back in the good life garden

May 27, 2024May 26, 2024Leave a comment

Another from campus, I was attempting a panorama of the RMI (Robert Mondavi Institute) for Food and Wine Sciences, from one of the few shady spots in the Good Life Garden (“morning Margo” “hello Jerry”) but I couldn’t be bothered to colour it in. I’ve sketched here before of course, it’s close to my office. I do wonder sometimes, I get in a rut with my sketching. Like, drawing the encampment on the Quad, it was at a bit of a distance but it’s still showing something different, a moment in time worth documenting. Sometimes though I’m just drawing a place because it’s there, and will probably look the same in 10, 20 years. I do remember when it wasn’t there of course, it was built in my work-life-time. I still have a wine glass from the grand opening, as it was around the time of the UC Davis centenary so it had that motif on it. I think that was from then anyway. My former supervisor got herself about four or five of those free glasses, it was a fun little trip. She passed away several years ago, sadly. I learned of former colleague who died a couple of months ago, very sad to hear, he had retired a long time ago. While looking for his former workmates to tell, I learned of another who died last year, who was on the original team of staff I worked with when I joined our department. Made me quite pensive this week, thinking about all those people, all those old times, when I was brand new to this university. Now it’s my job to make people feel at home in our place of work, as it was theirs before me. Life goes on, doesn’t it, and I keep on drawing it.

RMI

October 17, 2023October 17, 2023Leave a comment

This is the Robert Mondavi Institute (RMI) of Food and Wine Sciences at UC Davis, very close to where I work. I’ve drawn it a couple of other times, and am surprised I don’t draw it more because it is an interesting building. I stood in the middle, in the Good Life Garden surrounded by all sorts of flowers and foods, and drew the view looking east. The sky was dramatic that day; I couldn’t stand in any shade, so when the sun came out I would hide under my hat with my collars up, like a spy. Those limes in the foreground looked nice. This October is getting me down man, getting me stressed. Needed to stand in a big garden for a bit. I actually went to a meeting in that building over the summer. When I say it was in that building, it was actually mostly over Zoom, I was one of three people there in person (including the host) while everyone else were little faces on this big screen. I was taking notes, but being in person I couldn’t do that thing where you’re looking at the screen nodding as if you’re paying attention, but actually getting some other stuff done. It was pretty awkward being one of the only people actually there. That was summer though, now most of our meetings are in person again, and it’s less awkward when you’re in a room full of people. I have been the only one on Zoom though, in a meeting last year when I was in London, and if you’re the only one, generally you are a big head on the big screen instead of a small head among many others. I probably looked like Holly from Red Dwarf.

food and wine, i’ll be fine

June 23, 2018June 22, 2018Leave a comment

This is the Robert Mondavi Institute of Food and Wine Science, which I have drawn before. This was sketched a couple of months ago now. Before the World Cup. This World Cup is draining me a bit, it’s all I can think about. I’m up at 5am every day watching it, then spending the rest of my waking hours thinking about whether Germany will get into the knockout stages and how England can avoid them; why both Spain and Iran changed into their away kits when their away kits are the same colour as the other team’s home kit; how unexpectedly brilliant VAR has been; why are Argentina playing so utterly rubbish; was that Iran player’s attempted flip-throw that became a limp roly-poly the funniest moment of any World Cup; when will the 0-0s start? Is this happening to you? There is a day next week when the football stops and I hope to completely catch up with life on that day. Anyway this is as I said the RMI, nearby to my office, sketched one lunchtime.

Ok here are some previous versions…

counting acts and clutching thoughts…

February 6, 2017February 6, 20176 Comments

It’s February, the birthday month. I don’t really do a lot to celebrate, I don’t have parties or anything, don’t really have enough of a social circle for the sort of nights out I used to have when I was younger, now it’s more a quiet meal with the family, a pint of beer and some cheesecake. Now this sketch, done on the first day of the month at the UCD Arboretum about a minute from my office, was not meant to be metaphorical of birthdays but in that great way you can retrospectively attach meaning to anything, this is a bridge, signifying crossing from one time to another. Weak I know. On the far side though is the Robert Mondavi Institute of Food and Wine Sciences, which includes the Beer lab, so I supposed that signifies celebratory tipples in some way. There is a STOP sign, which must mean I need to stop and assess myself, and there is a yellow sign for a roundabout, which of course as we all know signifies the Circle of Life, obviously, that one’s obvious. The path, well part of it falls into shadow which of course means the path is not always clear, and then of course there is the Creek, and that one is easy, it signifies my creaking body as I get older each day. I had no idea there was so much semiotic depth to my sketches! I wonder what all the fire hydrants mean? Actually don’t answer that.

the good life

October 18, 2013October 18, 20131 Comment

I’ve been busy…and not updating. Mostly not scanning. There has been some sketching. There’s mostly been drawing cartoon cut-out skeletons for Halloween, and a cardboard Iron Man suit. Don’t ask. Anyway, these are in fact my sketches from the last Davis sketchcrawl in September, starting at the Robert Mondavi Institute for Food and Wine and stuff, in the Good Life Garden. Yes, the Good Life Garden, named (I presume) after the TV show with Felicity Kendall and Richard Briers and Jerry and Margo. This place is pretty amazing, for a good life garden. At UC Davis we have world-class enologists, who presumably are experts in Brian Eno. Seriously, Enology is a real thing, and goes hand to hand here with Viticulture, with I believe is the science behind Jaffa Cakes and Digestives (the correct term is McVitieculture, but over here they drop the “Mc” just like they drop the “O” in Oenology, which as you know is to do with wine and is not to be confused with Onology, the science behind Yoko). Ok now all that has been cleared up, let’s get on with the sketches. At the top, the Good Life Garden, in which I got a little sun but savoured the lovely smells while humming that beloved theme tune. Hey, one thing I never knew is that in America, The Good Life was called “Good Neighbours”. Now I’m sorry but that is too close to another show we all know, and yet another theme tune stuck in my head. Apparently it was renamed due to an earlier unsuccessful show called The Good Life starring JR Ewing, I mean, Larry Hagman. I am trying to imagine Paul Eddington in a ten-gallon Stetson, with his middle-class commuter stiff upper lip, no that doesn’t look right.

This bit is the Beer Lab. That is, the “RMI Teaching and Research Winery and Busch Brewing and Food Science Lab”. Or just “Drink!” for short. This is the real University of Beer.

let’s draw uc davis

September 15, 2013Leave a comment

Time for another sketchcrawl in sunny Davis…join us next Sunday September 22 for some sketching on the UC Davis campus!

We will meet at noon at the Good Life Garden, located in the courtyard of the Robert Mondavi Institute for Food & Wine Science (http://rmi.ucdavis.edu/). From there we will sketch individually or in a group as you prefer, before reconvening at 4:00pm at the Wyatt Deck in the Arboretum to check out each others’ sketchbooks.

As always this sketchcrawl is free and open to anyone who likes a bit of location drawing. It’s a great way to really explore our town, and meet (and learn from) other sketchers.

Hope to see you there!

“may I have some of your tasty beverage to wash this down?”

January 22, 2013Leave a comment

Taking a lunchbreak during a very very busy work week, I walked down to a spot in the shade of the bike path near Old Davis Road to sketch once more the Robert Mondavi Institute for Food and Wine and Beer and All Sorts of Other Fun Stuff. I always forget the correct name but that’s what I call it, and I had a tour of the facility last summer, and it really is a very interesting place. They have very scientific wine tasting auditoria and are home to some of the best enologists in the world. Seriously, these guys know their stuff, and not just the enologists, but the other food researchers too. They know their beer too, and have a whole new section devoted to beer science.The wine in California goes without saying, of course, but I love the beer out here, as you may have guessed. Now back in England if I say American beer, most people I know will think Bud-bleurgh and other such nonsense. No, no one thing I can say is that Americans, especially out here in the West, really do know and love their brews. Anyway with thoughts of a nice cold one at the end of a week of cold mornings, sunny lunchtimes and hectic workdays, it was nice to relax and concentrate on all those lines and windows.

Funny to think, when I started working here, when I started sketching Davis, this building didn’t even exist. Now I see it every day, and I still like it.

the space between us

July 13, 20112 Comments

The Robert Mondavi Institute for Wine and Food Science at UC Davis, sketched from afar on the Old Davis Road. Pass by it every day, always wanted to sketch from this spot, beneath a shady tree at the other end of the vinyards, planted a couple of years ago or so. UC Davis is a leading institution for viticulture and enology. California has a lot of wine-growers. I like this sketch; it illustrates the colours of Davis, the local ‘palette’, and gives a nice sense of location – not just northern California in the middle of July when the grass is ochre and the sky is permanent blue, but my actual location while sketching it, sat distantly among the foliage.

Tomorrow my location will be even further away, as I’ll be flying off to England, and then to Portugal…