and value. I don’t get much opportunity to draw boats in Davis, only when I go down to the City. Amsterdam harbour is the perfect place for boat sketching. Oh, except when it is very sunny, pushing midday and there is little shade. I was getting thirsty, so I walked over to NEMO (a huge building, very easy to find), which is a big science museum, to get a drink. I had to go to a cafe on the actual roof, climbing up these huge steps, and when I got to the cafe I couldn’t decide in my overheated mind what to get, so I think I got two types of fresh juice, one might have been a smoothie, and some fruit, and some water as well, and it still didn’t feel like enough. I think I was getting a bit of heat exhaustion. I carried on with the workshop, drawing the scene below, first with the brush pen (which I liked) and then just with watercolours (which I liked less).

My colours seemed dull. Shari suggested that perhaps my paints were a bit too dry, and that dulls the colours I would get. I didn’t quite understand, because they were wet, I was using water (I’m so thick), but I learned that if I had ‘wet’ paints, that is, paints from a tube and not dry in the pan, my colours would be a lot brighter. I got to experience that later in the day when Donald Saluling let me use his paints, and I could instantly tell the difference. I don’t really try a lot of different paints out, so that got me thinking maybe now is the time to invest in a bunch of tubed paints, maybe some nice Daniel Smiths or something. I’m so scared of that, but I think now’s the time to start being a bit bolder. (Fast forward to March 2020, I still haven’t bought new paints but I am using an iPad now and I can get way bolder! In a funny way this class really helped me think about digital sketching). Shari also showed us some very interesting travel paintbrushes too, and I have since got some of those, but of course haven’t yet tried them out (because as I have said before I like to let paintbrushes sit there for half a year before I pluck up the courage to actually use them for anything).

When the workshop was over, I decided I needed to draw a couple more boats before I had lunch. My hotel was only across the street, so I found some shade under a tree, and cooled off. This was a nice way to end the first part of the day. But it just kept getting hotter. After a rest, I grabbed some more nice juice and a sandwich from the Albert Hein supermarket, and headed out to the sketchwalk taking place at Spui. Clearly my forgetfulness was taking control because I totally forgot to attend Rita Sabler’s sketch demo. When I got to Spui I found the sketchers, and was meeting up with another Portland sketching friend Kalina. The heat was hitting me hard now, I was sweating and sluggish. And then I realized I had forgotten my paints. I wanted to spend the rest of the day painting watery scenes, putting into practice what I learned in the morning, but my watercolors were sitting on my bed at the hotel. Aargh! I saw Gerard Michel sketching on Herengracht and joined him for a bit. I then found a green Citroen and sat in a small gap next to a bike and tried to draw it. I spoke to a guy from Ohio and a woman from Germany who were also sketching it. There were so many sketchers everywhere. That’s how it should be. The heat was getting to everyone, but still we soldiered on, filling our sketchbooks. I added some colour later to this, if you are wondering.

I also added the colour later to this, but this was a scene I was determined to sketch, but in no real state to do so. This was the moment in the Symposium when I think the heat battered me the most. I really should have just been doing something else, maybe sitting inside a dark cafe with a cold cold beer. Beer did not sound that good to me right then though, my head was already a barrel filled with porridge. This by the way is at Herengracht and Leidsegracht. I should like to come back here when it is cloudy. Again, I added in the wash later, to reflect some of my mood.

This is what it looks like when you look through that bridge, and through a whole load of other bridges.

But my head could not handle such views. The bridges could have gone on for ever and ever. I needed some water, but then I found a cafe called Joe and the Juice. It was cool inside, and I liked the names of the drinks. I decided I needed a refreshing smoothie called “Stress Down”, that name just stood out to me. It was made with Aardbei, Gember and Framboos, which I determined was Strawberry, Ginger and Raspberry.

Honestly I have no idea why that combination worked so well, but it felt like a complete power-up. Like in a computer game when you find a floating heart and it restores your health. My sluggish mind and drained body suddenly felt much more energized, and I went outside, pulled out the brush pen, and immediately drew the sketch below, which I really enjoyed.

Finally feeling a bit better about my sketching, I went back to Spui and was finally ready for a beer, I met up with Kalina and we met Donald Saluling (first time I had met him in person), and we sat outside a bar filling the early evening with chat and good times. Even on hot days like this, it’s good to all be alive.

Long post this, could have been two. But it’s all one story. The next posts will be really much shorter. Or maybe longer. That day’s sketching was not over, and I did manage another brush pen sketch at a brown cafe, but I’ll save that for another day.

drawing old north davis

May 28, 2019May 28, 2019Leave a comment

Just over a week ago some of us Davis sketchers braved the stormy weather and came out to sketch Old North Davis. This is the neighbourhood north of Fifth Street, laid out just over a century ago, full of leafy streets and cute houses. We met at the Davis Co-Op on G Street, and spread out to sketch. I drew this corner, at G and 7th. It wasn’t yet raining again so I was making the most of what I could get before seeking cover again. Actually I like rainy sketching, I just put my umbrella inside my jacket, it seems to work.

I’ve always liked this building, historically called the Anderson-Hamel House. I have sketched it before, and pass by it most weekends when heading downtown. It’s a ‘Queen Anne’ cottage and was originally the home of John B. Anderson, who established the Bank of Davis and was actually the mayor of Davis when Davis first became a city in 1917. One of the interesting things about this house is that it was originally down at 2nd Street, but was moved when later owners the Quessenberry family decided to build their drugstore there, and so the lovely house moved into Old North Davis. Its history is detailed well in John Lofland’s book ‘Old North Davis’, an absolutely invaluable guide to the area, street by street, hosue by house. I recommend it for anyone interested in this part of Davis (I for one would love to do one where I get to sketch all the buildings).

I then sat in the Lyda Williams memorial garden on E Street and was going to sketch from there, sat on a bench in the hopeful sunshine, but a local cat decided to come and sit on my lap for a while. Ok little cat, that’s fine, just have a nap there, my feet need a break anyway. Thunder started rumbling, getting closer and closer. Eventually the cat got down and went under the bench, and I sketched this house on 6th and E. It’s very peaceful here, people out on their Sunday strolls around the neighbourhood. Someone I’ve met before called out to me “nice day for a sketch!”. The thunder rumbling more loudly above me was making me go a little bit faster. In the end I left it where it was and headed back to the Co-Op, just in time for the rain.

The car above was parked outside the Co-Op, a Datsun (don’t see many of them nowadays), and I actually sketched it at the start, but only got as far as the headlights, the windscreen and the overall outline, I had to finish the rest afterwards, because the driver came and drove away. Not sure what the funny rat symbol was on the side, but the car was very souped up and personalized, with paint splatter and special features, it was like a Stone Roses record cover.

And here are the brave sketchers who sketched Old North Davis. We’ve yet to determine the date of the next Davis sketchcrawls but we’ll post them very soon.