Spring Walk in Three Rivers

About a week ago on a chilly afternoon with brilliant sunshine and puffy white clouds, Trail Guy and I went for a walk. Nothing much to say – just enjoy spring in Three Rivers with me.

Goodbye, Cowboy

Walk This Way, 2006, oil on board, private collection

Bert Weldon, 1956-2019

New Idea for Drawing Lessons

In the month of March, I am teaching a beginning drawing class to six people, two hours per week at Arts Visalia, a very fine non-profit gallery in downtown Visalia. (This is the county seat, the town we usually mean in Three Rivers when we say we have to go “down the hill”.)

The six folks were all new to me, although we have found a few connections, as one does in a place like Tulare County. We worked through my regular beginning exercises on the first evening, and they were terrific. Easy to work with, understood and followed directions, asked good questions that helped me clarify my instructions, and they all did very well.

I suggested that they bring photos they might like to draw from for the second lesson. That night, I woke up with such a good idea that it could only have been inspired by God.

It is based on the idea that there is an order of difficulty in drawing. Here it is from easiest to yikes:

  1. Other people’s drawings
  2. Black and white photos
  3. Color photos
  4. Real life

I went through my zillions of photos and chose a stack that will give a beginner a reasonable chance at success. Then I chose one to try out – could I draw this quickly? Could I scan it successfully and make a printable tool for my new students?

Yeppers.

I always have new students do a tracing of the photo so they have a simple version for beginning a drawing. Tracing is a tool, not a “cheat”.

I like this! This means I have 11 more tracings, drawings and scans to do. Good thing I love to draw.

Vertical Mineral King Painting

In looking through my photos to choose new Mineral King subjects (or new approaches to old subjects), I kept going back to a photo of some fisherpeople in the stream. Finally I decided to narrow it down to the parts that matter and try it on a vertical 6×18″ canvas.

You can see the first pass within this jumble of paintings in their embryonic stage.
Top down is the same as back to front in this painting. This works out well for me, since I “draw” with my paintbrush, often resting my hand on the painting. Many painters use a “mahl stick” to rest their hands on, but I paint too small for this to be of any help. Besides, I don’t like extra stuff, gear, tools, things. The more stuff I own, the more stuff breaks and gets lost and fills up my brain and life.
Slowly crawling down the canvas.
After all those greens, it is fun to put in blue for the stream.

This is as far as I can go until things dry. I’m unsure about the fisherpeople. The largest one is about 1/16″ high on the photo and appears to be riding a bike. That can’t be right. So I will probably look through my photos and see if there is one of Trail Guy or Trail Girl (I haven’t told you about her) that would be better. Trail Guy used to take Trail Girl fishing so she could hold the fish and talk to them before she released them. She is grown up now and we miss her something fierce, but she has a real job and doesn’t live in her parents’ basement. That’s good, I guess.

Another Bridge Day

This represents a typical day at the easels for me, working on a few paintings, hanging out with my cats, taking a break to go see the river from the Dinely Bridge which crosses the middle fork of the Kaweah River here in Three Rivers.

I tightened up some details and began working on the Oak Grove bridge on the 6×18″ painting.
Then I switched to the other Oak Grove bridge painting.
Scout may be contemplating impending motherhood. Look at the pretty orange stripe that runs down from her eye. It will be fun to see what her babies look like.
Upstream view of the Kaweah River during a string of storms.
Downstream view. I love this kind of lighting – dark sky, bright sun, clarity.
This is a memorial bouquet which gets changed regularly on the Dinely Bridge: flowering quince, daffodils and rosemary approximate the three primary colors.

Bridge Day

My favorite thing to draw and paint is the Oak Grove Bridge, 6.5 miles up the Mineral King Road. I think a bridge is the most perfect blend of architecture and scenery. It is sort of a cliche, but so what?

This is 10×10″. The color is weird because I photographed it after dark.
This is closer to the truth, although I do tend to exaggerate colors in my oil paintings.
This is as far as I went on the bridge painting day. Maybe the phone rang, or it was time for lunch.
Scout and Tucker weren’t too interested in the details but liked hanging out on the window sill shelf behind me. Samson would have been chasing my paintbrushes or biting my ankles. This pair came from the same place, but have entirely different approaches to life than their cousin/brother/uncle/who knows.
This 6×18″ painting is an entirely new approach to painting the bridge.
The background shrubbery was the obvious next step since all the colors were ready to go on the palette from the previous bridge painting.
That long green “fairway” on the left is probably the bank leading down to the road.
This is as far as I can go until everything dries. Then, the bridge itself will get painted.

I made up the rocks beneath, which one might think I would have memorized by now. Closies count on this. Ditto with the growies (since I am talking in weird abbreviated words). It will prolly take a week or so for these to be dry enough to continue.

Memorial service for The Cowboy
Bert Raymond Weldon, May 21, 1956 — January 8, 2019
CELEBRATION OF LIFE AND RECEPTION Friday, March 15, 2019, 11:00 a.m. CrossCity Christian Church, 2777 E. Nees Avenue, Fresno, California 93720

Trail Half-Day

Yesterday I promised to show you the hike my walking buddy T and I took one morning instead of our usual ground-pounding fast walk. (This qualifies as a hike because we carried food and water.) We drove about 10 minutes into Sequoia National Park, a little ways past the entrance station in order to walk to Shepherd Saddle.

This was our view when we started around 8:30. Sure felt casual compared to our normal meeting time of 6:00.
We were expecting rain and wanted to test our new parkas, but Sycamore Creek was the only water we saw besides some puddles and a few water troughs for the stock.
Now here is a peculiar sight. Have you ever seen a horse with a perm?
The clouds obstructed most views of the mountains except for a tiny piece poking out.
The manzanita were almost the only flowers we saw.
The clouds were beautiful looking down the canyon.
And here we are, at the gate on Shepherd’s Saddle. We are on National Park land; the other side is a mystery as to ownership.
T gave me a tangerine, and it was so pretty I photographed it before peeling it. We left the emergency M&Ms unopened – please be impressed.
Going home was much quicker. Duh. It was all downhill.
Sycamore Creek already?
We wondered if it had more water flowing on the way back down, but didn’t pursue the question.

Okay, Central California artist, get to your easel and start painting.

Memorial service for The Cowboy
Bert Raymond Weldon, May 21, 1956 — January 8, 2019
CELEBRATION OF LIFE AND RECEPTION Friday, March 15, 2019, 11:00 a.m. CrossCity Christian Church, 2777 E. Nees Avenue, Fresno, California 93720

Painting a Half Day

Isn’t that an odd title? One day last week my walking buddy and I decided to drive to a new place and walk a trail instead of heading out at dark-thirty with flashlights and walking a road. This meant that I only had a half day to paint. So, hubba hubba hubba, let’s git ‘er dun. The plan was to get the last 9 paintings covered with the basics in colors and shapes, not to detail anything. In other words, to do a job, not a good job.

2 alike, an 8×8″ and a 6×6″. This is the most popular Mineral King oil painting subject.
Another pair of look-alikes.
Five more makes nine. Now what shall I work on?
I climbed up on a ladder to get a view of a table full of paintings in progress. There are 20 here. You’re welcome (I know you were wondering whether or not to take the time to count these.)
While on the ladder, I looked out the door at my irises in bloom.
Before deciding what to work on next, I took another census. With these, I’m up to 28 paintings.
But wait! There are 5 more, for a total of 33. When I said there are 32 in progress, I was ignoring the citrus.
This one! I’ll do this one next. I might be a teensie bit bored with painting greens.
After photographing a painting, I can see the things that aren’t quite right. Why are those things more visible on a computer screen than in person? What is more important than matching the photo is deciding if the painting can stand alone.
And as a reward for being so productive, I chose to work on my favorite bridge. The colors are weird in the painting because it was actually dark outside when I took the photo, so the camera was confused.

Phew. That was a sprint. And after walking 6 miles in the morning. . . I’ll show you our walk tomorrow.

P.S. The promised update on a memorial service for The Cowboy
Bert Raymond Weldon, May 21, 1956 — January 8, 2019
CELEBRATION OF LIFE AND RECEPTION Friday, March 15, 2019, 11:00 a.m. CrossCity Christian Church, 2777 E. Nees Avenue, Fresno, California 93720

Cabins and Flowers

My assembly line method of painting the Honeymoon Cabin in Mineral King was a challenge in several ways. Breaks to look at flowers helped. Maybe March is my favorite month.

This was fun because of the pink and purple, two rare colors in my landscapes of Mineral King.

Can you see the changes from the previous photo?
Flower break!
These now need to wait to dry so I can put in the flags and some wildflowers.
Time to work on these three little ones again.
Another flower break!
All five oil paintings of the Honeymoon Cabin in Mineral King are now drying so they’ll be ready for flags and wildflowers.
Final flower break! All day I wondered what smelled a little different, and when I crouched down to photograph these flowers just outside the door, I had my answer.

Painting Animals

No motivational quotes today, just some paintings in progress.

A little more detailing, a signature, and BaddaBing, BaddaBoom. (Cowboy Bert used to say that when he meant a thing was finished.)
Maybe these roosters could be named BaddaBing and Badda Boom.
Tucker had a few days of being under the weather and off his feed. (Any more cliches to describe this?) He’s back to normal except a bit more tired than usual.
Scout’s ready for anything.
Meanwhile, just outside the door. . .

P.S. Here is the promised info on the memorial service for The Cowboy.
Bert Raymond Weldon, May 21, 1956 — January 8, 2019
CELEBRATION OF LIFE AND RECEPTION Friday, March 15, 2019, 11:00 a.m. CrossCity Christian Church, 2777 E. Nees Avenue, Fresno, California 93720