Visual information is necessary to an artist. In the olden days, artist did sketches. Cameras came along and made things easier. Digital cameras showed up, and now the visual information is quick, easy and abundant.
I am working on a coloring book for Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks, to be titled Heart of the Park. Those of us with ready access to these places call them “The Park”. It is 2 parks that overlap in several areas and are administered by the largest employer in Three Rivers. (That would be SEKI, AKA The Park, AKA National Park Service.)
My friend and I took a field trip so I could get the final photos needed. These were all in Kings Canyon, so we went through Sequoia to get there. I’ve spent quite a bit of time there, but most of it was in Wilsonia, working on The Cabins of Wilsonia. My photos were inadequate for the task at hand.
Version A of Panoramic Point?Or Version B? (that is Hume Lake, not in the Park, but in the line of sight to the canyons and peaks beyond).The Gamlin Cabin is behind the General Grant Tree.I may have learned about these types of corners in one of Laura Ingalls Wilder’s books.The view from the back wins because of the Giant Sequoia behind it (not the General) and because of the stone chimney.I didn’t know there was a Big Stump Trail. It was recommended as a possible source of coloring book pictures.The trail was fun for this group of visitors from France.I need to see the stump without all the people, and since it is no longer wasting film to take many photos, I take as many as I want.24,000 may be a bit of a load on my laptop, but I keep reminding myself that I don’t download movies or games, so it will be fine.This vertical version of the view would work in the coloring book, but I don’t like it. It could be a nice meadow with deer and wildflowers, but I don’t like it. It’s sort of like a graveyard, and I don’t like it.
Heart of Exeter, Coloring Book, is here, available through my website and at 3 stores in Exeter, California.
The cover of the latest “Heart of” series of local coloring books for grown-ups.
Took some fiddling around, but I figured out how to put it and Trail of Promises on the website.
Go to the For Sale tab on the top menu; when you hover over it, it drops down into another menu. One of the choices there is “Books”. You can hover over Books, and see “Coloring Books”, and then under that, finally, thought it would never show up, is Heart of Exeter.
Maybe I should have People to do that computer stuff so I can just draw. Maybe those People would be the ones to deliver to stores, fill the online orders, package and run things to the Post Office, reorder supplies, pull weeds and vacuum the studio. Oh, and answer the phone and bring me lunch too. (Don’t forget to wash my brushes!!)
Yep. Just as likely a bluejay will drive a Prius.
Back to reality: here are a couple of the interior pages in the new coloring book.
Heart of Exeter, Coloring Book, $15, available here
First random Mineral Kingobservation is about a wildflower called “Cow Parsnip”. I think white flowers are a little bit boring but this one grows taller than me sometimes and has this ongoing mystery of the leaves.
Is this Cow Parsnip? Look at the lacy leaves.Or is this Cow Parsnip? Look at the big maple leaf type leaf (from the Department of Redundancy Dept.)
Second random observation on Mineral King is also about wildflowers. Goldenrod is a yellow flower that I find a little bit boring except that it is a harbinger of fall. This photo was taken on July 30. Seems early. . . does this indicate a big winter coming?
The yellow flower in the foreground is Goldenrod.
Random observation #3: Hey Trail Guy! Your favorite flower is next in the queue.
Trail Guy with Indian Paintbrush along the Nature Trail, which I think would be better called the Wildflower Walk.Leopard Lilies. Anyone know how to extract fragrance from flowers??
Random Mineral King observation #4: This platform thing was supporting a display of Mineral King artifacts in the ranger station. The display was dismantled to be moved to the upcoming Mineral King Room in the Three Rivers Historical Museum soon. Trail Guy retrieved this platform that he built in 1986, and together we thought of making this table. Rustic, resourceful, and cabin-ish, yes?
Random Mineral King observation #5 is about garbage. Mineral King lost its garbage service, and all cabin folks have been driving their trash to Silver City. We cannot keep it in our cabins because it will attract bears. This adds to traffic on the road. It is very hasslesome, so Trail Guy is also acting as Garbage Guy this summer. He procured a dumpster through his many connections, and each week he unloads trash from the dumpster near the cabins into his Botmobile and then hauls it to Silver City, where he unloads it from the Botmobile into the massive dumpster at Silver City.
I hate that he has to do this, particularly when people are inconsiderate. (Actually, he doesn’t have to do it; he chooses to.)
WHO ATE A FRESH PINEAPPLE AND DRANK A TON OF BEER AND DUMPED IT UNBAGGED INTO THE DUMPSTER BETWEEN JULY 27 AND JULY 31?
You are an illiterate inconsiderate idiot, and you need to apologize to Trail Guy. He is doing everyone a BIG FAT FAVOR, and your piggish messy behavior is unacceptable.
A very very fine bottle of cabernet might help ease his pain. He goes to bed early, so you could sneak it to the cabin after dark, and be sure to tiptoe because he sleeps with his ears open. You don’t want him to know who did this dastardly trash deed and is atoning for it.
(THERE IS NOTHING YOU CAN DO TO MAKE ME NOT BE MAD AT YOU, SO DON’T EVEN TRY. I AM NOT GOING TO EXCUSE MYSELF FOR SHOUTING EITHER – THIS IS MY BLOG AND I FEEL LIKE SHOUTING.)
Trail Guy is a fine man with a servant’s heart who just wants to be of help to his cabin neighbors. Why don’t they have a little gratitude??
Some do. It only takes one pineapple-eating, beer-guzzling idiot to wreck stuff.
Final random Mineral King observation: Foxglove grow very well in Mineral King (and in Wilsonia too), but the Park doesn’t want them there because they aren’t native to the area. A few remain in spite of eradication efforts. I think they are very pretty. I included them in a drawing in the Mineral King coloring book.
Now you will know what color to make them if you bought the coloring book.
The second most popular scene I do as a Mineral King painting or drawing is the Honeymoon Cabin.
Bottom canvas is the beginnings of another oil painting of the Honeymoon Cabin in Mineral King.
This is the one remaining cabin from the resort days in Mineral King. The resort was owned by Ray and Gem Buckman, and they sold to Disney, thinking that the ski resort was an inevitable next step in Mineral King.
It wasn’t. No ski resort, but Disney ended up owning property. This is the only structure remaining, and the Mineral King Preservation Society turned it into a little museum.
It is quaint. It is scenic. It is paintable.
Working from 2 photos, pulling the best features from each one to make the painting as appealing as possible.Reshaped the top-right of Vandever (the mountain), began adding greenery to the juniper tree on the left and the red fir on the right. (I think it is a red fir – I should know after painting and drawing it multiple times!)Now it is looking like something I might be willing to sign with my name (as opposed to Mickey Mouse’s name?)
This just needs to dry so I can scan it. Photos taken while wet usually have this weird sheen. . . that’s why the gable end of the cabin looks sort of faded here.
Honeymoon Cabin #?, 8×10″, oil on wrapped canvas, $100. Use the contact button underneath the About The Artist tab if you’d like to buy this before it sells at the Silver City Resort.
No, my painting isn’t suspended from a bridge. It just returned to me for a minor detail.
Mrs. Customer asked if I would put the tiny white lines in the windows because her husband wanted them there. I sighed, and said, “I was hoping you wouldn’t notice!” Then I told her to smack her husband with the back of her hand for me. After that, I added the little lines.
I like happy customers, and didn’t mind at all once it stopped being 108 degrees out. The swamp cooler in the painting workshop can’t cope with that sort of temperature.
Neither can I.
P.S. I may have added a few more details, brightened up a rock or two, straightened an edge, added a blade of grass. . .
The art reception for the Sequoia Art Show was well attended. It appeared that everyone had a good time. I did. Thank you for coming!
Hey, Kelvin! Look left – Nadi’s art is fabulous!Look at all those people having a nice time.A lull. . . it is a privilege to have my work in the same room as Nadi Spencer’s paintings.All spaced out like that on white walls. . . if the floors were shiny, I’d feel as if my work had truly arrived.Lauren, a friend and drawing student – she and I both got haircuts, and she donated her locks to Pantene to make a wig for cancer patients.This is how Trail Guy attended the show – in the place of honor right in the foyer.
Trail of Promises: Packing the Backbone of the Sierra is finally here! Louise Jackson has been working on this manuscript for several years; she and I have been working on it since last September, and NOW IT IS HERE!
Ahem. Please excuse me for shouting. Lots to be excited about here!
Eventually it will be available through Amazon. Until then, you may order it from me, or of course from Louise Jackson, Monica and Jack McArthur, or Mike McGinnis if you know them.
We’ll start with an Add to Cart Paypal button right here. I’ll put it on my website when I calm down enough to figure out how.
The total with tax and shipping is $21.29 per book. If Paypal’s math turns out differently, I will refund you the difference.
Meanwhile, here is what the back cover of the book says:
While many live with intentions to experience adventure, three people–a recreational packer, a wilderness backpacker and a horse masseuse–actually followed through. Their trip along the backbone of California’s Sierra Nevada was guided by commitment to a special cause and promises made to friends, family and themselves.
Too quickly, completion of both the trail and their promises proved elusive. Blocked and broken trails, misdirected advice, injuries and even death became a part of their month-long experience. Only with the help of their faithful mules, families and friends, and with the sustaining wonder of the wilderness surrounding them, could they succeed in accomplishing the goals they had set.
My favorite place and time in Mineral King is a flower show in the first half of July at the junction of the Farewell Gap and Franklin Lakes trails.
First, we had to get there. It is 4 miles one way on a well-graded uphill trail. Some parts are flattish, some steeper than others. There is very little shade. There are 2 creeks to cross.
Thistle, just a preliminary sneak-peek to the flower show.Franklin Creek, the 2nd creek to be crossed on the way to the flower show.Explorer’s Gentian is my happy flower, and it was out in profusion on the way to the flower show.Leopard Lilies are Trail Guy’s happy flower. They hide a little bit, but not for those with an acute sniffer.
Here we are at last – the flower show! Bigelow Sneezeweed is the star.
Here comes our friend Kirk, but he is only passing through.Two buddies, who like to hike, love Mineral King, and are both thrilled to still be healthy while approaching upper-middle-age. (Says she of middle-middle-age.)Happy Trails, Kirk! We will finish our lunch in the flower show cafe before heading back down.
Salt & Light, or Reading Rabbit, oil on board, 11×14″
Remember Reading Rabbit? He appears when I want to tell you about books I have recently read that I think are worth the time.
Having recently assisted an author with photo editing, copy editing, book design, printing and proofing, I am stunned that there are so many readable books in the world. The process from idea to real book is very very very difficult. It is now more accessible to the average bear, but it also means that the quality of books has diminished. There are unedited books, poorly edited books, poorly designed books, books with illegible photos, and even books with a “forward” instead of a FOREWORD. It’s enough to kill off any reading rabbit, for sure. See?
Okay, I’m done bloviating for now.
Recently I have learned from, enjoyed and finished these books:
Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, Barbara Kingsolver. The author and her family decided to dedicate a year to eating local food only. Barbara is a fabulous novelist, so I will read almost anything she writes. This book also had excerpts from her daughter and her husband, and recipes. It was set up month by month so the reader could understand the seasonal efforts. What a ton of work, but very rewarding. Now I want to make my own mozzarella cheese!
The 188th Crybaby Brigade, Joel Chasnoff. Shortly after returning from Israel, I met a former Israeli soldier. He needed artwork, but I wasn’t the right person for the job so I sent him to someone better qualified. In spite of my not being the right artist for him, we had a great conversation, and he recommended this book to me. It was written by a friend of his, another American who served in the Israeli armed forces. What a fascinating read! And such fun to see an entire chapter titled “Tim Bailey”, the name of the man I met. This book will entertain you, worry you, and make you wonder how Israel has survived with its armed forces being made up of teenagers.
My To-Be-Read list continues to grow, much of it due to the website, Modern Mrs. Darcy. She has a weekly podcast called “WSIRN”, for What Should I Read Next. In it, she interviews someone about their reading preferences, saying, “List 3 books you love, 1 book you hate, and tell me what you are reading now”. Then she summarizes the books very succinctly and makes recommendations. Her blog is very well written, and one of my new favorites.
Here are Amazon links to the books listed here:
Never mind. I can’t remember how to do that, and I need to go work on the Sequoia/Kings Canyon coloring book.
Tomorrow is a Mineral King day on the blog. Y’all come back now!
I have 3 nephews. 2 of them are “creatives”, one an accomplished graphic artist supporting a wife and 2 children, and the other about to start his junior year in college as a music major. Might be performing arts, might be music theory. . . can’t remember exactly and embarrassed by asking him too often.
Music Nephew and I have been having an email conversation about “the arts”, and he mentioned how a musician friend of his gets in the way of his own success. I responded with something that I think you might enjoy, Oh Blog Readers (all 4 of you or so. . . maybe 6 or 7, but I still don’t know how to access or read the blog stats).
Most of us trying to make it in the arts are usually in the way of our own success. I’m gradually learning to redefine success. I know I don’t want to spend hours and hours on social media trying to build up a following, so I’m not – that’s success. I’d rather have real people that I know just happily following my blog and thinking of me when they have an art need – they do, so that’s success. I also don’t want to do the crazy hard work of building up a body of work that might appeal to galleries, which I’m not, so that’s success.
My life’s work is to discover and display the good things of Tulare County, a place I love to hate and hate to love. Sigh. Thus, the mixed ideas about success – I am portraying this place, but sometimes I want to live somewhere with a less hostile climate, cleaner air, and richer more educated populace.
If you made it to the end of this bloviation, you deserve a reward. Here, have a look at a successful pencil drawing of a bridge.
Marblefork Bridge, pencil on paper, 11×14 framed, currently hanging at the Courthouse Gallery in Exeter.
