davis farmers market

July 5, 20251 Comment

Still making it through the sketch backlog, here are some from the Davis Farmer’s Market in early May. (I say Farmer’s Market, but I think it might be the Farmers’ Market which actually makes more sense, as in the Market of the Farmers (plural), it’s not the market of a single farmer who owns all the stalls and controls the means of production, I’m not an economist so I couldn’t really say) (actually a quick butchers at their website shows it is simply the ‘Davis Farmers Market’ with no possessive apostrophe at all, confusing things even further, is it a place where you can go and buy various farmers? Do they all line up like the droids outside the Jawa’s Sand Crawler? “Farmer Giles, two for a pound, ger your Farmer Giles here.”) (It is a truth known to all British folk that to be a real farmer, you have to be called ‘Giles’). Anyway I went to the Farmers Market and sketched. And then bought a Farmer to put in my salad later. Not really, I don’t eat salads. This was on the hottest day of the year so far, it was a whopping 94 degrees, which is very hot for early May. It is currently early July and the weather is of a similar temperature, and I am not a fan of hot weather, but I live in the Central Valley and it’s Hot. I thought about going down to the City today because it is generally a lot cooler down there, but in the end I couldn’t be bothered. I do need to get out and sketch though. It keeps my mind off of everything. I think about apostrophes rather than catastrophes.

Let’s have a look at some of the people who were at the Farmers Market that particular Saturday. Markets are good places for quick people sketches, because they move more slowly than they do at, for example, a bus station or a 4am Black Friday stampede outside Walmart. I do tend to mix and match a bit, so you might get one person’s head and another person’s body or legs, or the t-shirt the person you have drawn was wearing replaced by that of the next passer-by with more interesting attire. (Wow that sentence was a slog wasn’t it. “You can type this sh*t George but you can’t say it.”) Then there was this couple, one of whom was definitely wearing a cape and a witch’s hat, along with a mask, and well it was more interesting than the usual khakis and baseball caps or whatever. I bet it felt hot in all that black though. Below, some more people, there’s no way that cellphone man was wearing a green t-shirt with a big white square on it, I must have seen that on someone else. I wonder what was inside the box? I can’t just make stuff up so I left it blank. These are drawn in my little Seawhite book, which is not the best for getting much bang out of the watercolour, they look a bit like dry markers. The colourfully dreessed woman at the bottom with flowers in her hat was at a stall with North African food which looked very tasty, but I have not yet tried. I was listening to a singer/guitarist next to me who was actually very good. I overheard a woman talking to him too, she was a songwriter. I like listening to people talk about song writing. It’s such a personal act of creation, and I do it myself, but I don’t share it, just my drawings. And this blog writing, which as we have determined isn’t really writing. Anyway, this also isn’t fine art drawing, just me going about with my sketchbook trying to record the real world, and this is what comes out. People passs by in the background, just a few lines and a splatter of paint, but they were real people too, now only ghosts on a page.

And then as the Farmers Market drew to a close I drew the stall with all the baskets, next to the Market Info hut. All those people lining up to ask (a) where the apostrophe is and (b) where they can buy farmers. they sell hats and t-shirts with the Farmers Market logo on (you can add your own apostrophe if you feel you need to) you can get your market goods (not farmers) specially wrapped up into a gift basket at Christmas time, which is nice. Anyway, this was me sketching at the market, and already that was two months ago. Time flies like an arrow, fruit flies like a banana, etc. I had an overpriced chocolate croissant and went home.

the market and all its people

April 10, 20251 Comment

This has been quite the week for the markets. Now I’m not an economist, but in the words of someone I used to work with many years ago, ‘Jesus, Lads’. Speaking of markets, I do like to sketch a market. People amble along slowly, making them easier to draw, sometimes standing about to chat. So on this one Saturday at the Davis Farmers Market I got a lot of quick people sketching done, as you can see below. It’s good to loosen up and draw like that. The world is made up of people, a diverse mix of backgrounds and thoughts and ideas and dreams, but we all need to eat. I sat at a picnic table and drew the scene above of the Farmers Market, the trees of Central Park Davis showing signs of spring while still waning out of winter. These types of scene sometimes overwhelm me but you just keep them simple. Trees on top, triangles next, heads and scribbled bodies, then all the stuff a feet level like those concrete walls, with a few vertical tree trunks dividing it all up. As I sketched, a couple of very young kids came and sat at the table and exclaimed to their mother, “Maman! Il fait de la peinture!” I guessed they were French and said “Salut!” and showed them all my book. Their mother was actually American, and told me they used to live in France, and were going to be moving back over there, to Lyon. I told them to look out for the great puppet theatres there, and also if they want to get into urban sketching, the huge Urban Sketchers France national ‘Rencontre’ will be held in Lyon this June. I won’t be going to it, though I did go to the ones in Strasbourg and in Lille. I’d love to sketch Lyon though. The last time I was there was in 2002 with my wife before she was my wife! Great food there, and of course puppets.

Here are all the people sketches I did on that morning/early afternoon, using a brown Pitt brush pen and watercolours. People passing by, people stopping to chat with each other, some mixes and matches (this person’s head, the next person’s body), even a dog and some musicians. You know what is coming up, Picnic Day. It’s this weekend. Perfect opportunity to get out and people sketch. Then I remember I don’t really like Picnic Day much, it’s too busy and overwhelming; I might stay away this year. I went last year, it was hot and there was a lot of slow walking about. I don’t mind the market though. I’m trying to think, what other markets have I sketched, other than the Davis Farmers Market? I sketched Portobello Market last year and the year before. I’ve sketched Borough Market, of course. I’ve sketched the San Francisco Ferry Building Market a few times. I sketched the Market at Place Richelme in Aix last summer, on a rainy morning. I sketched the big covered market La Boqueria in Barcelona. And yes, I’ve even sketched Wall Street. I prefer a proper street market. I have a wish-list of other markets I’d like to sketch. Places where people gather.

a saturday down portobello

January 7, 2025January 7, 20255 Comments

On the last day of November, exactly a year since Shane MacGowan died, I found myself in Ladbroke Grove, heading to Portobello Market. I was going to a book signing by an old friend of mine from university at a little bookstore. I was up early; my Mum and I were playing the Pogues music in honour of Shane, and having a morning singalong with a bit of the Wolfe Tones on my ukulele, and then I headed out for my day of sketching and literature. I decided not to take the tube, but caught the 302 bus from the end of my street like I would do in the long-ago old days. I hadn’t been this way to Notting Hill in over 25 years, I think, changing bus in Willesden for the 52 towards Victoria. The 52 used to run all the way from Victoria to Mill Hill before they split the route in two. I sat at the top looking out of the window, trying to remember and recognize all the places along the way, seeing some of them in a new way as an urban sketcher. I must explore Kensal Green and its big old cemetery some day. I got out at Ladbroke Grove, which was already quite busy with foot traffic for the market, and sketched the tube station from across the road. It’s not the most visually exciting tube station, but worth sketching. I am really into sketching tube stations, and old pubs, and bookshops. I like sketching markets too, but they get so busy that I often shy away from it. I stood outside an estate agents; as I sketched, tourists stopped by to look at all the places that were listed, massively overpriced tiny flats in a massively overpriced massive city. Tour groups gathered outside the station. Portobello has always been popular with tourists; growing up Ladbroke Grove was always seen as a little bit rough, but definitely a big area of music and culture. I’ve only been to the Notting Hill Carnival once, on a baking hot day in 1996, and spending a day squashed in a slowly moving crowd that moved like a thick sauce through these wide streets before ending up watching Jamiroquai in his massive hat, that was once enough for me. I thought about that as I sketched. I am better in a crowd when I’m by myself. I headed into the crowded market looking for some food, and smelled out what looked like a delicious paella. It really wasn’t, and I ended up throwing it away. “More like a paella shite” I said to myself, making a mental note to remember that if I ever came back. I went to my friend’s book signing at the nearby Jam Bookstore (more of that in a different post).

After I left the book signing at Jam I went back into the busy world, and stood in between two parked vans to sketch this book stall. I had books on the brain, and also on my arm, carrying a bag with five new books in it. I didn’t have space to buy any from this stall, but they were getting a fair bit of foot traffic. As I sketched, there was a fellow behind me taking photos, photos of me sketching as it turned out. I didn’t much mind. He introduced himself to me and offered to message me the photos. His name was Trevor Flynn, and he’s an artist himself who has sketched around Portobello for years, and runs a company called Drawing At Work (http://drawingatwork.co.uk/), he has got people out sketching for years. He also knew about Urban Sketchers London and has worked with sketchers I know. Always nice to meet other sketchers. In fact he told me he did all the sketching and storyboarding for the film Notting Hill, back in the 90s. I loved that film, I remember I had a really long and stressful day at university, I studied drama and they were usually long hours, and I would often stop at the cinema on the way home (either in Stepney or in Camden) to catch a film and relax, and this one night I watched Notting Hill and it cheered me right up.

I kept strolling further down the market; I had sketched down here last year so wasn’t necessarily going to do too much today, as I was heading towards Notting Hill Gate with the idea of walking down Kensington Church Street, but this colourful art market area on Tavistock Road caught my eye, especially the bits of orange on the trees in the background. Well I had to sketch the scene. As soon as I did, a lady in a pink high-vis vest came to talk to me, she told me this was something called Open Art Spaces (see openartspaces.co.uk), and these were all independent artists selling and showing their work, and she gave me their card (a Moo card; I had forgotten mine). As I sketched, I was joined by one of those artists, Chen Xi, who is also an urban sketcher. He is from Singapore but is in London doing a Masters, and he knew several of the Singapore sketchers that I have known over the years, even been taught by them. I chatted with him for a while sketching the scene, and when I was done I bought some of his cards and walked around the market talking to other artists and buying more cards, coasters, bookmarks. It was fun getting out and talking to people in my favourite city, I should do it more often.

I walked down Portobello with that Al Green song from the movie stuck in my head, though the seasons didn’t change, and I don’t look like late 90s Hugh Grant, well not much anyway. I saw the Electric Cinema and decided I really needed to draw that, with the Christmas trees for sale outside. I never saw a movie here, but I have a vague memory that they had a small bar here back in the 90s and I came in for a drink with an ex, though it might have been somewhere else, or maybe I imagined it. I’ve been dreaming about London for so many years now, I mean actual dreams when I’m asleep, that whole areas have grown that my sleeping self is convinced are real but actually don’t exist at all, built as if from broken Lego sets of real places and experiences; I wish I could draw them. There is a lot of London that I’ve not been to in over 25 years that I have almost entirely forgotten; later that week I walked around parts of Mayfair that I had honestly set outside my mind completely, not since I was an open-top tour bus guide, but when I walked through certain squares and down certain roads, memory and story came flooding back. In some cases, they trickle back, and it’s like that around here. Sometimes the mystery of memory is more exciting. I was standing next to a stall that sold quite posh looking ham, if memory serves (and we know it doesn’t), and the market was getting busy but I wanted to press on.

Down Notting Hill Gate I went, and there’s a lot to sketch around there, but I just wandered about, thinking about stories. I was near Campden Hill Road; back in the mid-90s I actually took an evening course in screenwriting here, not a very long one, but it was enjoyable. I remember quite liking the people in the class, and the teacher was nice, and I had to write a short screenplay; I think I wrote one about a priest meeting a woman, it wasn’t very original, and in fact the instructor complained it was too derivative of a TV show called ‘Priest’, which I had never seen, and didn’t sound like the sort of thing I’d watch. Then I wrote another about a woman who was in love with the grim reaper and would murder people to see him again; not very sophisticated, and my heart wasn’t in it. I’ve never written a love story since. I remember there was an Irish guy on the course who was writing a screenplay about the Battle of Brunanburh, but this was before I studied Old English poetry so I wasn’t really familiar with it, but I remember he did a good job. I should do more evening courses, though there’s not as much choice in Davis as there was in London, and I don’t know what I’d want to do. Not screenwriting again. I walked down to Kensington Church Street as I wanted to visit the Churchill Arms, or at least watch their Christmas lights come on. This is a famous pub, often winning pub of the year awards for its unusually over the top floral arrangements outside, though for the festive season they deck out in thousands of lights, and as you can see from the sketch lots of people gather to watch them come on. I stood across the busy street and drew fast. My waterbrush ran out so I had to add the paint in afterwards. As I sketched, a woman with a thick Texas accent asked me without prompting or introduction if I had visited the Tim Burton exhibition. I said I had not, and she proceeded to tell me I should go, because they had just been there and it was wonderful. She said my drawing reminded her of his sketchbooks, which was a surprise to hear. she then asked if I knew who Tim Burton was; now the thing is, whenever anyone I don’t know randomly asks me if I have heard of someone, my natural instinct is to say I haven’t, so I said “no; is he the guy who invented trousers?” It just came out; I was thinking of the clothes shop Burtons. So she listed all the films he had directed, and by this point I had to keep pretending I didn’t know who he was, in case she thought I was taking the mick, so I ended up making the “no, don’t know that one” face to films like Batman and Edward Scissorhands. I did like the sound of this exhibition though, and said I would try to go and see it; “Tom…Barton?” “Tim Burton, you’d enjoy it.” “Thanks, I’ll check it out.” “You should. Have a great vacation!” and off she went. It’s nice to meet people, I’m getting good at it.

I did want to rest my legs and have a festive pint before heading back to Burnt Oak though, as it was now dark and my legs were feeling weary. I stand when I sketch because I don’t like being hunched over on a stool, and getting some rest is good. The Churchill was packed, there was no room at the inn, even though the interior of that pub is on my list of must-sketch places. I used to go in there sometimes years ago and marvel at all the stuff on the walls and ceiling, the landlord was from Tipperary I think because I remember lots of Tipperary hurling memorabilia, had some good nights out in there years ago. They also did a lovely Thai curry, but no chance today. I walked about to some other little pubs I was surprised were still there, but didn’t look much like they did in the 90s, but I ended up in the Prince Albert, where a load of people were watching the football, Arsenal against a really bad West Ham. I sat down for a while with my back to the screen, nursed a pint and sketched them watching it, lads with no faces. The food smelled expensive and not very enticing, so I didn’t eat, and then I got the tube back home. It was a year since Shane MacGowan died, and I went back to Burnt Oak to spend the evening out with my Mum and some longtime family friends, and several pints of Guinness. That was a busy day.

rainy days in the south of france

July 26, 2024July 25, 20242 Comments

Provence is usually sunnier than this. I woke up one morning for my usual early sketch and pain-au-chocolat run, to the sound of heavy rain against the cobbles. We were heading to Nice that morning, but with this storm rolling over it looked like the Cote wasn’t going to be as Azur as we’d hoped. We get enough sunshine in California. Still a little bit of rain didn’t deter me. I remember that it poured down the last time I’d been in Aix-en-Provence, a torrential downpour that nearly caused me to miss my TGV to Strasbourg. Doesn;t stop me from sketching. I walked over to Place Richelme, where the mornings are alive with colourful fruit and veg stalls before being whisked away by lunchtime for the cafes. It’s one of our favourite squares in Aix, and I found a dry doorway to stand in and draw, and listen. People passed by me on their way to work in the building, each one with a pleasant “bonjour” to me on the way, this is how they do it in France, people say “bonjour” to each other, and I like it. Looking across the Place, I remembered there was a pizza stand on the other side years ago where you get big slices of Neapolitan style pizza very cheap, the ones so big you fold them to eat them, and we’d get those at night after a couple of drinks at the nearby bar Le Brigand, we had many evenings sat outside there. When I first met my wife we went there with some friends and I think I surprised her by having three conversations at once, one in French, one in English, one in German, with people I knew around us. I would struggle to have one conversation in English nowadays. Le Brigand is still there, unchanged. There was another place nearby called Happy Days, which is now gone. I would sing the theme tune to Happy Days as we passed, but in French, and deliberately bad French for comic effect. I hummed that to myself as I sketched the market. I listened out to the market people greeting each other, the thick Provençal accent I once heard described as ‘soupy’, or “le Parlé de Chez Nous” as my old barber would call it. “Dang dang dang,” they would say, meaning “Wait wait wait” (“Attends attends attends”), and “ah put-aing!” when they swore. “Vous dessinez bieng!” one man said to me as he looked over my sketch, I smiled in thanks. I love listening out for that southern accent. I drew as much as I could, and dashed off to get breakfast.

This church tower rises above the narrow and busy Rue Espariat, which sneaks uphill through the old centre-ville. This street always brings me right back to the early days in Aix, a sit was easy to get lost but here you knew where you where, more or less, and it is always a short hop over to the wide Cours Mirabeau. On this day, I had left my family at the shops to go and sketch, but no sooner did the sketchbook come out then so did that warm dusty rain, turning the air as soupy as the accent. I’m really doubling down on that word ‘soupy’. I still wanted to draw, so I stood tight against the wall and did my best. I had to go and sit down somewhere to add colour and shading, the raindrops were starting to glomp onto the page. I walked down to the Place des Augustins to a familiar old pub.

I do wonder when I write these posts, show these sketches, who is reading, is it anyone I know? Anyone that I knew from Aix, that has stumbled across all of this? If so, hello there, bonjour, I hope you’re doing well. My memories of people have faded a lot over the years, names and even faces, , though I still have a lot of old photos, and my year in Aix was during the time of physical photos that you had to get developed at a shop, then keep in a box in a cupboard, unseen. Anyway I went into O’Sullivan’s, a pub we all used to meet up in back in the old days, and it’s unchanged. I did last come here on that trip nine years ago and sketched the bar, just as I had done once in 2003, though much better. I didn’t want to sketch the bar this time, I just sat with a beer outside under the dry eaves, and I sketched a couple of people sat evading the rain opposite me. I remembered the street opposite, there was a little kebab shop I think, where my flatmate Emma and I would sometimes run into a local guy we knew called Corentin who played a djembe drum. He was a sweet guy, I remember he liked to climb trees. It was in that very little square that my future wife and I had our actual first date, eating tapas at a little restaurant across from me. We had met at my birthday party a few days before, on a much rainier night than this.

It was time to go and have dinner, but before meeting up with the family I had one more sketch, a fountain that I definitely also drew back in 2003, the one on the corner of Cours Sextius. I used to pass it on my way to visit my future wife, so it always reminds me of that walk. Cours Sextius is another tree lined boulevard, busy with traffic, well shaded, and I remember there was a club there called the Bistrot Aixois which I didn’t really like much, very popular with the American frat boys spending their semester abroad in France. I had never heard the term ‘frat boy’ before coming to Aix, an American guy I knew brought me to a party held by some frat boys. I remember having a lengthy discussion with one guy about how Robert De Niro is not actually a good actor, he just plays Robert de Niro all the time. There were a lot of American students in Aix, for many it was their first time outside of the US, and it’s not a bad place. I got to know a lot of art students while I was there, though I was only just starting to get back to drawing myself. And of course I met my wife, from California, and that’s how I am now living in Davis of course. This was a short visit to Aix, it was nice to see how the place is doing, though we’ve come a very long way since then. It was time to leave for Nice. Until next time Aix, jusque’à la prochaine fois.

christmas time at the farmers market

December 21, 2023December 20, 2023Leave a comment

A couple of weekends ago we held our latest Let’s Draw Davis meet of 2024, a small group in Central Park sketching at the Farmer’s Market. It had been a cold week and I was expecting a chilly morning, but the sun was out and the autumn colours were massive, and it was a really nice morning to be out with a sketchbook. I decided I’d sketch with my brown-ink fountain pen, it really creates a nice tone with the fall colours. There were a lot of people and stalls to draw; the flat earth people weren’t out this time, having probably fallen off the edge of the world. There was a banjo player making some nice tunes. As I sketched a young couple came up and tried to give me a flyer to some party with their church; no thank you, I said, but they were really insistent. I tried to politely make it clear I’m a little busy. They complemented my drawing but said “God gave you that gift”. I’m like, mate no, thousands and thousands of hours of practice gave me this gift, anyway see ya later, have a Merry Christmas. Still they held out the flyer, and then asked “Have you ever heard of Jesus?” I couldn’t help myself and said “No, never heard of him, who’s that?” As they started to actually tell me, and question me on how I celebrate Christmas, I had to say look mate you might try someone else, I’m not interested and obviously busy, and they finally left me to my sketch. Really not got a lot of time for religious converters, and don’t really have to explain why. One of the other sketchers later said they’d also been approached by the same insistent group, and instead had a long philosophical debate with them, and they eventually left him alone. At least it wasn’t the flat earth lot.

I drew more people about the market, I was going to colour them in but ended up leaving them as is, I like that brown ink. I wrote the colours next to them too, people were really out in lots of colourful clothing on this colourful Fall morning. Christmas is just around the corner. While I’ve no interest going to anyone’s Jesus party, I do absolutely love the Christmas carols at this time of year. One of my favourite festive moments since coming over here was attending the annual Christmas Concert at Grace Cathedral in San Francisco, which I did on a couple of occasions about a decade ago, having illustrated the program and poster for the event. There is nothing like a cathedral for the incredible acoustics of a Christmas concert. (Also, did you know that ‘Away in a Manger’ has a different tune in America than it does in Britain? We learned that song every year in junior school for our nativity play, so it is strange hearing it with a different tune, a bit like hearing Yellow Submarine with the tune of a David Bowie song) (which I have done at karaoke by the way, replacing the lyrics of Modern Love with those of Yellow Submarine, which really worked; I remember as I was going up a woman said to me “I really love this song!” and I said, “Yeah, you’re gonna hate this version”, but actually it really worked. I had this theory years ago that you could shoehorn the words of Yellow Submarine into any song. You can even do it with ‘Away in a Manger’ – try it! Fun Christmas party game). Anyway I love a Christmas Carol. You don’t get carollers coming round to your door any more, at least we never have here. I used to do it as a kid, me and a few other kids on our street would go round knocking on the doors in the Orange Hill area of Burnt Oak singing basically two songs, “Jingle Bells” and “We WISH you a Merry Christmas”. And occasionally Away In A Manger if they wanted an encore. We would get some money each, 10p, 20p, 50p if you were lucky, but woe betide those who gave away a full quid because word would get around and every carol-singing kid from Deansbrook to Stag Lane would descend upon your doorstep singing the exact same rushed verse of “We WISSHHH you a Merry Christmas” and hold out their hands. Ah fun times.

Well there was a group of singers in the park this day giving a performance of festive songs (though it was much more the church hymns than your Jingle Bells), but they were really good and I enjoyed listening to the singing as I sketched, with the fall colours behind. Nobody tried to give me a flyer either. Still I was up against the clock as the sketchcrawl was ending soon and we always meet to look at each others’ sketchbooks and share sketching tips. That Lamy Safari fountain pen with the brown ink is good for the quick sketchy movements of drawing people. These singers mostly wore black or dark clothes so it really stood out against the autumnal trees. Catching this season while I can.

50p down the market

June 13, 2023June 12, 20232 Comments

Saturday morning, London, I didn’t have any concrete plans for the day but was meeting old friends in the evening. I had the whole day to explore and sketch, but wasn’t completely sure where I’d go yet. I had a list of places I wanted to sketch on this trip, places in London that I had not been to in a very long time. I decided to head for Notting Hill Gate, and walk down to Portobello Road Market. I honestly cannot remember the last time I went there, maybe once when my wife first moved to England 21 years ago? I know I went there with my mate Terry once in about 2001. In the mid-90s I used to come to Notting Hill a lot as I had a friend who lived here, though even then I didn’t really go to the Market very often, usually because it was always so busy, and I didn’t really like crowds. Also I worked on Saturdays, didn’t I, back then? Memory fades. Still it had been a really long time since I was even last in Notting Hill, so it was an interesting experience to be back, and there is lots to sketch. First of all, the Central Line was jam packed, and everyone was getting out at Notting Hill Gate tube. Portobello Market is a really popular tourist destination, and it seemed like most of the voices I heard were Italian or American. After a little wandering about I walked down to the Market, past all the little vintage clothes stores and antique stalls and colourful shopfronts. I ate an early lunch at a place that does eggs called ‘Eggslut’ and paid like thirteen quid for a salmon and egg sandwich. Thirteen quid. Prices in England are through the roof right now. When I was a kid, my friend Terry used to help out his Grandad at Portobello Market on Saturdays, his grandad Charlie Bonello (who was Maltese and a great laugh, he used to tell us silly jokes) had a market stall down here, and there was one phrase he would always say whenever Terry would buy something his grandad thought was overpriced, he’d say “50p down the market!” So that became out catchphrase (one of them) for years since. I thought of him when I was paying thirteen quid for a salmon and egg sandwich, I could hear him telling me “Thirteen quid?! 50p down the market!” Except this was that same market. Times have changed since the late 80s, I guess.

I found a spot next to a big fruit and veg stall, overlooking the crossroads with Colville Terrace and Elgin Crescent, next to this trendy looking tea shop, and stood for a long while drawing the scene as it snaked towards me. There were a lot of people around, so I drew passers-by in that usual way, not really drawing anyone in particular but mixing and matching bits of different people as they went by. Any resemblance to any person living or dead is entirely coincidental, although someone did pass by with that exact mohawk and beard combination, so he had to go in the book (he probably wasn’t wearing a massive white shirt but I was tired and lazy with my observations. First drawing of the day, and I was tired already? Well I’d been out late the night before, but I was standing here for quite a while and my legs were hurting. My legs hurt even looking at this drawing. I didn’t want to sit, you need a better view. I coloured most of it in later (except for a few parts I’d started), but there was a lot of ink drawing to do on site, and that Fabriano watercolour sketchbook really makes your pen work on that paper. I had ‘pre-prepared’ the paper a little bit this time, adding a thin wash of paint over the pages the day before, and that helped the pen move a little bit faster but still not as smooth as in the Moleskine. Still I love to sketch a market, and now I’ve finally sketched Portobello. If you want a print of this, well it will be more than 50p down the market, I need to offset the cost of that sandwich somehow…

At the entrance of Portobello Road itself, where it curves into Pembridge Road, there’s this big yellow pub called the Sun in Splendour. I’ve never been in there actually, and didn’t on this day either, but I wanted to draw this colourful corner so I stood over by the e-bike stand on the other side of the road. The first thing I drew was the pile of orange rubbish bags on the pavement. They were soon taken by the garbage trucks. Why keep those in you ask? Well I have my reasons. Look at all the people making their way to or from Portobello Market, I didn’t colour those in as I went along, and you can see there are four people in red, almost entirely evenly spaced out, which is weird. Anyway one thing I wanted to do was try out my gold gel pen for the pub name. I did this a few times in sketches on this trip, and sometimes it didn’t really stand out as much, but in this case it did. I had to remember not to spell ‘Splendour’ in the American way. It did remind me of the sugar substitute they use in the US.

Around here, I saw a lot of references to the 1999 film Notting Hill, the one with Hugh Grant and Julia Roberts which should be considered very cheesy and a bit naff, but in fact I love that film, I’m a fan of lots of the people in it, and sure it’s definitely cheese, but who cares. I remember one night at university when I was doing drama, I wasn’t feeling that well and had worked late on drama projects, I forget exactly what we were working on, but it went on really late and I was pretty exhausted. In those days I had a very long tube journey home back from Mile End to Burnt Oak, and was not massively looking forward to it. Sometimes I would stop halfway and get out at Camden Town, and go and see a film at the Odeon on Parkway before heading back to bed. On this one night I didn’t even get to Camden, I popped into a cinema in Stepney Green (which is probably long gone) and watched Notting Hill, and I have to say it totally cheered me up. Sure that silly Elvis Costello rendition of “She” was crooning all over the place, but the soundtrack was pretty great, and I dunno, it just put me in a good mood, and I was ready and up for things again the next day. Doing a drama degree was pretty exhausting, London was pretty exhausting. In fact I went back to Mile End on this trip, visited my old university, did some sketching; more on that in a later post.

Further up Pembridge Road, the little shops lining the street up towards Notting Hill Gate are colourful and worth sketching. That fish and chip shop across the street was busy, next to a vintage clothes shop. There have always been those little shops around here. I’m not really into old clothes or fashion, with the obvious exception of football shirts, of which I’m a football fashion afficionado. I did notice that many of the people in the street were wearing light puffer jackets, it wasn’t cold but it wasn’t that warm either. I stood against an iron railing and drew them, while people sat on steps next to me eating their lunch and smoking. There seem to be a lot more smokers about, and loads more of those bloody vapers, with their little plastic vapes and huge clouds of sticky sickly vapor. At least with smokers you can see the puff of smoke coming when walking behind them, with vapers it just appears as you’re walking by and fogs up the narrow sidewalk, gross. Definitely worse than it was a few years ago. Anyway I moved down a little bit towards cleaner air and sat on some steps to add some paint. As I did, someone came up and said “this is going to be an odd question but can I film you while you draw? Just for a few seconds.” I was like, sure why not. At least you asked, which is nice, I wouldn’t really have cared. Then about five minutes later, I swear, a girl came up and said, “Do you mind if I ask you something?” I said, to her surprise, “You want to film me sketching?” “Yes!” she said, “Is that ok?” She did have her phone in her hand as if ready to shoot so it was a good guess, but I said “Sure no problem, it’s just funny ‘cos you’re the second person in five minutes to ask me!” I suppose people like to see people sketching the world. I love being a tourist.

The last thing I drew that day was an old pub I have been in before, the Prince Albert, but not since about 1997 or 1998 I think. It’s changed a lot since then, but it’s still there round the corner from Notting Hill Gate tube station. It’s pretty swanky inside with its fancy food; I popped in to use the toilet after sketching outside for a while, my legs getting very tired by this point, and ended up staying in for a pint and to add some of the colour. That red car outside, it was stopped in traffic for a little bit and I drew it very quickly, probably not very accurately but it seemed appropriate for the area. Yeah I got a pint, it was £7.10, and not that nice (I didn’t even finish it). “£7.10” I said, “50p down the Market”. Turns out £7.10 is a pretty average price for a pint in London these days, it’s gone up a lot since even last year. Everything has, food, transport, energy. It’s a good job the Buck is still strong against the Quid. There was a big screen on in the pub playing one of the play-off games, I think it was one with Notts County playing Chesterfield at Wembley for a chance to return to the Football League (wait, neither Notts County nor Chesterfield were in the Football League? I didn’t realize). I didn’t stay for the whole thing but there was a group of Aussies (in a London pub, you are never very far from a group of Aussies) watching the game and discussing their careers in the music industry, from what I could gather, I wasn’t really listening, could have been Jason Donovan for all I know. It was nice to get off my feet for a bit though. I love wandering and sketching, but you need to stop and rest. After this, I wandered Notting Hill for a bit more, walking down to the Churchill arms on Kensington Church Street, which was a pub I used to really enjoy evenings out in years ago, and is on my bucket list to draw, but I didn’t have time to sketch on this occasion. I took a quick snap (for a from-photo pub-drawing to be done later) and headed to Leicester Square where I’d be meeting up with some very old friends for an evening of dinner and drinks and laughs. It was fun to wander around this old haunt for a bit though.

sunday morning drawing davis

August 6, 2021August 5, 2021Leave a comment

Last Sunday morning, on the first day of August, we held our first Let’s Draw Davis sketchcrawl of the year. It has been a while; I paused organizing them due to the pandemic and I’ve been busy on weekends this year, but one of my fellow Davis sketchers Marlene Lee suggested holding one at Central Park that day during the craft Fair that was going on. It was a good idea. There were lots of vendors selling interesting art items, and there was a band called ‘New Harmony Jazz Band’ playing old numbers. It was nice to see other sketchers again, I’ve been hiding away for a long time and seeing others out and about doing their stuff is always good to see. Plus one guy (Alex) was wearing a Wolverhampton Wanderers shirt! I was delighted, I love football shirts but I’d never seen someone in Davis wear a Wolves shirt before. I’m showing you the sketches I did in reverse, so I can put my final drawing – this big panorama of the Craft Fair in the Farmer’s Market area – first. There were quite a few people around but it wasn’t crowded. Many people were masked up but most weren’t. Many of the sketchers were (including me for about half the time, usually when I might be interacting with people). It makes me feel more like a ninja, plus the mask I was wearing has my drawings on it (you can get masks with my drawings on here! https://society6.com/petescully/masks). I drew the scene above in about 1.5 hours, including about two thirds of the colour, but I coloured in the background when I got home. It was already getting hot, and I stopped for a shaved ice (which needed a few more flavours). Below is the band, they played nice music to sketch to. I drew that, and my other people sketches, with the Zebra brush pen that I was using a couple of years ago. It’s nice to use something like that again, it makes for rapid sketching.

And below are most of the sketchers, as you see I drew Alex in his Wolves shirt twice. If I had drawn more detailed sketches I would have done all of the shirt detailing on the front of that particular shirt. I myself was wearing my France football shirt that day, a favourite of mine, but mostly in honor of Esteban Ocon, who had won his first Grand Prix that morning at the Hungaroring in Budapest, a crazy race that saw a lot of carnage at the first corner. Ocon was also the first French driver to win a Grand Prix in a French car (Alpine, formerly Renault) since Alain Prost in the Renault in 1983. To see the podium with just one anthem played and for it to be the Marseillaise, well I’d never seen that before so I wore my French shirt in Ocon’s honor. I am about as obsessed with Formula 1 as I am with football shirts, as you can tell! I get up very early to watch it. 080221 LDD C IG

Below are Ann Privateer and William Lum, also drawn in the Zebra pen…

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…and here are Ann Filmer and Marlene Lee, sketching in the shade. We’re hoping to have the Davis sketchcrawls go monthly again; I just got my soccer coaching schedule (so many Saturdays to the end of the year, and beyond) so others will organize but since campus is all coming back in-person this Fall it will be good for people to get outside and draw with each other again.

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The Let’s Draw Davis FB Page (where events will be posted) is here: https://www.facebook.com/LetsDrawDavis

There’s also a Let’s Draw Davis FB group, where people who attended can post their sketches and photos afterwards: https://www.facebook.com/groups/LetsDrawDavis/

good morning san francisco

August 2, 20212 Comments

It was too hot in Davis (stop the press!) so I took a 7am train down to somewhere much cooler, San Francisco, where I got sunburnt. It always happens. I put on lots of sunscreen, but those rays still get through that fog. It was breezy too, and it’s easy to forget. In Davis that never happens because it’s so hot I am never out of the shade. still, it was a nice day to be out and about. I arrived early, so I could spend a bit of time around the Farmers Market at the Ferry Building. I’d not been there since before the pandemic; there were a lot of people around, but it wasn’t too crowded. I even got my favourite food in this city, these little ‘bombolini’, small doughnut things filled with lemon or custard or nutella. Absolutely delicious, and worth the $62 round trip Amtrak ticket to get down here. Yeah, it’s not cheap getting down to the city these days. But a break from the oppressive heat Davis, it’s always a good idea. I stood on a long wooden log and drew the Ferry Building, as that morning fog drifted in and burned out. A bit like myself; I drifted into the city in the morning, and then by the end of the day I burned out. I got a lot of sketching and wandering done in the meantime though.

I drew some of the people who were in the market that morning. That guy in red was wearing a 2006 Spain shirt. I always think of Robin Williams when I come here. I remember spending a weekend here with my wife in the late 2000s and we came down to the Ferry Building Farmers Market and there he was, Robin Williams, buying some food. Always makes me feel a bit sad. He lived locally, until his passing in 2014; they eventually named the tunnel you pass through after the Golden Gate Bridge after him.

I turned around after drawing the Ferry Building and the people and drew the view looking the other way. The sun was out a bit more now, but I needed to draw this SoMa skyline as it has changed so much in the decade and a half since I moved out here. Even this scene here, that building behind Gate B is where I used to pick up the Amtrak bus after a day in San Francisco, but that’s all been redeveloped into a nice plaza now. Many of those tall buildings weren’t here a few years ago; it’s like London and San Francisco are competing for new skylines every time I’m away. Still I enjoy drawing all these details. I had to wait until later to add the colour though, because the day was moving along and so was I. Lunch was a couple of tasty Argentinian empanadas from inside the Ferry Building, and then I wandered over to Market to decide where I would wander next. As before I didn’t really have a plan, I just wanted to sketch somewhere I didn’t sketch in June, but somewhere with a good view and somewhere I could just sit for ages looking at it. Find out next time where I ended up…

(6) Stratford, (7) New Cross and (8) Tooting

July 28, 2020July 28, 2020Leave a comment

Going east from the city, this is the last bit of vaguely familiar territory for a while for me. On the left, number 6, that is the Town Hall at Stratford in east London. I have been inside there once, while I was a student at Queen Mary University of London in nearby Mile End, and I took a French exam there. I studied French, though I probably didn’t study it as hard as I could have. I lived in Belgium and France for brief periods, but my French is not the best. Chaucer made a joke in the Canterbury Tales about one of the pilgrims, the Prioress, speaking only the French of “Stratford at Bow”, not the “proper” Parisian French (“And Frenssh she spak ful faire and fetisly, After the scole of Stratford atte Bowe, For Frenhssh of Parys was to hire unknowe.”) Seems to me he was making a joke at my own poor French, learned at Stratford atte Bowe, seven hundred years early. Oh well. You may know Stratford from the 2012 Olympics in London, that was a beautiful occasion wasn’t it, still my favourite opening ceremony, made me miss home for sure. I’ve spent a bit of time in Stratford over the years, seen it change, I would never have guessed the actual Olympics would end up there some day, but that happened.

Right let’s not linger, time to jump on the Overground and end up in New Cross Gate, across the river in southeast London. Have I ever been to New Cross? I don’t think I have. It was always one of those places I’d see interesting indie club nights advertised on fliers handed out in Soho or Camden, but then I’d see where New Cross was and I lived in the complete opposite end of London. If it was beyond the river, yeah probably too far. I don’t know south London very well; as a north Londoner you grew up with a lot of people basically acting like it was a different city entirely. They talk different them Saaf Landoners, and there aren’t as many tube lines down there, and cabbies won’t go saaf of the rivah after dark, see. Not that I ever got a cab anywhere. I did get to know some of south London in the late nineties though through the medium of going out with women that lived in Clapham. That’s an interesting area, divided into Clapham North, Clapham Common and Clapham South, but there’s also Clapham Junction but that’s not on the Northern Line. It’s an area so full of European au pairs that my friends referred to it as “Nappy Valley”, though I didn’t get the pun on Napa Valley at the time, I assumed it was some saaf London thing. I love that we call it “saaf” London, even though I also pronounce “south” as “saaf” more than half the time. My norf London accent can be quite thick, even now I’m Californian. For example when I was a kid, true story, I though Bran Flakes were called that because of their colour, because they were “Braan”, literally brown flakes. Not all norf London speaks like that, in fact there are loads of slightly different accents across London, but most Burnt Oakers like me have quite strong cockney voices. So no, I’ve never been to New Cross. Why did I include it here? Not sure, maybe I really wanted to go to nearby Goldsmiths College years ago, doing art and whatever else they are famous for, but I ended up choosing Queen Mary and studying French and Drama, and life takes whatever turn it has to.

Right, turning away from New Cross, I now have to get across south London somehow to reach Tooting. I probably should have left this stop out, or drawn Greenwich or moved directly to Canterbury, but I didn’t want to be so dismissive of South London that I would draw New Cross and then be like right, that’s all there is. So I went (virtually) to Tooting, which is a stop on that lower part of the Northern Line, the line that stands on one leg, and a place I have never been. I know it only from that TV show that was on when I was about 3 or 4, Citizen Smith, with Robert Lindsay as Wolfie Smith. Aparently when I was 4 and filming a TV show at BBC TV Centre in White City I saw Lindsay and went up to him excitedly. My mum told me that years later. Never been to Tooting, but I’ve been to nearby Balham a couple of times, both times going to parties there in my early 20s. Being on the Northern Line, that meant I could get home without changing trains, theoretically, so I wouldn’t be lost in the wilds of saaf London. This sketch is of Tooting Market, which looked interesting but I will probably never go to. Maybe I should have drawn Croydon, that’s a more interesting place, but in my mind I probably still thought, yeah but I should be near the tube so I can get home in time for dinner and watch Gladiators and Noel’s House Party, even though actually I’m sitting at a desk in California in 2020.

Ok, enough norf-London bewilderment at saaf-London, now time to get all London-centric with the rest of the country. Next stop, Canterbury! (checks notes) I mean, next stop Broadstairs! Broadstairs?

Portland’s Autumn

January 17, 2019January 15, 20191 Comment

In November I went up to Portland, Oregon, to teach one of the 10×10 Urban Sketchers workshops, on Interior Perspective. I was invited by my friend Rita Sabler (the excellent Portland reportage sketcher), and it was as always an enjoyable visit to one of my favourite cities. I only ever seem to go these days in dark November, but this time it was not rainy at all. It was very colourful in fact, with the autumn leaves out in full force. I tried to capture as much of that as possible in my out-and-about sketches. Above, Portland’s Saturday market, with the Skidmore Fountain in the foreground. I sketched this fountain in 2010 at the first USk Symposium, on a Saturday morning perspective sketching class with Frank Ching. That was the moment I always look back to when I really gave up my inhibitions about drawing in public; rather than find a place to hide and be invisible, better to sketch openly and not worry about being ‘in the way’, become part of the place. On this day, I was able to observe the market as some stalls were still setting up, and as people passed by I got a real feel for the character of this quarter of Portland.

I like the Steel Bridge, another one I drew on that first Portland symposium, that time at a workshop with Lapin, I sat between him and Gerard Michel discussing different approaches. I’ve always wanted to return to this riverbank in the Spring when the blossoms are all pink, but coming back in Fall with golden leaves floating down is almost as nice. I did get a bit cold though, and so streetcarred it back to the hotel for a rest before my workshop.

This one was sketched at the food carts area at Alder Street, after I had spent a good long afternoon wandering about Powell’s. Powell’s is such a great big bookstore, I could spend forever in there. They had my books, too, which is always exciting to see. I have a tradition now of going to Powell’s and then wandering up here for a big hot dish of Thai food, and I was not disappointed. I sketched across the street, the sunlight starting to fade, the urban greys brightened up by the reddish orange of the trees.

Not too far away, a bit earlier in the day, the Star Theater, with yellowy leaves scattered about. A group of homeless people sat nearby talking and laughing, streetcars rattled past, a slight breeze blew leaves and thoughts past as I sketched. My legs were hurting; I had had a night out before, and a good lie-in, but as each year passes I always forget I need a bit more rest. I spent the rest of the afternoon in Powell’s. And below, of course, an orange Portland fire hydrant, weather-worn and pock-marked.