Tag: El Cerrito

Categories
Ink and watercolor wash Landscape Painting Places Plein Air Sketchbook Pages Urban Sketchers

A Walk By the Park, A Guy on the Roof

Putting Up the Xmas Lights by the Park, Ink & watercolor, 7x5"
Putting Up the Xmas Lights by the Park, Ink & watercolor, 7x5"

It was such a beautiful sunny day (our drought continues) I decided to go for a walk and find a spot to paint outdoors instead of in the studio. I walked the mile to Peet’s Coffee and then, with a cup of their dark, rich (decaf) coffee in hand, I turned towards home, still looking for inspiration.

I passed the little urban creek behind Peet’s, and considered sketching it but it was shaded by trees and very chilly.  As I walked by the little pocket park alongside Albany Hill, this little cul-de-sac called out, “Paint Me!” With a handy picnic table right there to lay out my paints, how could I resist?

Although I usually sketch directly in pen, this scene was so complicated I decided to draw in pencil first. As I was completing the drawing I spotted a guy on his roof with a string of holiday lights. Do you see him? I know it looks like he’s standing on top of a tree but the roof of his house is just behind the tree. I think I made him a bit of a giant!

Categories
Drawing Ink and watercolor wash Life in general Painting Places Sketchbook Pages Urban Sketchers

K-9 Unit, Paramedics and Fire Truck at El Cerrito Plaza

K-9 Unit, Paramedics and Fire Truck, ink & watercolor, 7x5"
K-9 Unit, Paramedics and Fire Truck, ink & watercolor, 7x5"

The parking lot at El Cerrito Plaza was filled with police cars, fire trucks, hazmat vans and other emergency responders when I walked up there to do errands Saturday. Contrary to my sketch above, which looks like a police car crashed into an ambulance (thanks to a little drawing flaw), it turned out to be the annual Tri-City Safety Day.

I sat on the curb and sketched while cops, firemen and other public safety people handed out fire hats, pencils and buttons to kids who got to climb on police motorcycles and fire trucks, and explore the DUI checkpoint trailer.

The K9 patrol car was off limits when I was there, as King was standing guard inside, barking if you got too close. I heard that earlier he’d been out and available for petting but I bet the huge German Shepherd scared off more kids than enticed them.

Categories
Ink and watercolor wash Landscape Outdoors/Landscape Painting Places Plein Air Sketchbook Pages

Sunset at Sunset View Cemetery

Sunset View Cemetery shadows, ink & watercolor, 5x7"
Sunset View Cemetery shadows, ink & watercolor, 5x7"

The shadows and ridges in the grass (and what might have caused them) fascinated me so I tried to capture them before the light changed, which it does rapidly at sunset. At one point I had to stop drawing and just watch the glorious sunset over the bay and the way the fog moved in and out and back in.

View of the Chapel, the flat lands and the Bay from the cemetery, ink & watercolor 5x7"
View of the Chapel, the flat lands and the Bay from the cemetery, ink & watercolor 5x7"

The light was so odd when I painted this last one before it was too dark to see that the colors came out really pale. I tried over painting later at home and only ended up overworking instead, I’m afraid.

I’ve struggled with trying to paint the view from the hills to the bay many times. I either put in too much detail so it doesn’t read distance or get the proportions wrong. Someday soon I’ll challenge myself to paint it again and again until I get it.

Categories
Flower Art Ink and watercolor wash Landscape Outdoors/Landscape Painting Places Plants Sketchbook Pages

Water Lilies Part II: In Sun and Shade at the Cemetery

Lily in the Sun, ink & watercolor, 5x5"
Lily in the Sun, ink & watercolor, 5x5"

When I was sketching the lily pond at the cemetery the only camera I had with me was my iPhone. I took a few photos even though I didn’t expect them to come out well (which they didn’t since I was too far away). But I was able to get enough information from them to do two more little studies when I got home of the lilies in sun (above) and in shade (below).

Lily in the Shade, ink & watercolor, 5x5"
Lily in the Shade, ink & watercolor, 5x5"

Sunday, just one week later, I returned to the cemetery with my good camera, looking forward to taking some good photos from which to paint and continue my water lily investigation. Sadly our recent warm weather had dried up half of the pond. I couldn’t get a single good photo and was uninspired to sketch the tangles that remained.

I’m surprised the cemetery owners don’t replenish the water in the pond. Although we’re supposed to conserve water, I know they water the lawns or they’d all be brown since it doesn’t rain in the summer here. What’s a few more gallons to maintain the lovely water lilies?

I guess I’ll have to wait until next spring or summer to continue my lily studies unless I can find another lily pond nearby.

Categories
Drawing Ink and watercolor wash Landscape Outdoors/Landscape Painting Places Plein Air Sketchbook Pages

Sketching Lily Ponds at Sunset View Cemetery, Part I

Sunset View Cemetery Lily Pond #2, ink & watercolor 5x7"
Sunset View Cemetery Lily Pond Sketch #1, ink & watercolor 5x7"

When I was hiking with a friend in the large, beautiful, hilly cemetery near my house, we discovered a small pond full of lily pads and flowers. That afternoon I drove back up to the cemetery with my sketchbook and paints and set up my chair beside the pond. It was such a peaceful spot; quiet, serene and green.

Sorting out the shape of lily pads and flowers with Pentel Pocket brush pen
Sorting out lily pads and flowers with Pentel Pocket brush pen

I took a break to figure out the shape of lily pads and flowers, filling up a page of lily shapes, first with my regular pen and then the Pentel Pocket Brush Pen, until I understood the lilies.

Sunset View Cemetery Lily Pond Sketch #1, ink & watercolor 5x7"
Sunset View Cemetery Lily Pond Sketch #1, ink & watercolor 5x7"

The water was really confusing because of all the reflections of the sky, trees and shrubbery, and the quickly encroaching shadows since it was nearing sunset.

Sunset View Cemetery Trees, ink & watercolor 7x5"
Sunset View Cemetery Trees, ink & watercolor 7x5"

When the pond was completely in shadow, I turned my chair around to face the other direction and do a quick sketch of a meadow glowing in the sunset, surrounded by shadows.

Categories
Drawing Ink and watercolor wash Painting People Sketchbook Pages

Waiting and Waiting

Waiting at Kaiser, Ink & Watercolor, 5.5x7.5"
Waiting at Kaiser, Ink & Watercolor, 5.5x7.5"

Sketching is such a great way to enjoy time spent waiting. In the sketch above I was waiting for someone during her appointment at the medical center.  The lady on the left was dressed completely in Barbie pink from head to toe, including sweatshirt, purse and shoes. Even her cell phone was bright pink.

The little boy above spent his waiting time enthusiastically “reading” a book. He squealed with delight to his mom over each page.  It was so nice to see a child loving a book even if he was too young to actually read the words.

BART Station Street Light, ink & watercolor, 7.5 x5.5"
BART Station Street Light, ink & watercolor, 7.5 x5.5"

When Casey was here visiting from France, I arrived early at the BART station to collect her and her family. While I waited I tried to find something interesting to sketch from my car but this was as good as got: concrete, pole  and sky.

I spent the previous day visiting with them in San Francisco and was looking forward to showing them around Berkeley, which we capped with a fantastic dinner at Chez Panisse (thanks Casey and Michele!) Since Casey had her family with her, we didn’t get to sketch but I thoroughly enjoyed spending time with them. They are the nicest and most fun people. I wish we lived closer so we could play together more often! I plan to visit them in France within a year or so.

Categories
Animals Ink and watercolor wash Places Urban Sketchers

Amusement Park and Circus Museum: Playland Not At the Beach

Detail of Playland Diarama, ink & watercolor
Detail of Playland Diarama, ink & watercolor

Playland Not At The Beach Museum of Fun is an amazing place created by a group of volunteers and artists who are passionate about the circus, history, carnivals, and a San Francisco amusement park (now long gone) called Playland at the Beach.

Laughing Sal, ink, gouache & watercolor
Laughing Sal, ink, gouache & watercolor

Hidden away behind a nondescript storefront in El Cerrito, Playland Not At The Beach is both a museum  and a place to play carnival, penny arcade and pinball games (including historic and 3-D pinball machines), watch movies, see magic shows, have parties, explore the world of the circus and the world of Charles Dickens in miniature and much more, with room after room of visual delights, each surpassing the next.

Circus Diorama Detail, ink & watercolor
Circus Diorama Detail, ink & watercolor (the actual scene had about 3 times as many characters, but with so much to capture in 2 hours, I picked my favorites for this sketch)

The circus dioramas contain 300,000 hand-carved and hand-painted realistic figures of every kind of person, animal and behind-the-scenes activity (even including the cooks carving up big fish for dinner and the separate men’s and women’s dressing tents with performers washing up or changing clothes) and all the acts under the big top, all created by a man who joined the circus at 14 and his father, who were both lifelong circus lovers. It took a month just to create one elephant, which were each carved from a separate block of wood and are about an inch tall.

The creativity and dedication to follow one’s passion that went into making the circus dioramas brought tears to my eyes and left me intensely inspired.

You can see the wonderful sketches made by my buddies on our Urban Sketchers blog here. We plan to return to Playland Not At The Beach as soon as we can!

Categories
Drawing Food sketch Ink and watercolor wash Life in general Painting People Places Sketchbook Pages

Sketchbook Ate My Sandwich

Two Good Pots, ink & watercolor
Two Good Pots, ink & watercolor

My favorite two sketches the night we met to sketch at Fat Apples Restaurant in El Cerrito were the two “pots” on the left hand page above. The guy was the first thing I drew, the coffee pot the last. I wasn’t in great shape, having had little sleep the night before.  I just couldn’t get into the drawing zone, turn off the inner critic or relax into seeing, drawing, and enjoying the adventure.

Underneath the watercolor apple above are lots of messed up lines and the word “Grrrr” written all over the things that frustrated me. The waitress on the right kept returning to her spot and standing in exactly the same position each time and the counter beside her was even more stationary but I just couldn’t draw it.

Fat Apples BLT, ink & watercolor
Fat Apples BLT, ink & watercolor

When I added m ore watercolor at home to the BLT (left page above) I must have closed the book too soon because the pages glued themselves together. When I tried to separate the pages, part of my sandwich stuck to the other side. Not only did that ruin the sandwich but also a small ink drawing I’d liked on the other page.

I’d repainted the sandwich because when we showed our sketches at the end of the evening and I said it was my dinner, one of the sketchers innocently asked “what was it?” And she was right — it was so loosely drawn and painted that it wasn’t recognizable as a sandwich.

Categories
Drawing Ink and watercolor wash Interiors Other Art Blogs I Read Painting Places Sketchbook Pages Urban Sketchers

Honda of El Cerrito: Sketching Cars

Honda of El Cerrito, Ink & watercolor
Honda of El Cerrito, Ink & watercolor

The El Cerrito Honda dealership was kind enough to allow our Tuesday night urban sketchers group to come and sketch in their showroom. There were chairs and tables for us to sketch and paint in comfort and interesting architecture and cars to draw. I remember boys drawing cars all the time but never thought that someday I’d go out of my way to draw cars too.

The artist Rebeca Garcia Gonzalez told me that she likes including cars in her paintings because they remind her of jewel-like candies. In this post she not only included cars, but got a passerby to stand and pose for her and included him in the painting!

 

Shark Honda, ink & watercolor
Shark Honda, ink & watercolor

I drew this car at the end of the evening and it was so close to me that it got way out of proportion and then started looking like a shark with whatever that thingee was on top. It’s good to develop the ability to see and draw cars because they’re everywhere, and leaving them out of a scene can look strange.

 

Artist Beth Bourland told me a funny story about this car sketch on her blog. She kept working on her drawing after the cars drove away. Some passerbys looked at her sketch and then at the empty street in front of her, and back at the sketch, wondering if she was seeing things.

You can see Cathy’s Honda sketches on our Urban Sketchers blog here.

Categories
Berkeley Drawing Food sketch Ink and watercolor wash Painting Places Sketchbook Pages

The Draw Your Food Diet (at The Junket and The Bread Workshop)

Turkey & Swiss at The Junket, Lamy Safari, Carbon Platinum Ink & watercolor in Moleskine Watercolor
Turkey & Swiss at The Junket, El Cerrito. Lamy Safari pen, Carbon Platinum ink & watercolor in Moleskine

Whenever we meet to sketch at a cafe we always try to sketch our food before we eat it and we always joke about what a great diet it would be to do that at every meal. It not only helps to slow down eating, but it also helps to speed up sketching! This leads to looser, more playful sketches which I think are more fun to make and to see.

Sonia and I met for lunch at The Junket, a deli in El Cerrito Plaza. My Turkey and Swiss Sandwich on a sourdough baguette (sketched above) was the best I’ve had in years. It was my second choice though, as we originally ordered Chicken Dumpling Soup. But when I saw them spooning it into a bowl, it had the consistency of gloppy, yellow gravy. I asked if it was cream-based (Sonia is allergic to dairy) and they said no, they knew it wasn’t because they reconstitute it with water. Um…no thanks. I switched to the half sandwich and Sonia got salad and we were happy.

Grilled Veges & Brown Rice at the Bread Workshop, ink & watercolor in Moleskin
Grilled Veges & Brown Rice at the Bread Workshop. Ink & watercolor in Moleskine

On our next Tuesday night sketch-out we met at the Bread Workshop. They had contacted me the week before to ask if they could use this previous sketch I did there to illustrate a newsletter they are sending to supporters and I gladly said yes. They reserved a large table for us with a view into the bakery so that we could draw the bakers working.

I wasn’t much up to that challenge as it was my first night out after being sick for two weeks and my sketching felt rusty. You can see Micaela’s wonderful sketch here and Sonia’s here and here. The food was fantastic: my grilled veges (above) were so flavorful!

 

Bread and Baker at Bread Workshop, ink & watercolor
Bread and Baker at Bread Workshop, ink & watercolor

This was the extent of my drawing bread and bakers. The Bread Workshop are advocates of sustainable foods and practices and ranked as one of the top ten greenest restaurants in the Bay Area. Everything I’ve had there has been delicious and they were playing great music that night, going from George Benson to Billy Holiday to Tom Waits in succession.