Author: cabinart

More talking to myself

This is one of the pencil drawings for the upcoming book, The Cabins of Wilsonia

How will the book be organized?

Alphabetically, by street name

What order are you doing the cabin drawings?

Alphabetically, by street name. EXCEPT, when I began in the summer, I did quite a few of the Masonic tract and then quite a few on Fern where I also stayed.

Don’t you get bored just sitting there alone drawing in pencil?

Often Kaweah Kitty is with me. If it is cold out, she squishes underneath the light for warmth and blocks my vision and licks my hand.

But don’t you get bored anyway?

With the wonder of technology, I can listen to the radio or to TED talks on the computer or to Artists Helping Artists marketing broadcasts on the computer or to iTunes on my Bose speakers for the computer or to Iceberg radio on the computer which I learned about from my new friend Colleen. Who can be bored when you have the whole world available through that magic machine?

How will you get all those quotes you need?

I’ll just keep bugging people via email, maybe send out a real letter, and keep drawing cabins in pencil while I wait.

Where will I be able to order a book?

Call me, write me, email me. Check my website. Ask Gus. And, if I figure out how, it will be available through Amazon. Then, if you wait 10 years, you can pay twice as much on eBay!

Who are you, anyway?

I am California artist Jana Botkin, who specializes in pencil drawings of cabins. (Got that, Mr. Google??)

pencil drawing Wilsonia

In Which the Artist Interviews Herself

The Cabins of Wilsonia, my huge project, has created a few questions. Here I will ask some of those questions, and then answer them for you. (Mr. Google, I am a California artist who will do over 200 pencil drawings of cabins.)

What is Wilsonia?

it is an area of about 100 acres of private land bought and set aside before the National Parks were created. It is next to Grant Grove in Kings Canyon National Park in California.

How old are the cabins?

The first cabins were built there in 1919, there are some that were built in the 1990s, and there are all sorts in between.

What is that name?

It was named after President Woodrow Wilson (with apologies to Glen Beck).

Why are you doing this?

Short answer: because I am Cabinart. Medium answer: it hasn’t been done yet, and it will be a good product to sell. Long answer: I love to draw, drawing cabins is my signature art style and subject, Wilsonia is beautiful and interesting, and it is good to record these places before they change too much.

How many cabins are there?

There are 212, 12 of which belong to the National Park Service.

Will there be history?

There will be an introduction that briefly explains the history of Wilsonia. If cabin folks want to share some of their own history, it may be included in their quotations.

Will the book be expensive?

Compared to a clearance table book, yes. Compared to the current price of The Cabins of Mineral King, no. (It initially sold for $50 and is currently selling for around $100 used.)

Are you drawing all the cabins?

No.

Why not?

Short answer: there are too many. Long answer: some are too cluttered, some are too hard to see through the trees, some are too plain, some are redundant in appearance, and some belong to the Park, who most likely won’t be a customer for the book.

Won’t the book be boring with nothing but cabins?

The drawings will include entire cabins, cabin details, and quotes from cabin folks. If you buy one and then think it is boring, hang on to it until the books are sold out, then sell it for twice what you paid!

Will you sell the drawings?

Eventually. If I let them go before they’ve been scanned properly, it will be very hasslesome to retrieve them to rescan. I have sold a few, and I hope I don’t have to beg to borrow them back!

Do you know these people?

I know a surprising number of Wilsonia cabin folks! The former owners of our home in Three Rivers and the former owners of our cabin in Mineral King both have cabins in Wilsonia. My husband’s closest friend from childhood, our neighbors in Mineral King, my dad’s partner in an airplane, a cousin by marriage, old friends, friends of friends, previous customers, and now lots of new friends are all on the list of folks I know.

How will you earn money if all you do is draw Wilsonia cabins for more than a year and can’t sell them yet and have to learn how to use Adobe InDesign at the same time?

Any suggestions??? Anyone?? Ideas??

Excuse me now, I need to go lie down for a bit. Maybe I’ll just put my thumb in my mouth and rock a little.

Walk in the Park

Today that animal I am married to is turning 59. We did a stroll in The Park. Anything feels like a stroll after attempting Monarch Lake on the old “trail” last week. We stayed in the foothills, and almost wished for shorts and were annoyed by the face flies. Hard to believe it is January. (Are you praying for rain? You need to be!!) Anyway, I talk too much, so have a look at some nice photos. These fall under the broad category of Sources of Inspiration, which also means things I might want to paint someday. Oh, and if Mr. Google is paying attention, this is the blog of a California Artist who paints Sequoia National Park, Tulare County and Three Rivers.

P.S. I am an animal too, if banana slug counts as an animal.

hiking Sequoia Sequoia National park Three Rivers Tulare county

First mural, revisited

Back when I decided to begin muralizing, I started by painting Farewell Gap in oils and increasing the size each time. After I completed a 24×36″, it was time to paint it on my workshop doors. This was the first time I painted large and it shocked me how quickly it went. Michael stood back and helped me with the shape and scale of the peaks. Louise stood down the driveway and coached me on the water. This is how it looked in April 2008.

The colors faded, and I paint better now. Besides, the Three Rivers Studio Tour is coming in March 2012, so it is time to repaint.

Now, I can see that the poppy door is faded too. Is this going to be like painting the Golden Gate Bridge?

Mineral King mural mural Three Rivers Studio Tour

Weird Winter Walk, part 3

As we descended the non-maintained trail from Monarch, this was our view of Sawtooth Peak. If you aren’t familiar with it, the view here might help you.

Michael referred to this as the “moonscape”.

“. . .miles to go before I sleep.”

Nice light, eh?

Sometimes we lost the trail because we were avoiding stuff like this.

When I told Michael to look at the way these spires were lit, he said, “I’ll fall over if I look up!”. Speaking of falling, I did fall a couple of times. This is the first time in my memory that my knees and ankles just spontaneously buckled.

In the summer, we rarely choose to use the Sawtooth/Timber Gap trail. It is steep, hot, and dusty. On our trip down from Monarch, it was the most welcoming and comfortable part of the day. Because of freeze-thaw, the trail bed was a little spongy and not dusty at all. It wasn’t steep compared to the rest of the hike, and such a nice flat place to put one’s feet! Good thing, because we were on the edge of running out of daylight and needed to pick up the pace.

Michael took this photo of Empire and Sawtooth Pass while shouting at me to hurry up in the outhouse. I did hurry, but not soon enough to run down the icy slick road for a better view of the entire peak. It was truly this red, and only lasted about 1 minute.

Dang. That was a hard day. Michael asked me what the best part was, and I said “the sunset”.

hiking Mineral King

Weird Winter Walk, part 2

Yesterday I left you with the information that I am married to an animal. He went to within view of Monarch Lake, and then returned to me for the camera, which I gladly handed over, then resumed my semi-comatose state of gathering strength in the sunshine for the “walk” down.

Can you see the lake? It is beneath the peak sometimes referred to as “Sawtooth’s Shadow”. I think the real name is Mineral Peak. Anyone know for sure what this guy is called?

Here is the left side zoomed in.

And the right side.

And the view out to the Coast Range.

Did you know there is a sorry excuse for an outhouse at Monarch Lake?

See the 2 foxtail pines? They were just “right there”, but might as well have been in Rome for all my ability to reach them. You can see the shelf where the lake is just behind them. I didn’t care.

To be continued. . .

hiking Mineral King

Weird Winter Walk

On January 2, Michael and I drove to Mineral King. That is weird for this far into the snow season. The drive up was seasonless – is this late October? early May? Then we walked to Monarch Lake on a mostly dry trail. That is immensely weird.

Okay, I lied a little bit. Michael went to Monarch Lake. I climbed and struggled and finally say “I’m done”.

You can see the lack of snow, but what was there was glistening on Farewell Gap at 9 a.m.

We chose the old trail beneath the spires of Empire. It isn’t maintained, sometimes isn’t visible, is overgrown, disappears under rockslides, splits into multiple choice, but eventually gets you to the destination.

Can you pick out the new trail over there in the ice, snow and shade? That is why we chose the south-facing old trail.

Monarch lake is beneath Sawtooth. Nice “trail”, eh?

As I struggled along, I entertained myself by devising a numerical system to rate walking. #1 is going out to my garage. #10 is “I’m done”. This walk began at a 6-7, which is “this is sort of hard but I can do it and it is even sort of fun”. It became a #8 after about 2-1/2 miles when we were on the non-maintained trail for about a mile. This number is “this is hard and it isn’t fun anymore”. I decided #9 was “this is almost too hard but I can do mind over matter” and that when I hit #10, I’d quit. Gotta save some juice in my legs to get back to the parking lot!

I hit #10 just below the lake. When I emerged from my semi-comatose state, I was able to enjoy the sunshine and this view. I am married to an animal, and he proceeded on toward the lake. He said it was “only 5 more minutes” and I said, “not for me!”

To be continued. . .

hiking Mineral King

A new year, still reading

“Salt and Light“, oil paint on board, 11×14 (Thank you, Steven S., for the title!)

This year I will continue to tell you what I am reading (Thank you, Melissa, for the idea!). What does this have to do with art? Nothing, except it gives you a more complete view of who this California artist is. I’ll do it in groups of threes. Just finished or am finishing these books:

Heaven Is For Real by Todd Burpo (such an unfortunate last name). I was astonished and inspired by this book. It is a simply told story by the father of a boy who had an amazing life-changing experience at the age of 3. It is very convincing. It is here on Amazon.
Sylvia’s Farm by Sylvia Jorrin. This is a book of essays by a sheep farmer in upstate New York. At first I was confused because the chapters didn’t seem connected. When I read it, I could picture the sheep, the 28 room house, the stone walls and gates, the barn and carriage house. It made me go to her website to see the photos, but they were distorted on my screen. She uses the word “shall” too much, but I liked it anyway.
Losing It by Laura Fraser. I learned of this book from a reference to Fraser’s writing in another book. Her blog is great to read – what a life, what a writer! It made me order all 3 of her books from the library and this was the first to arrive. It is a very engrossing look into the diet industry and how the myth continues, despite the fact that diets are proven to not work.

What are you reading?

California Artist

Big Fat Announcement

For a few months I’ve been dancing around the subject of a Very Large Project on the horizon. Today is the day to tell you all what it is. It isn’t a very well kept secret, just a non-published-on-this-blog secret.

If you know me, you know I love to draw in pencil and that I love to draw cabins. Little cabins, big cabins, they inspire me to draw. So, The Cabins of Wilsonia, a book of drawings of (duh) the cabins of Wilsonia is underway! It will be similar to The Cabins of Mineral King.

There are differences.

1. It will contain very little history because I’m an artist, not a historian, and the history has already been written in several forms.

2. I will be doing this one solo instead of with Jane Coughran, the very qualified former picture editor from Time-Life Books who was my partner on the Mineral King book.

3. It may not contain any photographs, because there are more than 3 times as many cabins in Wilsonia as in Mineral King.

4. It will take longer than a year to produce because it is a bigger book (226 drawings, at least 128 pages and probably more) and I have to learn how to do the designing on my computer all by myself. (deep breaths, deep calming breaths. . .) I’m aiming for Memorial Day of 2013.

5. The cabins won’t all be represented – there are just too many!

6. The cabins won’t be identified by name. They will be in chapters by street names.

There are similarities.

1. It will contain pencil drawings.

2. It will contain quotes from cabin folks.

3. It wil be hardcover (yes Brad, I listened to you!), horizontal in format.

4. It will contain some history and explanation of Wilsonia.

5. It will be self-published. This is the way Janey and I did our book in 1998, except technology has changed DRASTICALLY. There are plenty of assisted self-publishing sites out there like Lulu and Blurb and West Bow Press, but I won’t be using them.

There are challenges.

1. 226 drawings to complete and scan.

2. 40-something quotes to gather and verify.

3. Adobe InDesign to learn to use.

4. Writing the text.

5. Finding a printer.

6. Finding a binder.

7. Selling them all!!

Happy New Year!

This California artist blog will resume the blog’s regular posting schedule of Monday through Friday, 7 a.m. Pacific Standard Time on January 3, 2012.

Wilsonia