Here’s another sketch from last month, a sketch of the space in the UC Davis Design Museum on the last day of my sketchbook show “Conversations with the City”. That was a fun show, I really enjoyed that. Now the books are all back home with me!
Tag: conversations with the city
video at the sketchbook show
The kind folks of Letters and Science at UC Davis created this nice short video about my current exhibition at the UC Davis Design Museum, which by the way has been a lot of fun. Many thanks to Amy Tran and Michael French for producing the video, and also to James Housefield for the very nice things he says in the clip. If you’d like to see the exhibit, which has been curated by James Housefield and Tim McNeil and covers ten years of my sketchbooks, the UC Davis Design Museum (located in Cruess Hall) is open Mon-Fri 12-4pm, and on Sundays from 2-4.
(The URL to the video on YouTube in case you cannot see it here is: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ygeACxokMV4)
conversing with the campus…
On October 6th I gave a talk at the UC Davis Design Museum as part of the reception to my sketchbook exhibition, “Conversations with the City”, which is curated by Tim McNeil and James Housefield. A lot of people came! Thank you to all who attended, it was lovely to meet you all and talk about sketching. I talked about my own story with sketching, and how I go about it, what I look for, what I used, and the various sketchcrawls that I have organized. I talked about Urban Sketchers, about the symposia. I also talked about using the sketchbook as a way to document history, showing examples such as the Occupy UC Davis protests of late 2011, the history of my son’s shoes, the progression in my own technique by drawing the Varsity Theatre for ten years and also (the set-piece I’d been dying to show everyone) the progression from the Boiler Building to the Pitzer Center (you can see that progression in this post). It was a lot of fun.
Here I am talking about some of my pens, the Uni-ball Signo UM-151 pens I love so much. I like to point with my left hand. Goes back to my old big-bus tour-guide days, holding the microphone in the right hand and pointing with the left. And ducking to avoid branches.
Here, I am pointing out sketches from the pages of my earlier sketchbooks.
And finally, Q&A. Now get sketching! You can see some much better photos of the exhibition on the Arts Dept website at UC Davis: http://arts.ucdavis.edu/photo-gallery/photos-conversation-city
There is also a nice article about the show (and the sketchcrawl which was held yesterday…) in the Davis Enterprise, which has a much nicer photo of me at the museum event: http://www.davisenterprise.com/arts/scully-leads-sketchers-on-a-lets-draw-davis-crawl/
If you want to to check out the exhibit, it is open Mon-Fri from 12-4pm, and on sundays from 2-4pm. It runs until November 13.
next thursday – conversations with the city, talk and reception
“Conversations with the City” – talk and reception
Well I’m enjoying my sketchbook exhibit at the UC Davis Design Musuem, the curators and staff there have done an amazing job showing off my little books. Anyway, next Thursday October 6th, from 6pm-8pm, the Design Dept will host a reception at the Museum, along with a talk by me which will be about my work, about urban sketching, and about why you should carry a sketchbook. You totally should come if you are in Davis!
Oh and why not bring a sketchbook? Hope to see you there!
Conversations with the City
Opening next week, I have an exhibition of my sketchbooks at the UC Davis Design Museum titled “Conversations with the City“. The exhibition, curated by UC Davis professors James Housefield and Tim McNeil, will display ten years of my sketchbooks, including every single one of those watercolour Moleskines, plus my fire hydrants (and other metal pipes) book from 2011, plus my recent accordion panorama of UC Davis, plus many more. You won’t be able to flick through the books, however there will be some sort of display where you can look through the digital scans of each book and display them on a screen.This will come with an opening reception with a special talk by myself on Thursday October 6th, from 6pm.
I can hardly believe it’s come around already. Posters have gone up all over campus, including some full-page ones, and above is one of the folded fliers from outside the Design Museum, which is located in Cruess Hall. There have been a couple of nice articles posted, one in the Davis Enterprise and one in UC Davis Dateline (“Our Urban Sketcher”). I’ve been sketching in Davis for over a decade now, and it’s really interesting to see the progression in my books, even just in the past few years. This year at UC Davis is called “Year of the Arts” – the Manetti Shrem will be opening, as well as the Pitzer Center, as you may have gathered from my many sketches of them – and in the posters my show is kicking it off, which is tremendously exciting; it’s actually my first proper exhibition on campus, believe it or not. The title of the exhibit comes from something I always say about sketching not just being about drawing your surroundings, but about interacting with them, having a conversation with your city, listening to it speak through the act of your drawing. Plus, fun fact, I actually talk to fire hydrants.
So if you are in Davis between September 19 and November 13, and would like to see my books on display, come along to the UC Davis Design Museum in Cruess Hall from Monday to Friday, 12-4pm, or on Sundays from 2-4pm. Entry is free. I’ll be in from time to time to have a look at them, so if you see me do say hello, I’ll be happy to ramble on about sketching, I’m never short of things to say on that subject! (Wait, come back! I haven’t told you about curvilinear perspective!”) Or come along to the reception and talk on October 6th, when I will talk about my work, about Urban Sketchers, sketchcrawls, and Why You Should Keep A Sketchbook. I hope to see you there!
Announcement on UC Davis Arts website: http://arts.ucdavis.edu/exhibition/conversations-city-pete-scully-urban-sketcher
“Conversations with the City: Pete Scully, Urban Sketcher”, UC Davis Design Museum, Cruess Hall. September 19 – November 13, 2016, Mon-Fri: 12-4pm, Sun 2-4pm; Free.
answers on a postcard
Well, what else has been going on on the UC Davis campus this summer? Building work, hot days, Delta breezes, summer sessions classes, and lunchtime drawings in a post-Manchester-symposium sketching-energy spike. Actually more of a pre-UC Davis-Design-Museum-Sketchbook-Exhibition sketching sketching-energy spike. Yes, my sketchbook exhibit is opening next month, it will be called “Conversations with the City” and will run at the Design Museum in Cruess Hall from September 19 to November 13. So exciting! See http://arts.ucdavis.edu/exhibition/conversations-city-pete-scully-urban-sketcher for more details. I will be displaying sketchbooks ranging from 2006 to 2016. The exhibit is Curated by James Housefield and Tim McNeil of the UC Davis Design Department, and I will also be giving a talk about my urban sketching work (and why you should keep a sketchbook) on Thursday October 6th, from 6-8pm. I will place an announcement in the sidebar on my website, but if you are in Davis then do come by!
In the meantime…here are some recent sketches of UC Davis. Above, the South Silo, undergoing a major refurbishment and upgrade of that whole area. New eateries will be going in, the paths will be widened to create a new vista, already we have seen some big improvements (despite the removal of an old funny-shaped tree, which was kind of in the way – it’s easier to cycle around Bainer now). You can see the oft-sketched Bike Barn there too on the right. It will be fun to see how different it all looks here. Below, part of the same building, still functioning despite the big renovations next door, the UC Davis Craft Center. I drew it one lunchtime before taking a Diversity training class in the building opposite. I added the paint later on.Not a lot of shaded spots to sketch this view from but I stood beneath a small tree.
Below is Nelson Hall, which is home to the Della Davidson Performance Studio. It’s on Old Davis Road, next to the Arboretum, and this used to be called the University Club. Last time I was in here was during the UC Davis Centenary celebrations (2008-09); in fact I took my new staff orientation here a decade ago. I’ve been on campus a long time now. I always felt like these little snapshots of Davis were my ‘postcards’ being sent back to those I left in England, so they can see where I live now. After almost eleven years in California there have been a lot of these postcards…
This building below has been on campus a lot longer: TB9, aka Temporary Building #9. It’s long been an arts studio and home to decades of ceramicists such as Robert Arneson. Fun story, first ever sketchcrawl I did in Davis (Dec 2005) I ended up outside here, sketching sculptures in the back yard area. Recently, TB9 was placed on the National Register of Historic Places – see the news announcement – due to its importance in art history. About time I sketched it properly then huh! It is right next to the Pitzer Center so has cropped up in the background a few times. With the Pitzer Center no longer being a big closed off construction site I was able to get stand off the road and get a better view without being run over by trucks.
Even older still is Wyatt Pavilion Theatre, below, a decent-sized performance hall built in 1907 (that’s right, 1907! Here is some history and info). I came and saw a play here a few years ago, Richard III; I really should go and see more theatre. I do have a degree in Drama you know. Ah that explains a lot I hear you say. Well it was French and Drama if you must know. I actually did a fair bit of foreign language acting when I was at college, though usually in German. Acting in German is way more fun; you get to do Brecht!
See that blue poster on the wall of the Wyatt? That is actually advertising my exhibition! Among other things, my that is at the top, which is exciting. So anyway, come and see my “Conversations with the City” when it opens, and take a peak at my sketchbooks. I hope you like it.
petescully 