MORE WEATHER (Instead of Art)

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When there is an event, everyone is a photojournalist. I am your photojournalist reporting from the middle fork of the Kaweah River in Three Rivers. There is a lot of action in other parts of town, but it is fairly sane in our neighborhood. I continue to be thankful that we couldn’t afford riverfront property when we moved here, and thankful to have a house that was here pre-1955 when The Big Flood happened.

Middle Fork

This is also known as the main fork of the Kaweah. We live about 1/2 mile above it and often walk to the Dinely Bridge to see how it looks.


Lots of snow is still hanging in there, in spite of the warm rain.

We took a walk, and Trail Guy carried a big rake. He tried to free up some gunk clogging a culvert so that mud stops flowing across our road.

Moro Rock is visible up the canyon while the Alta Peak elephant hides behind clouds.

Back to the Dinely Bridge, looking upstream

Looking upstream to the Dinely side of the bridge (makes me think of Olivia Newton John’s song “The river’s too wide now for crossing. . .”)

Looking upstream to the Sierra (Hwy. 198) side of the bridge

Looking downstream

Looking downstream toward the highway

Looking downstream with Comb Rocks in the distance

Back home for a brief moment of sunshine (hi Pippin!)

East Fork (also known as the Mineral King Road)

We got a call from an adventurous friend who rode his bike up the Mineral King Road. (He likes to do things like that. . .ride to Mineral King, run to Eagle Lake, and ride home in the summer). He took many photos for us where the road is “gone-zo” (his term) about 4.5 miles up.

These are some of his photos of various washouts and blowouts and gone-zo-outs. I’m not sure where each one is, but know that the county has a ton of work ahead.

He also sent videos, but those don’t work here. Many similar photos were posted on the Book of Faces by one of his traveling companions, and several friends sent me screen shots. Our friend called us before they went public. Thank you, Dennis V!!

 

Big Water Update from Three Rivers

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Many friends have checked in to see if we are okay. We are definitely okay, and touched by the many inquiries.

We took some bags to a friend who lives along Salt Creek so he could fill them with sand. The creek flowed over his bridge so he needed to prep more for the next wave, or “atmospheric river” as everyone loves to say these days. Looking upstream

Looking downstream

Looking down

Looking across It didn’t rain during the day yesterday and there was much to appreciate.

My neighbor wanted to go for a walk again.

Looking downstream at the Dinely Bridge (on the Middle Fork).

Looking upstream

The water is lower than yesterday.

Someone didn’t want to get her feet wet.

Equipment was working on that washout.

Looking upstream

Moments of sunshine, appreciating the early wildflowers and green.

Did I not notice those cones on our way toward the washout? I did notice the puddles. . .

If I lived by the river, I would waste an enormous amount of time just staring at it.

Looking downstream off the Dinely bridge one more time.

Yesterday we had thunderstorms around 5 p.m.

Town is still mostly closed, no church today, but people are allowed to leave town and return now.

Fearsome, Ferocious, Frenetic Water Report

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Thursday night brought 4-1/2″ of rain.

My neighbor asked if I wanted to go looky-looing on Friday morning. Her car is higher than mine, and I immediately replied YES.

She manages a vacation rental on the North Fork. This is the view from the backyard at the normally mild fork that often dries up in the summer.

This is the North Fork flowing over the top of the Airport Bridge (there used to be an airport nearby). The whitewater is where the water hits the railing that the county used to remove when floods were predicted. Now they prefer to leave the railings up, which causes the water to flow around and wash out the approaches. This happened in January. Here we go again.

This is by my studio and workshop.

Later in the afternoon I went walking with another neighbor to survey the ongoing excitement and damages. This usually dry drainage was roaring over the road by her house, so we went another direction.

Same drainage, farther down, closer to the river.

Looking upstream from the Dinely Bridge.

Looking downstream on the Dinely Bridge.

No, really, LOOK AT THIS!!

Pretty little drainage coming off Edison Road.

In a friend’s yard, where the water is usually a bit of a distance away. Not so today.

This is a spot where lots of people trespass at the river on this little beach. We could hear boulders banging around beneath the current.

Another little drainage along Kaweah River Drive. This is where overflow from the flume occasionally flows.

A yard where the flume flows is very exciting right now.

Well, oops. This is where we turned around. There was a roaring stream across the road. I tested it with a stick, and it was about a foot and a half deep.

Looking upstream at this drainage, wondering where it came from. A man who lived above was out walking and explained that someone built a pond incorrectly, the dam on it broke, and the result is that many people are trapped on the other side.

Walking back, you can see that the water is very close to the road. In the early 2000s, I saw it closer. I was scared then, and I shouted at my neighbor who was driving, “GO FORWARD, GO BACK, OR LET ME OUT, BUT DON’T JUST STOP HERE!”

What’s this??

Mandatory evacuations.

This is the view upcanyon from the Remorial Building. I said “Remorial” because another neighbor thought that was the correct pronunciation when she was a child. She is getting married in 21 days, but we still pronounce it that way.

A sheriff was going through the neighborhood around 7 p.m. last night to tell us about evacuation orders. But Trail Guy met him at the bottom of the driveway and said no, we aren’t going anywhere. The sheriff gathered our name, phone numbers, address, and went on his way. Our house was built before the ’55 flood, so we feel fine.

Painting my Obsession

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I thought this painting was finished and was about to scan it when I realized it was missing something important.

Snow covered mountains in the distance! White is the slowest color to dry, so it will be a week or two before this one is ready to scan.

This one needs definition in the distant groves and detail in the foreground branches. 

I am just making stuff up now. As long as it is believable, it’ll do.

This will take awhile, lots of painting sessions to try this, that, and something else.

Saturday night, remember to spring your clocks forward because Daylight Saving Time begins. It isn’t saving any daylight, merely shoving it an hour later so that mornings are dark again. There is talk of making it permanent, but those who think that is a good idea aren’t thinking ahead to waiting until 8 a.m. to see any daylight in the fall and winter months. I say leave the time right where it belongs and quit jerking us around.

So there.



Decisions to Get Ready for a Show

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“Locals“, is hung now at Exeter’s Courthouse Gallery, now called CACHE. I hadn’t planned to enter, because I have never lived in Exeter. But then I learned that having my studio in Exeter for 9 years was qualification enough.

Because I had a solo show at the end of 2021 and then participated in a group show in 2022, I chose pieces that the likely audience won’t have seen yet.

Two of the five pieces are pencil, only shown to you and to my drawing students. I dug around through existing unsold pencil pieces to find mats and frames that might work and found two, so I unframed the old drawings. One of the new drawings needed to have its boundaries extended to better fit in the mat. Then, I put the newer drawings in those mats and frames, a tedious task.

In thinking about three oil paintings to enter, I decided to use one of the new orange grove paintings, one of Sawtooth (the view that was so very popular in my 2021 solo show), and a new painting of a new subject (shown to you in an earlier post). 

This photo (2 taped together) was taken through my windshield on one of those fabulous clear days. It is shown here at an angle because otherwise it is too shiny to see here.

This got painted on a 6×18″ in spite of being proportioned differently from the photo, because I just cropped off the bulk of the sky. It was easy to paint, because the mountains are the same as on most of those orange grove scenes.

I considered the title “Heading East on 198”.

Then I reconsidered.

Locals is at 125 So. B Street in Exeter, Saturdays and Sundays, 11-4, until April 23, 2023. OPENING RECEPTION—MARCH 26, 2-4 PM (Yes, I know it opens prior to the reception.)

Sold in January and February

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Sales were slow in those two months.

 I expected to have had completed several murals by now. Instead, there are endless delays on the big Catholic church murals, my proposal on another mural was not chosen, yet another mural sounded all urgent back in August but the “customer” doesn’t return calls, and a public office which chose my art for its new building had a change in management so everything is on stand-by.

I also expected to have sold a piece or two in a show called Tulare County: Varied Impressions. Only one piece sold in the entire show, and it wasn’t mine. Bummer. Maybe I should have gone to the reception. . . nah.

Self-employment as an artist is easier after a few years of seeing patterns of sales and understanding that conversation is simply conversation until money exchanges hands.

These sold*:

(This one is in acrylic, on a large wooden panel.)

*Sold includes one given as a gift, and 3 on layaway at Kaweah Arts.

Finishing a Plein Air Drawing

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Plein air means “on location”. Last summer I sat by the stream in Mineral King with a set of 12 colored pencils to see if I could complete a drawing on location.

Not a chance. 

My friend Carrie Lewis posted the project on her blog, and recently someone asked if I would complete the drawing.

Since nothing is pressing right now, I decided to finish the drawing in the studio, but this time using the entire set of 120 colored pencils (Polychromos by Faber Castell)

I’ll just show you the photo, then all seven progressive scans, minus any jibber jabber. (But you can ask me questions in the comments, if you want to know anything specific about the process.)

I am finished and the drawing is done. (Did you know that people aren’t supposed to be “done”?)

This is Vandever, the right half of Farewell Gap in Mineral King, as seen by the Honeymoon Cabin from the gnarly juniper.

Make me an offer! The highest bidder (if not too insulting) before March 31 will be considered. The unframed drawing is approximately 6×8″.

 

Where are the Orange Groves?

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Where are the orange groves? They are in other paintings, eight other ones, to be exact.

This is a grove of oak and sycamore trees, at the Kaweah Oaks Preserve, working from a photo taken through my windshield. Don’t be alarmed; there was no traffic either in front or behind. I didn’t take the time to compose the photo carefully, just went click click click and then patched things together later on Photoshop Junior to get something paintable.

I flipped things to get the mountains more accurate.

That’ll do. Now the trees.

I thought you might like to see my palette; all the colors used here are mixed from white, 2 yellows, 2 reds, and 2 blues. 

Here is the left hand side as the detail begins to appear in the distant trees.

Mostly working left to right.

I didn’t save my crummy photos on the computer so that I can show it to you. After I had the prints made (it is 2 8×10″ taped together), I deleted them. There are too many photos on my computer, so I have to be very vigilant about deletion.

Finished! Too wet to scan, so I laid it on the floor to photograph it without shadows or wet paint glare.

Now, back to the orange groves. . .

Quick Day, Quick Draw

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The very fastest days are the ones spent in my studio, drawing with pencils, listening to podcasts. It took me about 2 hours to do this drawing. . .

NOT!* Just felt like it because there were so many interesting podcasts to listen to. And, because I love to draw. (have I ever told you that before?)

We will miss our UPS driver when he retires. And we will probably learn to really like the new one. 

*A long time ago I had jobs where I would work the entire day, then look at my watch and see it was only 9:30 in the morning.

Pencil Commission

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Has anyone ever had an unpleasant UPS driver? I think they must all be screened by personality before getting hired. If they are high energy, extroverted, optimistic, friendly, and have a good sense of humor along with a great memory, then they are candidates to drive those big brown trucks.

My UPS driver will retire soon, and he likes my art. He knows about my art because our buildings have murals on them, he delivers supplies to me, and I often greet him with a paintbrush in each hand.

He has the privilege of delivering to Sequoia National Park, and has taken some fun pictures of his truck surrounded by beautiful scenery. He wants a pencil drawing of his truck in one of these scenes, and has been sharing ideas with me for a few months. 

Recently, we figured out the best combination of brown truck with Sequoia scenery. Because the photos he shared with me belong to him, and because I don’t know the rules of a huge company like UPS, I will only show you my beginning sketches.

This is okay, but could be better. Trail Guy and I discussed the possibilities, because he actually has a very good sense of composition. (And zero desire to learn to draw or paint, so don’t even suggest that to him). We agreed on a solution.

Mr. UPS is good with either idea, but this one is definitely the winner.

He has no deadline, but it is nice to draw in my studio with reliable heat so I dove in quickly. Stay tuned. . .