Packing it in

I'm about to leave for a few days of cycling, and although there's not too much space in the panniers, what do I need to take apart from a few bits of clothes and some things to draw with?

I make a small pile of equipment to take - except I have this sneaking feeling that I'll end up using what I usually do: a thick black pen and a sketchbook. I like how pared down and simple these two are: black on white has an enduring appeal for me. The pile I intend to take is hardly extravagant — look at it. Taking a waterbrush and watercolour set is hardly going overboard, but how much will I actually use?

@jameshobbsart

The Walkie-Talkie: new on London's skyline

London's drive for a distinctive skyline continues unabated. Following on from the Shard and the Gherkin, taking shape now are the Walkie-Talkie and the Cheesegrater. (The half-finished Helter Skelter is currently on hold, and the Scalpel is in the pipeline, as it were.)
The eyecatching feature of the Walkie-Talkie, at 20 Fenchurch Street, is that it curves outwards towards its top, so the highest floors are larger than those lower down, giving it the appearance of a giant telephone receiver popping up through the city's buildings. Designed by Rafael Viñoly, it is due to open in April 2014, and while most of us usually have to make do with the external appearances of towers in the financial district, this time there will be a "skygarden" open to the public. The plan is that it will be free, but require advanced booking. We'll see how that goes. Would it have received approval without the garden?
Finding it to draw presented the usual problem with tall buildings in a city: the closer you get, the harder it is to see. At Leadenhall Market, from where I drew this, the view opens up and the curve of the building's sides becomes apparent, as if any interest in accurate perspective has gone out of the window. Turning around, and the rising Cheesegrater was visible, looming over Leadenhall Market. (More here on this one soon.)
At 38 floors, the Walkie-Talkie is hardly the world's tallest (the Burj Khalifa has 164), or even London's (it barely makes it into its top 10), but it looks as if it will have an overpowering presence on the scrum of tall buildings north of London Bridge. The crowd is getting thicker. Old friends—and enemies—are getting lost in the midst of it.

St Paul's Cathedral

I stopped by St Paul's Cathedral on the way back from work yesterday to draw while preparations continued for the funeral of Margaret Thatcher later today. I drew this still astride the bike, helmet and cycling clips still on: this, I find, encourages a focus on the essentials.

From a train along the River Exe

The train west from London through Devon follows the west bank of the River Exe, and then along the coast for several miles, and then along the north bank of the River Teign. It's a kind of constant and yet continually changing view out of the windows on the left hand side of the train. To draw this is to try to portray an amalgam of a specific place. The boat in the middle of this (above) started as a buoy, and then morphed from dinghy to whatever it looks like now. Is it a yacht?
The drawing below, of the view towards Exmouth as the train neared Dawlish Warren, was more about the sky. I was interested in how Rolf Schröter drew clouds from a German train, as the sky is often the least changing element of the scene out of a train window. I like Rolf's work a lot.

Room with a view

It's a view I've seen a lot of lately; I turn my head left now, and that's what I see. I like this view.

Against the tide

A quiet journey home to London on the train from the south coast one evening last week, watching the congested platforms filled with commuters on their way home in the opposite direction, as darkness falls outside.

Sketchcrawl: underground at Tate Modern

It wasn't ideal weather for a sketchcrawl yesterday, but it was handy having Tate Modern at hand to warm up in, while the temperatures outside struggled to reach freezing point. The vast new underground, windowless Tanks were showing William Kentridge's I Am Not Me (which closes today). It was dark, I couldn't see what I was drawing, and fellow viewers got confused with the silhouettes of Kentridge's eight-channel video work. A great space though. I like it in there.

Tate Modern's Turbine Hall