sketching as the sun sets

August 10, 2010April 30, 20204 Comments

Oh, the sketching stops for no one. Day One of the Symposium was not over yet. Still, I had a chance to relax in the hotel with some noodles and a cup of tea. I looked out of the window and drew part of the view opposite while talking on the phone. Then, as the evening came, I copied the sunset onto some brown paper and pottered off to Powell’s Books. Wow! What a place! I didn’t sketch there, I was too busy looking at books. That place is huge, a bookshop lover’s dream. A little while before, I had visited Reading Frenzy, to catch up on some of Portland’s well-known zine culture. I bought one local zine, and I really enjoyed it. I’ve considered (because it’s been suggested) that I turn some of my series into zines, and that is on the table in the foreseeable future, so it was good to see what other people are doing out there.

And so on to Portland’s famous beer culture. I stopped into Deschutes Brewery, where several other Urban Sketchers were already camped out, and caught up on some great conversation and a few more attempts at people-sketching. Below are Lapin, Don Colley from Chicago, and Frank Ching.

Don and I went on to Jake’s Crawfish for a beer and a last sketch of the day. It was an interesting looking place and we both sketched the same scene. His work is great, very dramatic and full of life, and he sketches in a huge old book filled with incredible drawings. It was a pleasure to watch him sketch and learn from him.

Exhausted, i got back to the hotel and posted a photo of the day one sketchbook. Phew! And there were still two more days of full-on sketching to come…

Symposium blog: http://pdx2010.urbansketchers.org/

all you need is Löw

July 6, 2010Leave a comment

Clearly the most fashionable man in the World Cup (if you don’t include his identikit assistant), German coach and George Harrison c.1965 impersonator Joachim Löw and his team of counter-attacking kids have taken South Africa by storm. They face Spain in tomorrow’s all-important semi-final, having utterly destroyed Maradona’s Argentina, and we all know about what happened against England. No need to mention it again. That was a Löw point.

an urban sketch

June 30, 2010June 30, 20102 Comments

This is Urban, who until his retirement this week was our computer guy at work. I took the opportunity to sketch him at his farewell lunch because I need practice drawing people on the spot, and also because this makes it literally an ‘Urban sketch’. Thought you’d like that. I drew it in my moleskine diary.

Speaking of Urban Sketchers…one month until the Portland Symposium…

allez les bleus! en est tous ensemble…

June 25, 2010June 25, 20101 Comment

Poor France. Seriously, I feel for their fans. I haven’t always felt so. Back in 2002, I lived in the south of France when they were champions of the World, Europe and the Inner Solar System. Public opinion prior to the Japan/South korea World Cup was that you could have Pele, Maradona, Puskas, Cruyff, anyone out there and France would still win without breaking a sweat. The player’s faces were on every yoghurt carton, every soda bottle, every TV advert; Zidane was a god whose image was omnipresent; and that awfully catchy song by ancient Franco-Belgian pop star Johnny Halliday, “Allez les Bleus!” Such was Gallic confidence, you could buy their shirts with the second golden star already sewn on.

And then they went to the far east, and failed to score a single goal. They came home stunned; nobody could quite believe it. The bubble burst. Never again would the previously soccer-cynical French public let themselves get so carried away with expectation. Therefore, it was a bit of a surprise that they came within a headbutt of winning the trophy in 2006. Even more of a surprise, retrospectively at least, is that the manager that took them so close four years ago is the same one who is so universally reviled now, Raymond Domenech, who I attempted to draw above in my football journal.

What happened? I recall their pitiful display at Euro 2008, when he held a press conference not to explain the dismal defeats they had suffered, but to propose to his girlfriend. France had no confidence in him, and yet kept him on, knowing he’d be replaced after the World Cup with former player and favourite, Laurent Blanc. They scraped through a qualification play-off, thanks to a Thierry Henry handball, but in South Africa it all went ventre-up. Player revolts, Anelka being sent home, training ground bust-ups – other teams would give their right leg to play in this tournament and this is how they all behave? And then against host nation South Africa, Domenech refuses to shake the opposing manager’s hand. French football is in chaos. The French president himself is demanding answers from this shambles.

“Allez les bleus, en est tous ensemble,” sang Johnny Halliday, “allez les bleus, en est tous avec vous.” Not any more they’re not.

all those oh-so-nears

June 9, 2010June 10, 20103 Comments

Watching the World Cup warm-ups this week, I saw on the side of the North korean bus something like, “Heroes of 1966, Korea DPR will be victorious!” For those who don’t know, North Korea’s last World Cup appearance saw them beat Italy and go 3-0 up against Eusebio’s Portugal in the quarter-finals (before losing 5-3). My first reaction was, now come on North Korea, let it go. 1966 was ages ago! Get over it, move on, don’t live on past glories. England would never do that, eh!

As kids at school we learnt that the Battle of Hastings was 1066, the Great Fire of London was 1666, and England won the World Cup in 1966. History did apparently happen on other non-66 years, but the England football team winning major tournaments alas did not. Years of Keegan, Lineker, Gazza, Beckham… all those oh-so-nears wear you down. Thirty years of hurt became fourty-four, and I can’t see that we have improved so much that we will be able to get past another inevitable penalty shoot-out, probably against the Germans. (Incidentally, England has won the World Cup more times than Germany. ‘West Germany’ however won it three times…) Still we like to hope, and we have Wayne Rooney.

England open their 2010 World Cup against the USA on Saturday. Hopefully it won’t turn out like the first time they played each other in a World Cup, in 1950. On that occasion, when England first deigned to take part in this silly cup of inferior nations, the seasoned US beat the England of Mortenson, Finney and Wright 1-0. The US team still talks about it even now; come on now, 1950 was ages ago, etc etc…

the greatest

June 2, 2010June 2, 2010Leave a comment

Who was the greatest footballer of all time? And is that the same thing as the best footballer of all time? For most people the default answer is Pele. Even for those who never saw him play, except for a few inventive long shots, a header saved by Gordon Banks and that scene with the tactics board in Escape to Victory, he is the greatest footballer of all time. We trust what they all say; those who watched him know what they’re on about. He did score more than a thousand goals for his club, Santos. He did win World Cups in super stylish fashion, surrounded by a super stylish team, at the time when the TV age was bringing the World Cup to many more millions than ever before. I’m just saying. True, Pele never tested himself in the big European leagues, preferring to stay at Santos where the goal just opened up for him, but he also didn’t live in an age where the multi-million dollar transfer to Real Madrid was absolutely inevitable; unlike so many ‘new Peles’ after him, Santos were able to ‘match his ambitions’. He did live in the age where you went off to the United States for a bagload of cash though (yes Beckham, it has been done before), finishing off his career at New York Cosmos in the NASL, before helping the Allies (along with Sylvester Stallone and half the Ipswich team) defeat Nazi Germany. Can’t get greater than that.

However, I was a kid in the 1980s, so for me Maradona is king, hands down. It’s all subjective. Puskas might have been the best. Stanley Matthews even. If Rivelino, Gerson, Carlos Alberto et al had all been born Ulstermen, George Best may have lifted the Jules Rimet in 1970 in the green of Northern Ireland, and we’d probably all be saying he was the greatest of all time. I’m just saying.

I’m sketching World Cup greats in my football sketchbook in anticipation of the World Cup, which begins next week.

the special one

May 24, 2010June 10, 2010Leave a comment

The European football season is over; Internazionale, of Milan, are European Champions for the first time since 1965 after beating Bayern Munich. Their manager, Jose Mourinho, has won it with Porto (but not with Chelsea), now with Inter, and it looks like he’s off to Real “we will do anything to win it yet again because we’re, like, obsessed” Madrid.

Drawn in my football journal, which is becoming increasingly manager-centric.

gordon is not a moron

May 10, 2010May 11, 20103 Comments

What an interesting few days! A week really is a long time in politics. The first general election to end in a Hung Parliament since 1974. The Conservatives won an extraordinary amount of seats, but not enough to gain a majority and legitimately form a government. To explain, this means that the party that came second, Brown’s governing Labour party, remain as government for now, until deals can be made for Labour or the Conservatives to form some sort coalition with the smaller parties, meaning all those that lost the election are allowed to govern rather than the party that ultimately came first, or failing any agreement, allow the Conservatives to form a minority government with Cameron as PM. Got all that? Don’t worry, I don’t think even they get it.

So amid the wooing of the Liberal Democrats by both parties, Gordon Brown offered his own head, and committed to stepping down as Labour leader. It was inevitable, of course (and he was constitutionally correct to remain in office while a new government is formed, despite Murdoch’s media arm of Sky News, The Sun et al trying to force him out in favour of their bloke).

The Liberal Democrats’ situation is wierd, isn’t it? The nation was so gripped with Cleggmania before the election that they forgot to vote for them – the Lib Dems ended up with fewer seats than in the last election! Even Lembit ‘Mr. Cheeky Girl’ Opik lost his seat to the Tories. But that doesn’t matter – despite such poor results, they now hold the key to deciding the next government, because it’s Clegg that Brown and Cameron are courting. Now explain that to the aliens from outer space.

I was thinking of that song Jilted John, and thinking of David Cameron. Listen to the lyrics and replace ‘Julie’ with ‘Clegg’, and imagine Clegg ditching the possibility of alliance with Jilted Dave and going off with Gordon. “And they were both laughing at me! But I know he’s a moron, Gordon is a moron…” It could still happen. One can only hope.

The election was fun though. I always used to stay up all night for elections, getting excited as they called such exotic places as Ceredigion and The Wrekin. This time we were treated to no ‘Portillo moment’, but watching Jacqui Smith lose her seta while dressed as No. 6 from the Prisoner was amusing. Paxman was a relative gentleman, while Dimbleby was getting tired of the shots of cars going down motorways. Bill Wyman showed up at one point, apparently dressed as Worzel Gummidge, declaring that basically he was working class but Labour did nothing for him, now he’s rich so he votes Tory. I didn’t even have to watch the sun rise; the great thing about living in California is that, being 8 hours behind, I could watch it all and see the new PM ‘crowned’ before bedtime. Well that didn’t work out! Several days later, it’s not done and dusted yet.

In other news, Chelsea won the Premier League, by a single point. Which presumably means that second-placed Manchester United can now do a deal with Arsenal and Spurs to become coalition champions instead. What? That’s not how it works? I’m so confused…

no time for losers, cos…

May 6, 2010May 6, 20102 Comments

We’re not Champions, no, but it feels like it. Spurs, my team, beat Manchester City (again; sorry City fans) to guarantee fourth place and a spot in the Champion’s League for the first time. Peter Crouch (a man so tall he has to, erm, crouch to avoid volcanic ash) scored the winner; that is supposed to be him above, drawn in my football diary. I’m recording football events. I enjoy doing that; now I’m trying to draw some of the people involved. Hopefully I’ll see an improvement as I go on.

As I write, I’m watching the BBC online, the tail end of Election Night, and no clear winner; a Hung Parliament beckons. I’ll write more about this some other time. Perhaps it will go to penalties? Maybe even a replay (as they did in 74)? Or maybe, just maybe, football can learn something from politics. Get rid of penalties, spoiling World Cup Finals, and have a system whereby the team that comes second can do a deal with the team that comes third to become coalition world champions; of course to come second you’d have to lose, so that analogy doesn’t work.

Anyway, I’ll leave politics for tomorrow. For now, come on you Spurs!

much more important than that

May 1, 20101 Comment

I never thought I’d see the day. A couple of weeks ago, I bought the England away shirt, the new Umbro ‘tailored’ kit in red. I’ve never bought an England shirt before, but this one is nice. I live in America now, so I can wear it without getting the urge to throw chairs. I am getting ready for the summer, when I will be following the South Africa World Cup. For those who aren’t aware I am World Cup crazy, and have been since I was a kid. I watched the last one on the Mexican stations, but this time I have upgraded to the English-speaking sports channels, which means I’ll nderstand when they talk stats, but will have to provide my own exclamations of“goooooooooooollll!!!!!”.

But before the summer of World cup, there’s a week of highly exciting Premier League left. It’s between Man U and Chelsea for the title, but for me it’s all about my own team Tottenham, and that fourth Champions League spot. If you’d have told me at the start of the season that Spurs would be in fourth place with a week to go I’d have said you were nuts. Well we have to thank that guy on the left there, Harry Redknapp, Tottenham’s manager (drawn in my football journal-cum-sketchbook). That could all change in the next couple of hours of course, and we have to beat (or not lose to) Man City, so I am still expecting us to throw it away again. Even if we do, we haven’t been below 6th all year and that is incredible. Come on you Spurs!

Over in France meanwhile, the team I followed when I lived there, Olympique Marseille, are set for their first title since the early 90s when they dominated and then exploded in match-fixing disgrace. Again, I’m still expecting that familiar capitulation but I’m hopeful for l’OM. Besides, my other old favourite equipe, Auxerre, are right behind them. Lyon’s time is over, and Bordeaux have lost it. Allez allez!

“Football football football football football. What you men see in it I don’t know. A load of men kicking a bit of leather around a field. You men, the things you think are great fun.” (Mrs. Doyle, Father Ted)