What a weird sounding title. Never mind. Have a look at the progress on the Kaweah Post Office oil painting for Chuck.
First I drew it on the canvas.
Then, I put the first layer of paint down.
Don’t be scared, Chuck! They all start out this rough. It is a long layering process, and I’ll keep you posted weekly on the blog.
Over the last 2 weeks I’ve been talking to you about our little landmark post office, the Kaweah Post Office. It took a huge limb right through the roof, and it will cost money to restore the place. It is one of the few landmark buildings we have in Three Rivers, and we need to take care of it. Lots of people got involved, and my painting of it sold on eBay to raise money, a friend donated a large chunk of change, and another man hired me to paint it again and donated a pile of cash toward the project.
During the time of concentrating on our little landmark, Trail Guy and I took a weekend trip to Lake Tahoe. While there, we spent time at two different landmark buildings that just knocked my socks off.
Our cool little post office would disappear in the boat house to one of these summer mansions, and it is ALL WE HAVE!!
Welcome to Tulare County. Now go home and gloat.
Sigh. At least we don’t have to wait in line around here for parking, to buy gas, or at Starbuck’s (the closest one to me is about 32 miles away). So there.
To continue yesterday’s dissatisfying post about color, here is an aspen painting before I added blue: 
Here it is afterward:
Ahem. Why is it that I can repair photos quite well using Photoshop Elements but cannot get the same painting to scan the same way 2 times in a row?
Who cares? I have real work to do!
A friend is learning about art, practicing diligently at watercolor, taking workshops and painting with a group in her town. She also reads about art, and has been kind enough to spend time with me, discussing various art related topics.
She told me about a book called “Breakfast at Sotheby’s: An A-Z of the Art World” by Philip Hook. Not only did she read it, she took notes. AND, she shared them with me!
Two main points interested me in our conversation about color.
1. In Breakfast at Sotheby’s, her notes say this: “Red and blue are the most important colors in modernist art.” (I’ll have to look up the definition of “modernist”. . . always something to be learned around here. . .)
2. One of her instructors believes that all paintings should have some cerulean blue. This is a lighter blue, leaning toward turquoise that I use when I mix colors. (I only use the primaries plus white to make all my colors with a few exceptions.)
While my friend and I sat together in my studio discussing color, we looked around together at the paintings hanging on my walls. We discovered 2 that had neither blue nor red. So, in a spirit of experimentation and adventure, I added some.
Artichoke before: 
Artichoke after: 
Now that is an unfair comparison. The scans turned out differently, although the size is supposed to be the same it is not, and I guess you’ll just have to see the painting in person. I promise that I didn’t mess with the greens. I did mess with the color and exposure on the computer, trying to get the 2 to match, but something just isn’t working.
Never mind. Have a nice day. Thanks for stopping by and making it to the end of this post. Perhaps I should just get to the easels and finish the Kaweah Post Office.
We interrupt our normal broadcast schedule to bring you a Kaweah Post Office fundraising update! (music, graphics, running line across the bottom of your screen? Nope, “We” is just me.)
My husband just retrieved today’s mail, and included was a check for $1500 to help pay for the rebuilding of the Kaweah Post Office!
Fifteen hundred dollars.
I am not making this up! What a crazy-generous friend we have!
The Kaweah Post Office is one of our only landmark structures in Three Rivers. I am working to help meet the insurance deductible to rebuild it because a big limb from a valley oak tree smashed the roof. (We are quite rural – perhaps a bear was in the tree eating acorns and caused the limb to break . . . I wasn’t there, but it could have happened that way!)
There is an auction on eBay to sell my painting of the Post Office; I will split the proceeds with them. (I gotta earn something here, dear readers – selling art is how I make my living!) It ends tomorrow, Friday, October 9, at noon. See it by clicking this link.
A nice man named Chuck told me he wants to participate with $200, but he just doesn’t shop on eBay. No worries, Chuck. I understand those types of boundaries, because I don’t play on Facebook.
So, I offered to repaint it for him for $100 and give $100 to the Post Office (that size normally sells for $150.)
Chuck upped his donation to $150 to the Post Office, so I got busy immediately. Here is how it looked after the first session on the canvas.
Normally, I don’t draw the image in pencil first. Instead, I block it out with my paint brush and correct the proportions with each successive layer of paint.
Because I will show Chuck a photo of the progress once a week on this blog, I wanted it to look better at each stage than paintings usually do. If he saw my normal sloppy way of beginning, he might get scared and withdraw his offer!
Thank you, Chuck (and don’t be scared!)
Mister Black is the name I give to the ravens I paint. There are two so far, painted because of the Raven Festival in Three Rivers.
Three Rivers does something special-ish on the first Saturday of each month. A new theme is chosen each month, and for October, it is ravens.
The amazing Nadi Spencer had the idea of a raven theme and took it a little further than just a normal First Saturday. October is a busy month for me, so I haven’t been around for the festivities.
However, I have done a painting for 2 years now. This is the first Mister Black.
In this is this year’s version he was looking out from atop that pole (which was actually white and fiberglass.)
At Sierra Subs and Salads in Three Rivers is a show of the raven artwork. You can learn more on the First Saturday Three Rivers page.
Gotta go paint now!
I am perpetually fed up with artists getting asked to donate to good causes. In May of 2014, I posted “An Artist Bloviates about Donations” on LinkedIn. My hope was to encourage fund raisers to find other methods besides asking those who are often at the bottom rungs of the financial ladder.
Under the list of “Reasons to Donate”, #1 was “An artist loves the cause and wants to help.” I currently have a cause I love and want to help.
Tulare County, where I live, is poor, rural, and in Central California. It is far from Los Angeles, San Francisco or the Silicon Valley. We are not rich either in money nor in landmarks.
One of our favorite historic structures is the Kaweah Post Office, a tiny wooden structure just outside of Three Rivers. It is 125 years old and still in operation!
Because we are also not currently rich in rainfall, many of our trees are very stressed. A giant oak above our little Kaweah Post Office lost a limb which smashed the roof and porch of the landmark we love.
The building is publicly appreciated, but privately owned. There is insurance, but it comes with a large deductible.
So, I am auctioning the above oil painting on eBay. In keeping with my principles about artists not giving away their work, I will donate half of the proceeds toward the restoration of the Kaweah Post Office.
A few notes:
1. Kaweah is the name of the rivers of Three Rivers. (South, Middle and North Forks of the Kaweah make up the three. . . never mind about the Marble and East forks – our forebears had to draw the line somewhere!)
2. It is pronounced “Kuh – WEE – uh” (not to be confused with “The River Kwai”)
3. The auction listing is “Original Oil Painting of Kaweah Post Office”.
4. The painting is 10×10″ on wrapped canvas, ready to hang.
5. The auction went live at 12:02 on September 29 and remains up for 10 days.
Now, let’s see how this bloviating artist’s version of raising money turns out!
I believe that cabin communities are a true treasure of Tulare County, here in Central California. I love to draw cabins. Don’t believe me? My business has been called “Cabin Art” since 1987.
As a studio artist, I work from photos. There is no way to get the level of detail I like while sitting outside. Besides, I’m oldish now, and need a giant magnifying light, along with cheater magnifier glasses.
So, here are a few photos of Mineral King cabins for you to enjoy. Sometimes the light is just right, so I take the same scenes over and over and over.
Here’s a catch-all, catch-up post for you on random topics. My blog post ideas are triggered by pictures, and these were just languishing in the file without purpose.
This painting was very difficult. I worked on it from real life, and from several different photos taken at different times of year. This is the final iteration (unless someone has a suggestion for further improvement).
We are in year #4 of a drought. In spite of 15″ of precipitation in July, there was no snow on Bear Skin, the almost-year-around patch on the side of Vandever, which forms one side of Farewell Gap in Mineral King.
My favorite bridge was built in the 1920s and is supposed to be replaced. This fills me with dread. The current plan is to keep this one as a footbridge/landmark and push the road further up the canyon with some sort of newfangled, modern, probably-not-very-attractive contraption that will destroy the simple beauty of this scene. But I am neutral to the subject, keeping an open mind. . .
Sometimes when I drive down the Mineral King Road, I am struck by new scenes. You’d think that after 31 summers of driving it almost weekly that I wouldn’t notice a thing. You’d be wrong.
At the end of the Mineral King Road is a bridge. (It was rebuilt in Sept. and Oct. 2011 and the process was documented fully on this blog.) The abutment gets a lot of water abuse on one side, and was piled with rocks to protect it. However, kids love to use rocks to build dams in the stream, and most of those rocks got scooted away! So, the men in uniform and heavy equipment had to come redo the rocky protection underneath the bridge.
Some new friends joined us in Mineral King early in the summer. Mister New Friend was an outstanding photographer, and he took this photo of Trail Guy and me. (Thank you, MAK!)
Perkins and I thank you for joining us in the random topic round-up.
