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/

urban sketchers of the world

August 4, 2010August 9, 20185 Comments

The Urban Sketchers Correspondents met up at Henry’s Tavern on the night before the Symposium kicked off, and it was an instant whirlwind of sketching minds. Everyone knew everyone, though for many it was the first time we’d met. Five continents were represented right there: Liz (and Borromini Bear) from Australia, Isabel from Mauritania (though she’s Portuguese), Lapin from Barcelona (though he’s French), Gerard from Belgium, Simonetta from Italy, Kumi from Tokyo, Tia from Singapore, and the US contingent of Jason (Brooklyn), Veronica (NYC), Shiho (LA), Matthew (Idaho), Laura (North Carolina), Frank (Seattle), Gabi (Seattle, though he’s Spanish) and me (Davis, though I’m from London).

And I sketched people! Well, I had promised myself that I would try more, and here I didn’t have to worry about it being ok. I wasn’t the only one who doesn’t normally sketch folk on the spot. I certainly need practice and to find a technique I’m comfortable with, so i gave it a try, mostly in my little brown paper book, and picked up a few pointers. Above are Gabi Campanario, the tireless Urban Sketchers founder, Gerard Michel, of whose Liege drawings I am a huge fan (they remind me of my year in Charleroi), and a group of urban sketchers (the one in the hat is Prof. Frank Ching, who told me I’d drawn him looking like a Columbian gangster). I was sketched a few times too; there is Lapin above, sketching me holding my pen in a funny way, “l’incroyable tenu de crayon de pete”, he called it. There’s a name for a new book!

The highlight was probably looking through Gerard Michel‘s jaw-dropping sketchbook. Seeing it online, it is unbelievable just how good it is, but in person right in front of you it is just incredible, and also surreal, work you know so well is right there, right in front of you. I can say that about pretty much all of the sketchbooks I saw that night, certainly. Sufficiently humbled and inspired in equal measure, I went back to the hotel, and spent midnight drawing from my bedroom window.

preachin’ to the converted

July 12, 2010July 12, 20101 Comment

More from Jacksonville. There are so many interesting buildings to draw here, it’s impossible to know which one to choose. When in doubt, draw the church. Actually this was not as easy a choice as you might think, as there are several old wooden churches from the mid 1800s to choose from. I sat in the shade opposite the very classic Americana structure of St.Andrew’s church, originally built as the Methodist Episcopal Church in 1856. Picket fence, white wood, pointed steeple, all you need is a well-dressed bald guy with a pitchfork. How could I resist?

I started drawing another church just around the corner, another one from the 1850s but this time for the Catholics, but only got a third of the way through before giving up – I had no shade that time. Sitting in shade on sunny southern Oregonian days is a good idea. It looked just like the one above, but had some windows, and a telegraph pole next to it. Just imagine it, I’m probably not going to scan it.

Shade is good, but shade with fans and a bar and a cold beer is even better. That’s how I ended the July 4th sketching trip to Jacksonville, in the J’Ville Tavern. They have pool tables in there; I like the sound of pool, the kinetic crack of a break, the soft clunk of white potting black. I don’t hear it very often any more! They also have stuffed animal heads, lots of them in fact, and what looked like hundreds of dollar bills attached to the ceiling, for some reason (I didn’t ask; I prefer the mystery). Locals were very friendly though, and told me tales of historic Jacksonville. I guessed they tell them tales to all strangers.

when saturday comes

January 17, 20104 Comments

Last time I drew this bar I mis-spelled the name as Froggies, so I felt I had to draw in there again to rectify my error. It’s actually ‘Froggy’s’. This was the corner of the bar that you couldn’t see in that drawing too.

People were gathered for the American football, the play-offs so I understand. There was ice-hockey going on as well. This is how they spend their Saturdays, and I can certainly understand. I popped into the Soccer shirt shop down the road to watch some Premier League as well; Chelsea were thrashing Sunderland (my own Spurs manged a 0-0 with Hull). This is what Saturday’s are all about, isn’t it? For us men. For so many years, my Saturday’s were about getting what I needed to do done by about 3pm so I could listen to the footy on the radio and watch the scores come in at 4:45 on the BBC videprinter (is that what it was called?). And then late in the evening, Match of the Day, my favourite show. These days, I get my football results as I wake up, via live internet updates on the BBC (and their updater is far more sarky than the man who reads the results at final score). So nowadays my Saturday begins with the footy, and I don’t really care about the other sports (nor the MLS, which is frankly rubbish). So, sometimes, I go sketching instead.

angels on silver strings hang from above

December 21, 2009Leave a comment

After spending some time among the wild stones of Highgate Cemetery, I strolled through the park and back up to the village and sat in the middle of a traffic island, sketching the Angel Inn. Yup, another pub drawn. It’s a nice, warm pub with a good atmosphere and nice beers. I didn’t have the time (or energy) to draw the inside – some other occasion maybe. I would sometimes pop in here when I lived on Hornsey Lane, just down the hill. When I came out of the Angel Inn, the Sun had long since flown and the pretty garlands were zigzagging down Highgate Hill.

I hear there is a lot of snow in London these days. Have they learned to grit the roads on time yet? I remember back in, ooh, ’04 I think it was, the second annual Arctic Blast that caught us all by surprise (by giving us three days’ notice), and how my boss gave me a lift back from Finchley to Crouch End, bypassing the strangled traffic on the main iced-up roads by cleverly taking the back streets, but then having to navigate through stranded cars and sliding buses down Highgate Hill. It was like something from the Winter Olympics, but in extreme slow motion. Pretty scary. Highgate is a very steep hill.

prince charming

December 20, 2009December 21, 20092 Comments

It wasn’t as grey as it looks. It was a bright cold morning (with a chance of scattered showers turning cloudy later in the day), and so after a morning spent christmas shopping in Edgware I popped back down to Burnt Oak Broadway to do a sketch of a building I’ve always quite liked, but a pub I’ve never actually entered: The Prince of Wales (just known locally as the Prince). I thought it would make a nice drawing, since I’m into drawing pubs these days. Naturally, standing on the open street like that I kept my eyes open; I grew up trying hard not to stand out too much around here (not easy for a gawky red-head kid who held his pen in a funny way). I didn’t have to worry, nobody cared, no hoodies shouting “oi!” I quite like drawing Burnt Oak, in fact. You grow up there thinking about how grim it feels but there really is a lot of interesting stuff to draw.

a merry old soul was he

December 17, 2009December 17, 20092 Comments

The Coal Hole, next the the Savoy Theatre on London’s Strand. “Let’s all go down the Straaand, Let’s all go dahn the Straaand, ‘Ave a banana…”

I drew this after a whole day sketching in the cold and shopping in the warmth. It was very productive. The Coal Hole is a nice place to stop for a rest, and has a nice open fire next to which you can sit in a big comfy armchair (if you are lucky enough to grab it). I sat upstairs and looked down upon the suits and tourists, bags of christmas presents under the table, pint of London Pride on the table, and micron pen in hand. The pens were positively delighted to be back in the warmth, the ink oozed out beautifully like wine from a bottle, not like the reluctant agoraphobic ink I’d been dealing with all day. I migth have to buy gloves for my troublesome pens. But they are worth it.

Interesting thing about the Savoy Hotel – it has no floor thirteen. They are famously superstitious. If you book dinner at the Savoy for thirteen people they will give you a table for fourteen, and in the fourteenth seat they will place a little wooden cat called Caspar. Lucky for some. What’s more, the little road that leads into the hotel is probably the only road in the UK where you have to drive on the right hand side of the road (aka, the wrong hand side of the road). It’s a quirk dating back to the days of horse-drawn carriages, I’m told.

More London sketches to come!!!

sweet fanny ann

December 14, 2009December 13, 20094 Comments

A little pause in the London sketches – I’m about halfway through now so still many more to come! Here is my first drawing since coming back to the US: Fanny Ann’s Saloon in Old Town Sacramento.

I had to go to Sac to do a spot of Christmas shopping. And it absolutely peed down with rain. I had intended on stopping by here on the way home to maybe catch a sketch, but the enormous rainstorm meant I had a bit more time to do so. This is one of the most sketchable pubs in this part of California – there is so much paraphernalia to draw, hanging from the walls and rafters. I will draw more of that some time. It’s a little touristy, being in the middle of the old Gold Rush era cowboy town, but it’s friendly and a nice pit-stop. And the beer is good too.

the ship has weathered every rack

December 13, 2009December 13, 20093 Comments

This is The Ship, on Wardour Street. Everyone knows The Ship. It’s a small place that never really seems to change, and it’s one of my favourite little pubs in Soho. I used to come here a fair bit in my twenties. Being located right in the middle of soho helps, and I like to stop here whenever I’m back on a sketching trip to Soho, to warm up, and have a beer. I did so this time back, this time sketching it to boot. My pens were protesting so much at the cold that I had to put my pencil case on the radiator, while I ate a jacket potato. I hope this place doesn’t change. It’s a port of refuge of sameness every time I come back, while other old, familiar places are closing down around us. But everyone knows The Ship.

pillars of hercules

December 10, 2009December 11, 20091 Comment

I love sketching in Soho. You can do a sketch of something, and then just pop into an old pub and sketch in there. Sketch, and repeat. There are so many old pubs in soho to choose from. My friend Simon and I sketched down in Manette Street, just by Foyles Books (one of my favourite bookstores in the world), which as you may see I have called Mallet Street. Mallet Street is in fact somewhere else; oh dear, my A to Z London memory is starting to fade. We sat in the cold outside the Borderline club, a regular haunt of mine in the mid to late 90s (those indie nights) and I drew the back of the Pillars of Hercules pub, with the covered alleyway leading into Greek Street. Fingers freezing, we finished up and went inside for a pint of ale. I must say: though I love old English pubs, I’m not really a fan of the beers here any more. I’ve been rather spoiled by the West Coast micro-brews. Oh I don’t dislike them (in fact give me a Youngs or a Fullers any day), but these Adnams ones, well I would much rather have had a Fat Tire or an Anchor Steam. I think if I had English pubs with West Coast beers, I’d be a very happy man. And probably hung over quite a lot.