On the last night of the heat wave we met to sketch behind the Doubletree Hotel in Berkeley by the bay to cool off. The debate between candidates for California’s governor was on the radio so I listened on my iPhone while I sketched and it added a little spice to the evening. Who knew ol’ Jerry Brown was so funny?
Doubletree Lobby Chairs, Ink & watercolor
When it got too dark we explored the hotel, looking for sketching options. We considered the pool, the restaurant and the bar, but the seating area in the lobby was so comfy we plopped down and spent the rest of the evening drawing the chairs. You can see all of our renditions together on the Urban Sketchers Bay Area Blog.
All Day Meeting Sketches #1, graphite on notebook paper
We had an all day staff meeting today at our co-director’s home. It was a wonderful opportunity to catch up with each other, celebrate our accomplishments over the past year and plan for the huge amount of work we’ll be doing over the next year. It was also a chance for some sketching.
The gentleman above rests his finger just below his nose when he’s listening with concentration. (Just had to explain since it looks like he’s doing something else).
All Day Meeting Sketches #2, graphite
I really like the way the woman’s foot in this sketch turned out. She’s quite petite but I think I should have made her legs bigger since they were closer to me.
It felt inappropriate to take out my sketchbook (even though I know I listen well while drawing, I didn’t want others to think I wasn’t paying attention) so I drew in the same cheesy notebook I was using for notetaking. Of course everyone knew I was sketching anyway…
Last year we had our annual all staff meeting in a stuffy conference room. It was so much nicer gathering in a home where we could eat pizza in the backyard and sit in comfy chairs in a pretty living room and kick our shoes off.
Alvarado Bar and Grill, San Pablo; oil on panel, 8x10"
I recently began painting twice a week with the East Bay Landscape Painters whose members are preparing for a show of urban paintings of unexpected, nothing-special spots. For two Saturdays we painted on the unlovely corner of McBryde and San Pablo Avenue in Richmond.
I set up my easel by the air and water pumps at this gas station and set to work. I sketched out the composition and started painting the building when a huge semi truck double-parked right in front of it and began unloading produce for the market next door. My view was just about like this so I started on the empty lot next door. Half an hour later the truck left and I could finally paint the bar. I was happy with the above painting; a rare occurrence when I paint plein air.
Pupusas and Desayunos; oil on panel, 8x10"
The next Saturday afternoon we returned to the same corner. It was hot so I set up in a shady spot under this tree in front of a used car dealership and painted the Pupusas place across the street. Rebeca Garcia-Gonzalez also painted the Pupuseria, except she worked on an enormous canvas (maybe 24×30″) and her painting was fantastic! She also tells a funny story here about the day and the idea behind painting nothing-special spots.
While we were having our critique in the shade of the Fish and Chips place, one of the artists who’d left her chair and easel set up across the street by the pupusas shop just happened to look over her shoulder. She saw a guy jump out the side door of a van and pick up her folding chair. She started yelling at him, ran across the street and grabbed it back before he could stick it in the van. He took off and returned to our critique.
We met at the corner of Alcatraz and College on a warm evening and sat at tables outside A Cuppa Tea to sketch. Two women sat down beside me with cups of tea and began talking about prison while counting passing dogs. They asked about our sketching group, noticing us drawing, and then shared that this was their Tuesday night routine, and they were up to a dozen dogs already.
Although I didn’t mean to eavesdrop, hearing them talk about life in prison and the girls in their halfway house was just too interesting. It seemed ironic that having recently gotten out of prison they chose to meet on the corner of Alcatraz (the infamous prison located in the middle of the San Francisco Bay).
A Cuppa Tea, Berkeley, Ink & watercolor
It was great having the light of the cafe to sketch by as it got dark. When I could no longer see the street scene I turned around and drew the inside of the cafe through their window.
When we all finished sketching we went inside to see each others sketches. There were signs all over saying, “Tables for customers only!” (To fend off the students who clog all the cafes in town with their computers and piles of books). So Sonia bought another lemonade and when we left a few minutes later we left tips for the waitress.
Sala Berkeley Back to School Sale Window, ink & watercolor
Cedar and Shattuck in Berkeley on a warm fall night was perfect for our Tuesday night sketch-out. I started a few blocks south to draw the window display at “Sala.” Their windows are always great and have inspired me to draw them before. I was hurrying and didn’t quite get the proportions right so instead of tall willowy mannequins, these gals look a bit squat.
Cedar & Shattuck corner signs, ink & watercolor
It got dark so quickly there was time for just one more sketch before we went indoors. There’s a new Philz Coffee a couple of doors down from the corner with a large upstairs room filled with comfortable sofas, arm chairs, and big dining tables with fancy dining room style chairs. They were having a special event, “The Insect News Network.”
Insect News Network Show, ink & watercolor
The host with a microphone interviewed a bug scientist guest about the life cycle of various bugs that are found in urban gardens. They displayed slides and passed around live bug specimens in jars. Both were good speakers and made it all seem quite fascinating. It was great having entertainment while drawing. Their summing up statement was that “insects rule the planet; humans are only along for the ride.”
My plein air painting group held a workshop today at the beautiful Legion of Honor in San Francisco’s Lincoln Park at which Ed Terpening demonstrated. After an hour some people set up and started their own painting but I watched the full demo so had only enough time for this quick sketch. At the critique Ed pointed out the problem with the size of the guys in the foreground compared to the cars which made me laugh.
Ed is one of those rare artists who can paint while at the same time explaining the how, and why of what they’re doing. I learned so much! I’ve enjoyed following Ed’s blog, Life Plein Air for years and it was a real pleasure to meet him in person.
Afterwards I tried to walk over to the museum to see the Impressionists in Paris show (wonderful!) but was prevented by this craziness:
There were about a hundred noisy, smoky mopeds, coming up the hill and then circling around and around, more and more of them. Finally they left and I made it across the street and directly to the museum’s café for a much-needed latte. While I sipped I sketched the view out the cafe’s french doors (except they didn’t have Ed’s name above them):
Sketch under my notes about the workshop in journal
I took notes during the demo on a page in my journal that had an unfinished sketch done with green pen which is what that green mark is under Ed’s name.
Apparently the Legion of Honor is a place people go to take wedding and Quinciaños photos (even though their ceremonies weren’t actually held there). I noticed five different groups being photographed and took my own photos of a few. Since I used a zoom lens you don’t see the tourists and museum goers that were all around them:
Wedding group #1, So formal and seriousWedding Group #2: Flower GirlsQuincianera and her court of honor getting ready for photos
The Quinciañera is a Latin American tradition for celebrating a girl’s 15th birthday. Formerly a religious celebration, it has become an obscenely expensive event that can match weddings in cost and extravagance, including ball gowns, banquets, limos, huge parties, photographers, bands and more. I wish they’d save their money for college.
After their photos they left in a huge stretch limo as long as a bus but made out of a Hummer.
What is he thinking?
Nobody looked like they were enjoying themselves much in any of the groups. Except maybe the photographers, but they were getting paid to do their art.
I almost passed up this sketching opportunity as I hurried home from work but realized it was worth postponing dinner for and walked back. Here was this cute guy selling gourmet popsicles out of a pretend ice-cream truck that is really just a large tricyle inside a cloth-covered frame, playing rinky-tinky ice cream truck music.
I asked the proprietor, David Meisenholder, if he would be there for a while so I could sketch him. He’d been about to leave but was nice enough to wait while I sketched him (and he even made a few more sales).
The pretend, miniature “truck” is a brilliantly creative work of art, the kind of thing that makes your mind sort of expand and contract all at once, and is perfectly executed down to the little pretend headlights and grill on the front.
This is a new venture for David and his partner; you can see photos of the Popcycle’s “Maiden Voyage” here and you can find his locations via Twitter.
The signage and awnings on this corner in El Cerrito caught my eye, being an interesting eyesore. Only the icky Golden Gate Adult Books and Movies store still exists, just the signs remain for “Shirt Laundry &” and “TOOL.”
The “Tool” sign made me laugh since it has many connotations including one I’ve heard used lately to mean a dorky, loser of a guy (e.g. “What a tool!”)
Summer Squash on a Messed Up Page, brush pen & watercolor
Last week we went to a fairly desolate corner in El Cerrito with the intention to sketch a church and the local Wienerschnitzel fast food drive-thru. I was starting to get a migraine and feeling generally stupid so my first attempt just left a page with a bunch of black lines that I could see were all wrong.
I left the page and moved on to the next one (below). The next day I went back and drew right over the messed up page with my green Pitt Brush Pen to paint the squash above. (I’d cooked and eaten its delicious brethren but saved this one to draw.)
Wienerschnitzel, El Cerrito, Ink & watercolor
Here’s my second attempt. I love the way even the stupidest building can be pretty at sunset. At 7:30 it was already too dark to see so we gave up on drawing the church. By time we left at 8:00 I was happy to go home, take my migraine meds and head for bed.
Scruffy Roses Instead of Ice Cream, ink & watercolor
Sometimes when I’m tired and grumpy it feels like the solution to all my problems could be found in a bowl of ice cream. I know I’m not alone in this because I’ve noticed that movies and TV often show female characters heading for the Haagendaz when they’re upset.
I’ve also learned that despite those crossed wires in my brain* that say tired = eat sugar, dessert is rarely the solution, and only creates other problems for me. So I try to do something else and it usually works. On this occasion I spent the evening sketching some scruffy little roses from my garden. By the time I finished, the nearby ice cream shop had closed and I was ready to go to bed.
*Sleep Deprivation and Carbohydrate Craving
In a Harvard Magazine report on sleep research they explain how and why being sleep deprived creates a physiological craving for sugar. In one study, healthy, male college students who were subjected to sleep interruptions over a couple of weeks became carb-loading sugar fiends and even developed pre-diabetes. In the article the Harvard researchers say:”It could be that a good chunk of our epidemic of obesity is actually an epidemic of sleep deprivation.”
They say that most of us now sleep less than people did a century ago, or even 50 years ago although our biological need for 8 hours of sleep a night hasn’t changed. “We are living in the middle of history’s greatest experiment in sleep deprivation and we are all a part of that experiment,” says Stickgold. “It’s not inconceivable to me that we will discover that there are major social, economic, and health consequences to that experiment. Sleep deprivation doesn’t have any good side effects.”
Jana Bouc, Artist 