Sorry Thoughts in a Smoky World

All this time hunkering down inside out of the smoke (while the library is closed) is giving me extra time to think. Mostly I have come up with sorry thoughts. I will see if I can think of something positive to include.

  1. There is a garbage mama bear with 2 cubs living behind Village Market in Three Rivers. It was too dark in the shade of the Valley Oak tree to take any photos of the sorry creatures.
  2. We moved the watering bowl for deer away from the front porch in hopes of retraining them to ignore the planting bed there. Maybe it will be less sorry with less traffic.
  3. I vacuumed my studio against all common sense. With ash everywhere, you may be wondering, “Why bother?” Here is why I bothered: I dropped a box of pencils on the floor under my drawing table and when I emerged from gathering them, I was covered in dust, ash and spiderwebs. “Covered” may be a slight exaggeration, but ick, it was a sorry mess down there.
  4. My sorry pomegranate tree has never produced anything of substance, unless you count the flowers. I used to surround it with fencing and give it regular water; last year the fencing was needed to protect the herb garden, so I told the tree to either live or die, its choice. This year, it has produced about 5 tiny pomegranates. It looks normal but it is really small.
  5. Rather than go to the community meetings about fire (because I despise wearing a face diaper), I have been trying to watch them online. “Trying”, because a sorry speaker on my laptop is blown, the sound system at the Memorial Building is rumbly and mumbly (cannot hear any of the people asking questions), and sometimes the organizers just cannot get the camera or the sound to work. Technology will save us all, eh?
  6. These meetings are on Fakebook, which allows non-members like me to watch only during the meetings. With all the tech troubles, it popped to a screen showing people’s comments on the side. Ugh. People were abrupt, rude, and impulsively spouted their opinions without any thought as to whether or not it was helpful. Our county supervisor made an urgent request at a recent meeting to everyone to STOP believing what you read on social media and just go to the official places for fire information. Amen! 
  7. A very long time ago, we were invited to a friend’s wedding up at the heliport at Ash Mountain. The groom asked me to bring my camera for some candid shots, and when I arrived, he told me that the scheduled photographer wasn’t coming so I was IT. What??? I did my best, and have to say that the photos looked good because there was a fire. Why? I don’t know why there was a fire. Oh, why did the smoke make the photos look good? Because the foggy gray background showed off the colors and the people. (They aren’t married any more, but that has nothing to do with my photography, I promise.) This makes me wonder why I haven’t been looking for things to photograph around my yard. Easy answer: nothing is in bloom at this sorry time of year after a sorry summer. Oh wait, I did find this one.
  8. Does anyone else out there have a tab on their Favorites bar on their computer labeled “Disasters”? That is a sorry sort of label, although it is accurate. (Fires, the plague, local arrests, etc.)
  9. The spokesman for the fire information is from south Georgia. Whenever he mentions the continued survival of the General Sherman tree, I wonder if he is sorry; after all, General Sherman marched into Atlanta and burned the place. He always grins when he says the General is still standing.
  10. Wuksatchi Lodge will never be called that again by several of us who are enjoying Mr. Georgia’s presentations. His earlier pronunciation was “Wuh-kooshi”, but now he is calling it “Wuh-kah-shee”. (Gotta find our fun where we can!) His pronunciations brought much appreciated laughter to the meeting. 
  11. After letting our one remaining tiny lawn go wild all summer in hopes that it would thicken up, either by roots or by seeds, I finally consented to Trail Guy’s request to mow. It is definitely thicker after 2 summers of experimenting with my own peculiar theories of lawn growth. (Tucker likes the grass long.)

That was a positive thought. Okay, stick a fork in me – I’m done.

 

A Cat Called Chaos

A Chat Called Chaos? A Cat Called Caos? Never mind. Here is the story.
 
In 2004 I drew a cat for some folks who actually brought him to my studio. This was in the days of film cameras (Nope, not an Early Adopter of anything), so I didn’t save a photo of the drawing. Snowcat’s people recently asked me to draw their current cat, Chaos, and although I remembered Snowcat, I couldn’t remember the drawing. They sent me a photo.That was one alert cat!! When I was taking his photos, I reached out to touch him. He pulled away in a very subtle but arrogant manner. Made me laugh.
 
Their current cat spent the first 2 years of his life in a dog grooming shop and used to create chaos there. He is getting up in age, so they asked me to draw him, sending a handful of digital photos.
Chaos looks more alert in the lower photo, but the man appears to be strangling the cat. I asked for a few more photos with a different hand position.
This is less worrisome for the cat’s survivability, but the hand appears larger than the cat’s head. That won’t do.
 
I decided to just start drawing and figure it out as I go.
The weird orangish tint is due to the smoky light coming through the window over my drawing table.
This time to photograph it, I carried it outside for better light.
To be continued. . .
 
 

Still Smoky, Still Drawing

This sort of smoky light means it is hard to see to paint, but if I open the doors for better light, then it is hard to breathe. So, I get to spend another day in the studio with my pencils. (I love to draw – did you know that?)

This is a large collage drawing, a commissioned piece 14×18″, that will incorporate 3 different scenes. In designing, I tried something new – I used photoshop instead of doing sketches. I sent the customer 2 versions and she chose this one.

Here you can see the faint outline where things will go. I started at the top on the left, because as a right-hander, this helps to cut down on excessive smearing.

Setting it up took as long as getting it to this stage.

I had enough time to begin the next segment.

Next, I heard from the customers on the lengthy logo design project. Calling it “lengthy” is not an insult; this is a very challenging job, because the customers have been without a logo since 1980, logo design isn’t my strongest skill so I am slow, and together we are carefully working out the best design possible. This is the next piece in the puzzle.

I used an old (1997) drawing as a place holder, drew a new picture for them, and then we discovered that the old drawing was a better match. Alas, it wasn’t very well done. Well, it was fine for back then, but I was barely out of my Primitive Era in the last century. So I drew it again, and this time I added lemons, along with other improvements that probably only my drawing students will be able to appreciate. But I want this to be The Very Best Possible for my customers and not an embarrassment to my artistic reputation.

Hey look! It is clearing up! I could tell that something was taking place outside because there were some helicopters overhead, and they made the drawing table vibrate.

See? Clear as a bell! 

Not. But clear enough for air support as the fires continue to rage through Sequoia National Park and fill Three Rivers with worry, smoke, ash, fire equipment, and fire personnel.

If you are someone who talks to God, please keep praying for good slow soaking rain without any lightning.

 

The Best Version of the Classic Mineral King Scene, Ever

We cannot get to Mineral King just now. It probably looks like it did last year at this same time.

So, let’s just reminisce about better times and look at this important painting I recently completed. Can’t share any details as to why it is “important”, but I can show you the steps. I want this to be the best version of this scene that I have ever painted.

I began the painting while in Mineral King. The idea was to size and place the main parts.

Once I was back home in the studio, I began putting in the details, working from top to bottom, back to front (which means I paint the things that are farthest away first).

This is fun. It is classic “drawing with my paintbrush”, a frowned upon practice in the Art World. Hey Art World, are you wanting to buy my paintings? 

Silence.

Thought not. Well, I’m not making art for the Art World. Instead. . .

. . . I use pencils, oil paint, and murals to make art that people can understand, of places and things they love, for prices that won’t scare them.

P.S. It looks better in person (Yeah, I always say that, because they always do.)

When It Is Too Smoky To Paint…

… then I draw. (Unless I spend time on the computer designing a calendar, a new coloring book, a custom collage drawing, or some cards). But yesterday, I drew.

In 2022, the Gateway Bridge, AKA Pumpkin Hollow Bridge, will be 100 years old. This means there will be some attention on the bridge, which will probably bring about some opportunities to sell images of the bridge. Remember, I am a business person whose product is art, although I often act like an artist trying to figure out the business end of things.

People often confuse my favorite bridge, Oak Grove, with the Gateway Bridge. Let me help you with this:

Oak Grove: single arch, deep canyon of the East Fork of the Kaweah River, 6.5 miles up the Mineral King Road

Gateway Bridge: three arches, shallower canyon of the convergence of the East Fork and Middle Forks of the Kaweah River, just below the entrance to Sequoia National Park on Highway 198

This new pencil drawing is 9×12″, unframed, and I haven’t decided what to do with it yet. That will be a business decision, and yesterday I was focused on being an artist.

P.S. The top view is supposed to look like this:

Working Anyway (Cough cough)

If you think your cabin and cabin community might burn up along with your home and your town, you can spin in circles, nervously jabber on the phone, send endless emails and texts, putter, make a dog’s breakfast of your knitting, compulsively refresh websites with fire maps, randomly go through cupboards, seek oral gratification, pace, try to take deep breaths and then experiment with your new wheezy smoker’s cough.

You can also put on your big girl pants and do some work.

Montana Cabin, commissioned pencil drawing, 9×12″
The Orchard, original oil painting, 12×12″, $250 (plus tax, but you know that)
New drawing lesson with C via email – a demonstration on how to draw a dog eye from a fuzzy photograph of a now deceased black dog, the most difficult of all possible drawing situations.

Cough cough, hack, wheeze. 

It was actually sort of not too smoky yesterday so we took a walk. 

See what I mean about helicopters and the little marbles they carry?

Looking downstream – not too bad.

Looking upstream – yeppers, big wildfire, but smoke not as bad as it has been.

At one time, it looked this way. It could again. We could get rain. There is no reason to think that winter will never happen again. The peaks upstream don’t show in this drawing because it was winter and they were hidden by clouds, not smoke. Remember those days?

Oops. See what I mean about nervously jabbering?

Random Collection of Unrelated Thoughts in a Saturday Bonus Post

One week ago we climbed on the hill behind our house and saw this above our roof.

The smoke from fires makes it look like a foggy day. The differences are an orange tint, warm temperatures, and falling giant dandruff instead of a gray tint, cold temperatures and falling water.

This week Tucker and I had a little fun in the grass. He likes to stay just outside of arm’s reach, and jumps ahead whenever I crawl toward him. This is the second year of no mowing in hopes that the lawn would thicken up either by roots or by seeds. The cats love it long, and it seems thicker. Of course, transplanting chunks from another area may have contributed.

I just checked this book out from the library (Woodlake, because Three Rivers is closed due to the fires). It is fluffy, and fluffy is most welcome right now. The weird orangish tint is because of the fire.

This week I learned that the company who printed my coloring books has not saved the files. This means that reprinting any of the coloring books will involve a massive amount of computer work, again. The fad has passed along with demand, so I am unsure about proceeding. I am considering compiling a new one, combining pictures from the previous five. The Heart of Rural Tulare County is a long title, but it describes it well. This is an old post about designing #5. All the coloring books are sold out, but perhaps one of my retail outlets still has a copy or two. Here is the cover of the second one:

This week several places asked about reordering notecards. The prices have gone up considerably, and I am in sticker shock. When I started making notecard sets in 1987, they sold in stores for $5 for 10 cards. (You can read about that here, here, here, and here; there may be more old posts about them, but I am tired of looking for them and you are probably tired of reading all those links). Now they will have to sell at $10 for 4 cards. I made a new design, and will restock only a few of the most popular cards. People just don’t write that much any more to justify my keeping a large inventory. This is the upcoming Thank You card (no, it won’t say “Note Cards – 5.5″ x 4″ Folded – Premium matt: Front Side)

Because of the fires, drawing lessons did not restart the day after Labor Day. I have postponed them until the first week of October. I miss my students (a dear one died yesterday morning – if you are in drawing lessons and want to know more, email me). But, with the fire restriction of voluntary evacuation, I am reluctant to leave home; if it suddenly became mandatory to evacuate, then I wouldn’t be able to return home and get all my sweaters stuff.

 

17 Wildfire Thoughts (Mostly Questions)

I don’t expect anyone to read all this. It is just my peculiar way of thinking.

  1. If Voluntary Evacuation suddenly turns to Mandatory Evacuation, does this mean fire danger is imminent? I think it means that the officials want the roads clear of traffic and no people to worry about.
  2. If evacuation is mandatory, people are allowed to stay, but they are not allowed to return if they leave. I wonder if there are exceptions, such as getting groceries, going to the dentist, checking on elderly parents, going to work… I’m thankful I get to work from home.
  3. Why do the officials deem it necessary to bring in more crews when the terrain is too rugged for boots on the ground? Oh, it is to protect the town and the cabins on the Mineral King Road.
  4. If they are unable to contain a fire when it is only an acre or two, why do they believe they can contain it when it is hundreds of acres? Wouldn’t it be better to flood it with that pink stuff when it is small?
  5. I am sure that the people in charge know what they are doing. (Pippin knows what he is doing; isn’t it interesting how well he blends in with the weird light and dry grasses?)
  6. How can anyone know what he is doing when fires do what fires do, which is be unpredictable, go crazy and ruin stuff?
  7. But the people in charge know a lot about fire behaviors, patterns, how weather and terrain affects it, don’t they? (Did Pippin know what he was doing back when this photo was taken?)

  8. The people in charge are trained to talk in code to keep people from getting alarmed. (My dentist does the same thing – I got him to admit this to me when I called him on it.)
  9. Lower temperatures with increased humidity slows down fires. It also means a greater risk that pipes will freeze and burst in our cabins because Mineral King was closed before we had a chance to take care of some basics.
  10. Why doesn’t California do more active forest management? Think of the wasted potential lumber while we import overpriced lumber from distant locations! If logging, logging roads, and grazing were allowed (I don’t mean in the Parks, but in the Forests), there would be less fuels and there would be firebreaks. If mechanical thinning was done around settlements, they would have a greater chance of surviving. (Why aren’t they asking me how to run their business? And why has the term “forest management” become political? Good grief Charlie Brown)
  11. Why do we believe that Three Rivers won’t burn? The towns of Paradise and Greenville probably thought the same thing, and look how that turned out.
  12. In response to the previous question, Three Rivers doesn’t have those conifer trees, particularly standing dead ones, full of ptich, waiting to explode. Instead, we have buckeye trees, which don’t burn very well. 
  13. The Park Superintendent said the #1 priority is people’s homes (maybe he said “the community”). Within the Park, the big trees are more important than the Park’s structures because the trees are several thousand years old while the Park structures will probably collapse in 30 years.
  14. Helicopters carry a water container beneath that looks about the size of a marble in comparison to the size of the fire. Is this truly effective or is it the equivalent of a mouse with a squirt gun? (Just learned that there is some sort of fire retardant added to the water).
  15. Maybe it is a good thing that a great number of houses in Three Rivers are vacation rentals; that means less people to evacuate. (Would you believe that Moro Rock and Alta Peak are usually visible from this location? No reason for anyone to visit Three Rivers right now.)
  16. When thinking about evacuating, there are 2 parts to consider: A. What do I need for a week or two? and B. What can I not stand to lose?
  17. So many people have offered to help with trucks, trailers, places to store things, and places to stay. We don’t plan on leaving but have made piles of things in case it all goes nutso.
    The  same view in better times.

Drawing While Paradise Burns

That’s Paradise Ridge, not Paradise the town, which we know burned a couple of years ago (or was it last year? It’s all a smoky blur).

Trail Guy and I spent a good chunk of a morning talking about what to take, making piles, filling boxes. All the while, we had no intention of evacuating unless the fire gave us no choice. 

What are these relics? Is that ash? Are there any treats? Tucker wants to know.

After getting our piles somewhat in order (oh dear, I have way too many sweaters – how am I supposed to decide which ones to leave behind, possibly to never see again??), I went out to the studio to get some work done. Having an emergency doesn’t give me license to create emergencies for my customers.

This drawing might be a little bit too hard for me. Many details are hidden in shadow, and there is a horse. (At least his tongue is inside his mouth). It is good to tackle the hardest part first.

There might be a problem with his feet, so I moved onto the things that I can do with one hand tied behind my back and half my brain occupied with wildfires (and sweaters).

Working from the laptop screen definitely has its advantages. I can embiggen the photos and even lighten the shadows to understand what the various black blobs are.I drew most of the afternoon while listening to helicopters overhead, a welcome sound after they were silent throughout the smoky and worrisome morning.

And this is how it looked at the end of the day.

This is a commissioned pencil drawing of a cabin in Montana for a repeat customer who is a joy to work with and for.

In case you were wondering about the reference to the horse’s tongue, here you go.

 

Painting in a Makeshift Studio in Mineral King

These photos are from Three Rivers yesterday morning around 9:30 a.m. We are under mandatory evacuation from Mineral King and cannot go there. Evacuation is voluntary for our section of Three Rivers.

This post is about time spent in Mineral King approximately 2-3 weeks ago.

I guess that any place an artist decides to paint can be called a studio. I painted on the back porch of the cabin. (I hope I get to do that again next year.)

First, I started three of the paintings at home.

These three along with 3 blank canvases went to Mineral King. Because paintings have been selling well at Kaweah Arts , I wanted to keep my inventory up for them.

It wasn’t an ideal situation for painting, but I made decent progress over the course of several sessions (while avoiding red fir cones that the chickarees were dropping out of trees in the backyard).

It involved days of moving them inside to the stairs at night and back outside to dry during the day.

These 2 might be finished.

When the others are finished, I will scan them. Maybe I will remember to show you. Maybe they will show up in a post about sold paintings.