all the science words

February 11, 2022February 11, 2022Leave a comment

This was drawn while campus was still quiet, before people returned from the month-long remote period in January. That said, here on campus in early February, a lot of people are still working remotely, and there aren’t many coming into our department in-person just yet. This is the old Physical Sciences Library building, which has been undergoing a remodeling for the past few years. Beyond it is the Chemistry building, itself still undergoing a massive reshape. I drew this from the shade of the Physics building. When I was at school, science consisted of three parts – physics, chemistry, biology. You took all three, and then at GCSE level you did ‘integrated science’, which was divided among the three. As a rule, I enjoyed physics but was crap at it, I didn’t like biology but was good at it, and I was so-so about chemistry and was so-so at it. Maybe a bit more on the crap side. I was scared of Bunsen Burners (I mean who isn’t, really?). I like Van Der Graaf generators, mostly for the name (and the band). Biology though, I found it dull, and it was always a surprise to get some of the better grades in the class. My biology teachers were nice. I liked my physics teacher (Mr Vilis) a lot, even though he was always grumpy (he would go ballistic if anyone opened the window), and never gave me good grades or seemed to know I existed, but I still liked him, he could be funny. I really enjoyed reading about physics at home, but it was a difficult subject at school. Chemistry was sometimes interesting, especially when a test tube full of poisonous purple gas would break and everyone had to leave the room. Learning all the molecules and formulas was hard. I remember we learned ‘KMnO4’, Potassium Permanganate, and I thought that was the best possible band name ever, but I never used it. Now I think it sounds like a radio station in the US. Even if I had been better at school science classes, I would probably never have made it as a scientist because I would just make silly jokes from all the science words. And I am still afraid of Bunsen Burners.

with kaleidoscope eyes

February 4, 2022February 3, 2022Leave a comment

One evening after work, I was coming out of the ARC, which acts as the large Covid testing center for campus, and the sky was just blazing all sorts of colours. We get tested at least once a fortnight on campus, and it’s pretty handy, in and out. The building across the street there is the Student Health and Wellness Center. The sky was creating a psychedelic drama reflected in the windows, and so I grabbed my paints and a pen and tried as best as I could to draw what I could see. I couldn’t see the sketchbook too well in retreating light but I love the result. You can’t beat a good sunset. The colours are probably not that accurate and my paint makes a mess but that is the fun of capturing something like that, and my eyes are different from the next person. I got the general spirit of the sunset. There was a lot going on. We do get amazing wild sunsets here in January.

walker hall in the end

February 2, 2022Leave a comment

Walker Hall…is finished. Finally! The Graduate Center at UC Davis is the new home of Graduate Studies on campus and is located in the newly renovated historic Walker Hall. I have been drawing the whole process since before the renovation (see the whole album here) and so this month I drew a couple of close-up panoramas of the two courtyards between the three wings of this large E-shaped building. They were at slightly different times of day and different weathers but that makes it nice to see the two together. There is going to be a formal proper opening of the building in April (hopefully), and it will be nice to have the whole set to look back on. In fact here is how it looked back in 2014 before any of the redevelopment started…

Right, next project! It’s fun capturing a building being born / reborn.

you say you want an evolution

January 31, 2022January 31, 2022Leave a comment

This is Robbins Hall, UC Davis, drawn a few weeks ago. I like the way the tree spreads out into all those branches. Like branches of evolution (linking the picture thematically to the fact the word ‘evolution’ appears on the building), if evolution meant all evolving into the same thing, which is not generally how evolution works. I’m not sure a tree is the best model for describing the process of evolution of species, just as it’s not that great at describing the evolution of languages), Campus was still quieter with most people working remotely; that changes today, as our temporary from-home status comes back to our (temporary?) not-from-home status. I’m here anyway, but I think the fluidity between home/not-home are here to stay. We will see what the rest of this year brings. As January closes and February begins, the longest month replaced by the shortest month, things are busy. I had been considering a trip back to England to see the family during this period, but I decided against it when the new Covid strain hit the charts, the Omicron, that difficult third album. It’s so exhausting just thinking about everything, so I’m putting that trip off. I am sure I’d be on edge. As it turns out this week will probably be the busiest week of the year work-wise and the thought of trying to interview people remotely from my mum’s kitchen in London late at night didn’t appeal, so the trip back to London is delayed a bit longer. This is the longest time I’ve not visited London. I’ve been drawing Davis a lot this month, taking a break from the soccer, and re-obsessing over the Beatles since the release of Get Back, and Paul McCartney’s book ‘The Lyrics’, which I got for Christmas. I’ve re-watched Get Back so many times now, and spent hours poring over that book, I want to write a proper post with my thoughts about it all (and some Beatles-related drawings?), but that may take a while. I’ve even dug my old electric guitar out from its stasis pod under my bed to try and get back to playing a little, it’s time to branch out again musically. I might even buy a bass, if I can figure out where I would put the thing.

in the hands of engineers

January 10, 20222 Comments

One last sketch from Fall that I forgot to post, this is a view of Bainer Hall, UC Davis, with those yellow-leaved trees in the foreground, another lunchtime sketch. You have to draw the world as it goes along. Those leaves are gone now. There are people in this sketch, three of them in fact, you just have to look for them. This is the place for Engineering on campus. I never thought of Engineering as a thing to do in my life, I didn’t realize the massive scope of what it could be, probably. To me, engineering was being stuck under a rusty old car with a wrench wearing overalls covered in oil, taking a break occasionally to read the Sun and swear about the football, and I figured, no I wouldn’t be any good at that, except the last bit of which I am really good at. I think Engineering may be a bit more than that, and it’s one of those areas where you have to be really really clever and know lots of very technical science, but also probably get your hands a bit dirty. Honestly I have no idea, like with most things. I draw little pictures of streets and things, slightly less complicated. I wonder if I’d have been a good engineer though? I wasn’t all that good in CDT class at school. CDT was ‘Craft Design Technology’, what Americans would call ‘Shop’. With all the big mechanical tools, gadgets, circuits, plastic moulding machines, and I remember being enthusiastic about it, except it was in a school setting where the politics of the classroom meant very little got actually learned. Lining up outside the class was the worst bit I think, there were always a couple of would-be bully lads trying to show off. It’s a shame, I remember I liked my CDT teacher, though for some reason I can’t remember his name, but really I wasn’t all that good at CDT, unless drawing was involved. I remember we learned about Ohms and Capacitors. Thinking back, I wish I’d been good at that class, I just wasn’t. Though I remember one occasion, a competition where we all had to design, make and then race cars out of a couple of bits of cardboard, some elastic bands, a couple of pencils and some plastic kinder egg shells. At least, that’s what I used. And my one actually won! I think my drawings of the design helped, but my actual little vehicle – like a paper airplane with elasticated wheels – won the race as well. One of very few things I actually won at school. I basically retired as an engineer after that, my career in the Formula 1 paddock was never going to burgeon.

Everybody Loves Tardigrades

December 15, 2021December 15, 20211 Comment

They do, don’t they. Everybody loves tardigrades. This is a sculpture of a tardigrade, also known as a ‘water bear’, outside the Academic Surge Building on campus, next to where I work, home to the Bohart Musuem of Entomology. I took me three attempts to spell ‘Entomology’ by the way, going through ‘Entemology’ and ‘Entimology’ before finding the right spelling. I knew it probably wasn’t ‘Entamology’, and ‘Entumology’ looks very wrong, and ‘Entermology’ is right out, but looking at it, it should really be a word for something and it’s a shame it isn’t. When I first came to campus I actually interviewed with the Viticulture and Enology department, and they actually offered me the position despite my response to “what is Enology” being “it’s insects, innit.” No, Enology isn’t insects (it’s actually wine science), but Entomology is. So, they have a big tardigrade sculpture outside, because yes, everybody loves tardigrades. Except students awaiting exam results, they don’t like tardy grades. Here’s one, “what is the difference between an Aquarius and a Tardigrade? One is a water bearer, and the other is a water bear.” Ok that joke needs a bit of work (actually I think that joke needs a different job), but it’s true, everybody loves tardigrades. They are tiny little super beings that can live in any temperature and in any environment, although even they probably avoid parts of south London after dark. They are miniscule, and have been found in every part of the Earth, from volcanoes to the deep oceans, from the Antarctic to the Amazon, from Tesco to Asda, they are everywhere and can survive any conditions, although even they probably couldn’t sit through half an hour of watching Mrs Brown’s Boys. Thanks to humans feeling the need to pop off into space, tardigrades are probably already colonizing the moon, and are watching down on us wondering why it’s taking us so long to come back and get them. They are sometimes called ‘Moss Piglets’ but that might just be their band name. They have survived all five mass extinctions, though I still don’t fancy their chances under the Tories. They don’t actually live for very long, about 3 or 4 months, but that’s still longer than most Tottenham managers’ careers. Everybody loves tardigrades.

dream a little dream

December 1, 2021Leave a comment

Catching up on posting October sketches still, although November actually ends today. Can you believe it’s December 2021 already? Wow. It’s a good job I finished making this year’s advent calendar already. This year I made an unusual one, not so much a single calendar as 24 plastic baubles on a miniature tree that are opened each day to reveal the chocolate inside. Oh and each one is painted with a Studio Ghibli character, in acrylic, because of course it is. We should have gone to Japan this November, that was the plan. That was the plan last November too. The pandemic put paid to our plans across the Pacific. We were going to Tokyo, and one of the things I wanted to do was visit the Studio Ghibli museum. My son and I are both big fans of those films. We were also going to Tokyo Disney, my wife is a big fan of the Disneylands. I was also hoping to see my oldest friend Tel, who has lived in Japan for ages now. We still message each other, usually stupid messages. My son saw over my shoulder me and Tel were just messaging the word ‘bollocks’ to each other for ages. Needless to say, we aren’t debating Proust. In fact I can already imagine the jokes if we ever met someone who wanted to debate Proust. Still it’s been bloody ages since I saw him, would be nice to go and pay him a visit. I actually had a dream about him last night, or rather I had a dream and he showed up. That happens sometimes, I dream about my old mates. In this dream I met up with him and two other old mates (Rob and Roshan if I recall) and we went to a bar, but I was waiting at the bar so long for our drinks that I didn’t get to spend any time with them, and every time the drinks came they were wrong, and then everyone had to go home, and I didn’t see anyone again for years. I mean, I miss my old mates, but come on, in real life we would probably all stand at the bar while we waited for the drinks. Who knows, dreams don’t make sense. It’s also true that nobody actually cares about your dreams, they are not actually interesting at all. Like, literally the most boring thing is to talk about what you dreamed about. You may as well just say, I had this stupid thought, isn’t it weird I had that stupid thought, I wonder what it means. You happened to be asleep of course so you thought it was real. You never say, I had a thought the other day, and you were in that thought, but you were painted green and driving wheelbarrow made of ham, no people would be like, right, ok mate. That said, back when we were kids Tel did tell me about a dream he had, about Robin Hood and his Merry Men all dressed in skirts and dancing about singing “Don’t F*@k with me, I’m Robin Hood”. That made us laugh all the way down Green Lane. So I turned that into a song. Well a four-song musical actually, which we performed as part of our Expressive Arts drama class at school (though my teacher Mr. Hart made me change the words to “Don’t Muck With Me, I’m Robin Hood”). We didn’t wear the skirts. It went down well, I guess, nobody cared that much probably. I think I played Robin Hood? It was thirty years ago. A few years later, Tel did tell me he never actually dreamed that song, he just made it up for a laugh. So I mean, that’s the same thing.

By the way this is a sketch of Kerr Hall (background), on the UC Davis campus, while stood outside California Hall, the fancy new building in the foreground.

rear windows

November 23, 2021November 23, 2021Leave a comment

This is the rear side of the building where I work on campus, the Mathematical Sciences Building, though I am no mathematical scientist myself. My window is one of those ones up on the top there, and I’ve surprisingly never drawn the building from this angle before, though I have drawn from those windows a few times. I was walking back from the vending machine in the next building over one lunchtime (the drink machine in our building is a bit temperamental when it comes to actually accepting your card payment; you tap the card, it gives it the whole “authorizing payment” wait, and then on some days it says yes, and on others it says nope, we’re not doing that today, cash only and good luck with that, what’s ‘cash’, why not write a check, why not barter some oxen, caveman”) (I always imagine the drink machine talking in a very stroppy voice, or being like Barry from High Fidelity). Anyway I was walking back that way and decided that this was a good angle to stop and sketch, with the bins in the front, and the sky was looking interesting. We’ve actually had rain lately, and now the weather is cooler, like you’d expect for November, but this has been an unusually hot year in the west. The big return to campus this Fall has been successful, although a good number of staff are still working partially remotely, a situation that looks like it will continue, but the students and faculty are back and all learning in-person again, and it seems to be going well. Hopefully it stays that way. I couldn’t go back to fully remote myself, I would need a better desk for one thing. And a better chair. I should probably get a new chair for work anyway. I’ve had my current office chair for sixteen years, and it was my predecessors’ chair, back in the long long ago, so it has seen some mileage, or whatever the sedentary non-moving version of mileage is, just “age” I guess. The wheels are coming off the chair a little bit but it still works. Some other people in our department are getting new chairs now and the prices have really gone up since before the pandemic, the guys who bring the chairs told me, it’s incredible. Same with a lot of things I guess. That’s 2021 for you. And it’s nearly over, this 2021, this strange successor to 2020, and then we will have 2022, the grandchild of 2020, with whatever fun that brings. I should probably get a new chair.

still climbing the mountain

November 16, 2021November 16, 2021Leave a comment

This is ‘The Barn’, a building on the UC Davis campus, I have drawn it before, I have commented on its simple name before, I’ve done it all before. I like the regularity of it all. At the same time…well, you know. I just like to draw. It’s ok to draw the same thing over and over. Look back at Cézanne’s sketchblog from his years in Aix-en-Provence, another city I have spent time in. “Got up, had a little walk down to Cours Sextius, walked past the Dog People, got a Pepsi Max from the Petit Casino, and then drew Mont St. Victoire YET AGAIN. But I’ve never drawn in on a Tuesday before, so. Be nice if they built some more mountains near here that I could draw TBH. Time for a Poulet-Frites. Hope I don’t step in Dog Poo again.” I’m sure he said all that. I was in Aix from 2001 to 2002, I met my wife there. I loved a Poulet-Frites. Stepping in Dog Poo was a common occurrence. ‘Stepping in Dog Poo’ was my ‘Mont St. Victoire’. What if we had decided to stay there, instead of moving to Davis? Instead of The Barn, you’d see a lot of drawings of that fountain with all the dolphins on it. I would speak better French though, probably. I have never picked up a Californian accent. One thing about The Barn, it does resemble the shape of Mont St. Victoire, a little bit. Well, it’s triangular.

I climbed Mont St. Victoire once. Twice actually, if you count the second time I did it. The first time I got all the way to the very top, where it is very windy, and climbed it alone. The second time I got the the almost-top, but let my friend Simon do the last few meters, while I just waited at a pretty nice overlook. It’s pretty high up. It’s a good achievement, climbing a mountain, especially a famous one that a famous artist has painted loads of times. I wouldn’t mind doing it again some time.

This Saturday I’m going to run the Davis Turkey Trot – not quite climbing a mountain, but it feels like an achievement. I always look forward to the pancakes afterwards. And the shower, and the rest, and the day at home relaxing. When I relax, I do big projects. I’m currently making this year’s Advent Calendar, it’s going to be different from previous years. I’m painting Studio Ghibli characters onto plastic baubles using acrylic, which I’ve never done before, but I’m already done with that part of it. Next I need to decide how I’m going to assemble them, what goes inside each one, where I will put it in the house, and how it will go with all the previous years’ calendars. I always say, this year will be the last one I make. I was feeling pretty down yesterday afternoon. I’m not sure why, just that time of existence. Maybe I was thinking about London, I’ve been thinking about London a lot lately; I know someone who is going there for Christmas and he asked me for some London tips, so I basically wrote a two-sheet guidebook with illustrations, I can’t help myself. So, I’m missing London. Feeling a bit overwhelmed with work and soccer coaching and just getting up and down sometimes too, like I need a sketching trip. Tired of the pandemic, tired of worry, tired of my glasses steaming up over my mask more on these cold mornings when I go inside, just for the first few minutes but enough for me to feel a bit lost momentarily. When I was outside yesterday lunchtime I saw an older woman down the street take a call on her phone, sit down, and start bawling her eyes out on the phone, it must have been some bad news. That affected me too, whatever it was I felt so bad for her, but just made me think we’re all that phone call away from the same. You start thinking about everyone in your world, all over the world, and how far away you put yourself. I couldn’t wait for the day to be over so I could get home, and get painting again, and just sitting down and focusing on painting very small details onto a little plastic ball while listening to a talk by Brian Cox about the Universe or something, well it made me feel alright again, for a bit. I’m looking forward to the run this weekend though. It wasn’t that long ago that I couldn’t run at all, so it feels good to run a 5k race, especially since I’ve not done an organized race since before the pandemic. But mostly I’m looking forward to the pancakes afterwards.

maybe the dreams that we dreamed are gone

November 9, 20213 Comments

This is another lunchtime sketch from the UC Davis campus, this time down at the creek in the Arboretum, looking towards King Hall and, well, Mrak Hall, back there somewhere. You can just about make it out. It has been a while since I drew from this shaded path by the water, but it used to be a regular sketching spot for me, and I’d come back every year to draw as the scene changed. It looks a little bit unrecognizable from the very first time now. Believe it or not, the sketch below was drawn from the same place, over fourteen years ago. Obviously my drawing style has evolved a bit since 2007 but you can see how much things have changed in this view.

I know, I do a lot of these types of posts. Here’s a drawing of somewhere on campus, and here’s what it used to look like years ago. I never imagined being here this long. I’m not sure what I imagined back in 2007, but here we are still in Davis, tracking the changes. And for those of you “why don’t you put people in your sketches, blah blah blah” folks, look, there is one person in each of these two drawings, although the newer one is more of an anthropomorphic scribble. It’s probably not the same person, but maybe it is, after all, I am. They have gone from jogging along that path to walking across the grass, into the shrubs. I’m still drawing into a Moleskine, trying to interpret the world into ink lines and watercolour blots.