Quickety Update on Calendars (and a Little More)

Please excuse this interruption in your day.

1. The 2024 Mineral King calendar is still available. At the time of this post, there are 8 left, available through my website or if you email or call me. The Three Rivers Historical Museum no longer has any.

2. I spent 1-1/2 hours on the phone with Apple today to learn why blog subscribers using MacMail or AppleMail cannot see the photos in my blog posts that come to their email. (A few can, but WHY??) No answers came other than that I now need to spend an interminable length of time on the phone with the host of my website. Later. Today’s session used all my reserves for bad hold music and helpers who cannot help.

3. The new painting of fruit is in its home and is just right for the location.

4. The Native Voices exhibit at the Three Rivers Museum looks fabulous!

And that’s all. Just didn’t want you to miss out if you need a calendar.

Finished and Unfinished

Yesterday we saw two brand new paintings on the easels, looking like they’ll never get finished. Eventually most paintings do. Layer after layer, keep studying, figuring out what to do next and how to improve it every time I pick up the brushes.

Today we will see some finished and some unfinished paintings.

This is how the bright fruit painting has settled into its new home.

This is a good showing of the progression of my colored art: First I worked in colored pencil, then I practiced mixing colors by painting many pomegranates. Now I get a real kick out of mixing all colors, combining lots of photos, and just pantsing it on the canvas.

The new fruit painting for my friend/customer is completed, signed, and moved into the house for drying.

This is in the painting workshop just before I moved it into the house. I am very happy with this one and glad I did a new painting for my friend rather than just messing with the older one by changing some of the fruits.

There are three unfinished pieces waiting for attention.

I was hoping to keep this when it is finished, but I will put it in the 2024 show and it WILL be for sale. (I can always paint another one of my favorite type of subject.)
This one has had several do-overs and a very long time-out; I’m still not convinced that I can do the subject justice but I will continue to try.
First, the wire needs to be moved. Then I will commence to draw lots of golden colored ferns.

All of these paintings started out as the same sort of vague mess as the ones we looked at yesterday. Nevuh nevuh nevuh give up.

Beginning Two New Paintings

Here is a look at two new paintings, begun for the solo show in October of 2024. Seems very far away, but it takes awhile to paint enough pieces to fill a gallery on one’s own. I have about 30 available (several unfinished but in progress which I will show you tomorrow) so I need to paint another 10-20 pieces. I’m thinking 20 is better, because I paint small. Even when I think it is HUGE, such as 18×24 which feels ENORMOUS and takes FOREVER, it looks like a postage stamp in a gallery.

This one is 16×20. I can’t find the photo on my computer, don’t remember where or when I took this, and can’t really discern the details on the little photograph.

So why bother? It has wonderful light and the road pulls the viewer in.

It will involve some “artistic license”, and I will focus on the contrast between light and shadow. Slow layer after slow layer, lots of thinking and evaluating—that will be the process on this one.

I decided to do something different with something familiar, using a 10×30″ canvas that I had on hand. The sizes of canvas on hand often dictates what I paint. If it isn’t a tried and true subject, I keep the painting small. This is a tried and true subject, even if you can’t tell what it is at this early stage.

Can you recognize what this mess is?

Lots of painting ahead for your Central California artist as she plans the best way to show off the parts of Tulare County that keep her from moving to the beach. (As if she could afford that; besides, she’d miss Trail Guy.)

Practicing Painting

Practice Painting? Painting Practice? Paint Practicing?

Never mind. Doctors practice medicine, attorneys practice law, and this artist practices painting. Some days I feel as if I am brand new, with no idea how to tackle a subject. Some days I think I’m figuring it out. Only once in awhile does the process feel easy.

I have a solo show coming up a year from now, and I want to be ready. No last-minute panic painting, just a well-planned body of work that is cohesive, looks good together, represents my best efforts, and most of all, represents the best parts of Central California, specifically Tulare County. Or perhaps is the best representation of Tulare County, a place of superlatives, both great and terrible.

Hey Central California, stop your bloviations and show us some work.

Ahem. Would you like to see what I was practicing on?

About time.

I started with more detailing on the trees.

Then it was time to work on the background. All those vague and messy branches and clumps of needles were a bit confounding, but that’s okay, because I was just practicing. It helped to put in the sunlit strips of ground.

I had to turn the canvas sideways in order to place the tip of my brush WHICH I WAS DRAWING WITH, SO THERE, in the right place to get accuracy. In order to paint those ferns in detail, I DRAW WITH MY PAINTBRUSH.

Finally, I hung it on the wall to dry, and that’s when I realized I had begun the scene upside down but hadn’t actually reversed the canvas. Oh well. A wire is easy to move.

A Welcome Bear

We have bears in our neighborhood, and they are a nuisance. However, there was a welcome bear in my workshop recently. Literally a welcome bear.

This odd job came from the same man who had me repaint Little Bucky.

I started with the letters.

Next, I rotated him to experiment with brown fur colors. He’s not a “brown bear”, which is another name for a grizzly. Our bears are called “black bears”, without regard to their colors.

I added some yellow ochre to the brown to give him highlights.
It photographed way too light, too golden, wrong.

I mixed in some dark purple with the brown to give it variety; it makes the brown much darker. The whole idea was to have variation in the fur coloring.

The sign is super washed out i this photo, making the letters illegible.

The ears got a touch of pink—but less than appears in this photo.

Finally, I sent these two photos to Mr. Customer, and he was pleased, so I am too.

Bears around here tend to have lighter colored muzzles, so now this guy does too, regardless of whatever color it was when he was new. I also put a few splinters into his sign. The lettering is actually bright white, not light blue. The funniest part to me was that when he was wet, I turned his entire being by grabbing his nose. Don’t be trying that on a live one!

Quickity Peek at the Mineral King Road

Trail Guy, The Farmer, and The Supervisor (retired) worked on the Mineral King road this week, clearing culverts and cleaning gutters. This was all volunteer work, sanctioned by the Park.

The contractors repaired the damaged parts that were marked by Federal Highways; our guys did preparations for the winter, with rain predicted up to higher elevations in a few days. Their goal is to prevent the sort of troubles we had last winter.

The weather has been mild, and with all the water from last spring and summer, there are still WILDFLOWERS IN DECEMBER! (Yeppers, Trail Guy took the camera and came home with these photos).

These are bush poppies.
California poppy!
Mary Trauger’s sweet peas

Painting Fruit Instead of the Golden Gate Bridge

I had a few unexpected hours available to paint and decided to not waste that time doing something useless like weeding or vacuuming or painting the Golden Gate Bridge (just your basic endless repetitive chore).

I worked on the commissioned oil painting, 6×18″ for my friend/customer to fit between 2 other fruit paintings in her kitchen. She saw the painting Citrus Row and requested the addition of pomegranates and persimmons but gave me the freedom to arrange and fill with whatever else I chose. Instead of adding those P fruits, I started a new painting.

She sent me this photo to show me where she wanted to put the painting.
Back wall first
The fruit on the far right is a fuyu persimmon, not a tomato. I don’t know why I started on the right side instead of the left, which is normal when I draw so that my hand doesn’t drag over the completed area.
This picture looks worse than the previous one because the paint was quite wet and the late afternoon light made it very reflective.
Incomplete: the table, stem on the pomelo, and the cap on the fuyu. and the edges and signature.

It is quite a thrill to be able to mix and use all these bright colors. Of course, having painted this at the end of the day’s light, it could look rather wrong when I see it in normal daylight.

Yeppers, the table needs work. The leaf on the tangerine is blending into the table. The shadowed part on the orange on the right isn’t right. The fuyu persimmon might need some color correction. The shade from the lemon on the pomelo looks like an outline. On and on and on it goes.

It’s a wonder that any paintings ever get finished.

Feeling Fruity Around Here

Feeling fruity around here lately. A month or 2 ago, I painted this to decorate a banquet for a citrus marketing outfit.

A friend who has bought more of my paintings than anyone else saw this. She said, “If it doesn’t sell at the event, I want it!”

I took the painting to her, and she said, “I’ve been thinking. . . could you change one of these to a pomegranate? And include both kinds of persimmons?”

I said, “Sure, I can do that!”

Then I brought it home, thought it over, and decided to do a new piece for her. I dug through my fruit photos, looking carefully at the lighting and angles. Then, unlike my normal approach, I drew it out.

This is going to be good—colorful and well planned.

The other fruit painting I recently painted as a gift, I did without any real planning. I just pantsed it, trying this and that with paint, having fun with color.

I like it, and so does the recipient. Yeah, yeah, it probably would have been better to plan it. Sometimes I just rebel.

P.S. Good thing I painted a new one because the original, Citrus Row, sold at CACHE’s Holiday Fair!

Two Outings

Private collection, 12×36″

In 2023, I participated in exactly one art boutique/fair/bazaar. ONE. It was in Exeter on a Saturday at the history museum/art gallery, CACHE. This was the inaugural event, the reviews are mixed, and I am guessing it won’t become an annual event.

However, I had a good day! One painting sold (Citrus Row) and many smaller items too, all adding up to YES IT WAS WORTH IT.

Being sort of accidentally semi-retired this year*, I decided that a good day of work deserved a good day of hanging out with friends. Because I still live in the same area where I was reared (children are reared, vegetables are raised), when long-time friends return to the area, they often request a get-together. This isn’t always practical, but it is usually a real treat.

I left the house at 10:30 AM and got home at 5:30 PM, just to “go have lunch”. This is why I often turn down such requests, unless I have recently had a good day of work and don’t have any looming deadlines.

The drive was interesting (I actually left Tulare County!), the company stellar, and lunch was delicious.

Our post-lunch walk was exactly up my alley.

The dead tree was interesting, but I won’t paint it.
I will probably paint this. If I really squint, I can see the mountains. We were too far north to be looking at Alta Peak.
I will paint this, minus the white spots (whitewash against thrip?) and pokey little twigs. I’ll probably fake in a navel.
My friend had to help me with these: pistachios! She said that the crop was left to fall on the ground this year. What a terrible waste.
Of course I will be painting a version of this. Shall I make the hill green?

Two outings: one work, one semi-work related, both social, one closer but more taxing (talking to people all day makes me tired), the other far but entirely up my alley with 2 close and long-time friends in the country surrounded by foothills and oranges.

“The Best View”, 10×20″, $400, currently my favorite subject matter

*Because I had no work this summer I may have forgotten how to work.

Thank you—Inconclusive Conclusions

THANK YOU TO EVERYONE WHO TOOK THE TIME YESTERDAY TO TELL ME WHAT THEY SEE AND DON’T SEE IN THE EMAIL BLOG NOTIFICATIONS!!

Please excuse me for shouting. I am so touched by your responses and willingness to help.

In my attempt to see a pattern about who can and who cannot see photos in the email notifications, I learned this:

  1. Mac laptop – some can see the photos, some cannot
  2. Mac desktop – some can, some can’t
  3. iPhone – some can, some can’t
  4. iPad – some can, some can’t
  5. Android phone – all can see the photos
  6. Non-Mac desktop – all can see the photos

There must be some settings that we don’t understand on our iPhones, MacBooks, Mac desktops, and iPads. Now I might have to dig around on settings for Mac mail on every device they manufacture.

This hurts my apple-shaped heart. At least I know it isn’t a problem with my blog (using WordPress.org) or the subscription form.

One more thing: I sent out the blog post and left for the day. All your wonderful comments arrived, but I wasn’t at my computer to approve them. So, if you commented and wondered if it “went through”, it did, and once I approved it, it appeared.

You deserve a beautiful picture as a thank you for making it to the end of this post. (I hope you get to see it!)

Sequoias in Winter, 16×20″, oil on wrapped canvas

(I didn’t put the price because I don’t want you to think I am thanking you by trying to sell you something.)