Dutch iris are my favorite domestic flowers. I’ve painted them multiple times through the years.
Recently, I pulled one out of Kaweah Arts because I thought of a way to make it better. After sprucing it up, I thought you might appreciate seeing all the changes on this painting through the years.
First time
Better
Repaired and scanned:
Repaired, scanned, and fixed on the laptop to look like the actual painting:
Phooey, I think I need to replace the scanner.
Meanwhile, the painting is now looking most totally excellent (because they always looks better in person than on screens) and can be yours for $75 (plus tax if you are in California and shipping.)
This collage in pencil is of several Visalia landmarks.
The other day I had to go to Visalia (AKA Big Town) for the morning. In the afternoon, there were pressing responsibilities on the computer (scan some things, email them to folks who had requested such things, try a few more adaptations to the cover of the book I am working on (as editor and designer, not as author), and finally, I went out to paint.
Why? It was kind of cold out there, maybe 50°. That should be no excuse. I went out to paint, because incomplete paintings don’t sell. I had been studying my photos of Three Rivers the previous evening, thinking about sales, thinking about what I haven’t painted in awhile, and thinking about the local businesses who sell my paintings. There are a few new things I want to try.
No, it wasn’t as cold as this but I thought you might enjoy this pencil drawing of the Pear Lake Ski Hut.
Try? Yeah, as in “can I do a good job?” and “will this sell?”
Most of my current customers are visitors, travelers passing through Three Rivers. They want something indicative of their visit, preferably on the lower end of the price spectrum, small enough to fit into luggage and small enough to not skew their home decor.
Enough bloviating.
First I looked at the unfinished pieces.
While briefly considering what was necessary for completion, I felt a cold breeze on the back of my neck and realized I didn’t want to sit there while concentrating on details.
Instead, I chose to do something quick. Some things quick. Some quick things.
Never mind.
Choosing the photos, choosing the sizes, digging the canvases out of the supply shelves, assigning inventory numbers, attaching hanging hardware, and slapping on a first thin layer.
OUTTA HERE! Back to the house by the woodstove. THANK YOU, TRAIL GUY for keeping the home fires burning.
You may have noticed that I have been lollygagging quite a bit this year. I remember my dad describing himself as “semi-retired” when he was the age I am now. I think that is beginning to describe me. Go for a walk, hang out with some friends, organize some stuff, do a freebie job at church, organize some more stuff, do some errands… What? me work? maybe later… I’m busy.
However, due to the diligence of Stem & Stone along with Kaweah Arts, and a long-time reputation, there have been a few sales in the last several months. These are the ones I have remembered to keep track of.
This is probably the last time I will paint the Kaweah Post Office. It has been closed for several years, and it took several years for this painting to find a buyer.
I think these are the Sequoia Giganteas that was sold by Stem & Stone. If I forget to ask the seller for the inventory number, then I get confused as to which trees have sold. These 3 were actually very small: 4×12”, but I can’t make them proportionately small here on the blog.
I showed you these two while they were in progress. The first was 6×18”, painted for general inventory and the other 12×36”, a commission. I did the first as an experiment to see how it would work; the second one has more details as requested by the customer.
I don’t remember the circumstances of the sale of this one, titled Hiking Mineral King.
This 6×12″ was fun. I titled it Big Tree, Little Cow.
A newish cabin owner in Wilsonia discovered my book The Cabins of Wilsonia and was thrilled to find that the original drawing of her cabin was still available.
Then she discovered my website and found another pencil drawing to go with her cabin.
These sold last fall but I haven’t done a Sold post since last summer.
I thought that nothing was selling except notecards, but I was wrong. Maybe I should go back to the easels and stop with the lollygagging around. I can always put down my brushes and head out to pull weeds or take a walk or read a book (THANK YOU, READER/FRIEND LAURIE FOR ALL THE BOOK SUGGESTIONS!) while the paint is drying.
When one of my drawing students or I finish a drawing, we often like to get it reproduced as prints, notecards, for a business card or a brochure, in a portfolio of work. . . so many potential uses!
Back in the olden days, pencil was very difficult to reproduce either on a copy machine or a printing press. Now we have computers, which everyone knows can solve all the world’s problems.
Fall down laughing.
Now, with a scanner and Photoshop Elements (AKA Photoshop Jr.), I am able to prepare pencil drawings for reproduction. (This is a service I provide free of charge for my drawing students but I do charge customers because it can be a somewhat lengthy process.)
BEFORE
AFTER
Prolly time to buy a new scanner because mine is adding colors that do not belong. Ugh, shopping for tech products: the scanner quit working when I updated my laptop in 2017 (to a 2015 model), so I have to keep my old laptop in order to use it. The pieces and products and devices continue to multiply.
P.S. THANK YOU, LOU, FOR ALLOWING ME TO SHOW OFF YOUR FANTASTIC PENCIL DRAWING OF MORO ROCK IN SEQUOIA NATIONAL PARK!
I looked at this painting and decided it could wait.
Instead, I decided to work on the marmot.
And then the deer.
Finally, I wanted to do something easy, so I put the first layer on these three paintings.
I’d call that a productive-enough day!
P.S. Probably shouldn’t have signed the marmot. His nose is weird. I didn’t sign the deer because his face is a little weird too. Probably should just stick to scenery and architecture.
Here is the afternoon’s painting session after a morning of exploring around Lake Kaweah. I’m easing into the production of Mineral King paintings, with the workshop doors open to the greenery, flowers, cats, and sounds of leaf blowers, chain saws, a distant donkey, and the occasional vehicle. March is a month full of distractions and temptations to lollygag. However, summer is coming and incomplete paintings will not sell.
It is efficient to paint the same scenes at the same time since the colors are mixed on the palette. Because this is the most popular scene to sell at Silver City, I paint it in multiple sizes and shapes, and at different times of day and in different parts of the summer season.
I was pleased to be able to finish these—see the signatures? The previous painting session did not yield anything that was ready to be signed. If I can get those 3 plus 2 from an earlier session detailed and signed, then I’ll be over halfway to completing the ten paintings.
Why ten? With the ones that remain from last year, this is a total of about 15 paintings. Silver City Store sells anywhere from ten to twenty paintings for me each summer. I don’t want to have too much inventory left at the end of summer. So I keep track as paintings sell, then paint more of the popular subjects that have sold out.
It’s all a guessing game, supplemented with a little bit of intuition and experience. That’s the business of art.
In case you have forgotten:
I use pencils, oil paint, and murals to make art that you can understand of places and things you love for prices that won’t scare you.
This pencil drawing was done from several photos taken in the campground Sequoia RV Ranch up North Fork Drive in Three Rivers. Like the other drawings used in the 2026 calendar, the original is on a piece of 11×14” archival paper. It is for sale. $375 (plus tax if you live in California) or make me an offer, because sometimes I get tired of being businesslike and think the drawings are better on someone’s wall than in my flat files.
“Buckling down” is a weird expression. It reminds me of sayings such as “nose to the grindstone”, “shoulder to the wheel”, “eye on the ball”. . . How can a person accomplish anything in that awkward pose?
It was a beautiful early spring day (Yeppers, February is spring in Three Rivers).
Tucker wanted me to stay outside with him.
After a fair amount of procrastination (all productive, of course), I finally moved myself into the painting workshop (the open door to the right of the studio, which appears to be leaning, but that was actually me who was leaning.)
Because these are so small (3×9”), I did my best to make them as realistic as possible without spending endless hours trying to copy the exact look of each flower. We’ll price them at $75 each and see what happens.
Then I finally returned to the Mineral King scenes that need to be completed by Memorial Weekend. I tried to be a bit looser than normal, and after I finish all 10 paintings, it will be interesting to see if I go back and tighten up the detail.
These three topics are rattling around in my skull.
ONE
It rained and hailed rather ferociously while I was painting that indoor oak tree at my church; two days later I took this photo. Check out the first daffodils in bloom, in spite of the recent heavy cold storm.
TWO
The elephant was buried in snow. “Elephant?” That’s the shape that appears on Alta Peak after a snowstorm.
THREE
Stem & Stone* asked if I had any poppy and lupine paintings hanging around for sale. Nope. We discussed sizes and prices, with Stem & Stone suggesting something similar to the popular size 6×18” sequoia paintings. I countered with the fact that sequoia trees are more popular than poppies, thinking that $195 might seem steep for someone here visiting for the purpose of seeing sequoia trees. Stem & Stone suggested a smaller size but the same proportions. I found 2 small canvases in my supplies that fit the bill, both 3×9”. This gave me pause, but I agreed to try.
The cause for my pause is that very small paintings require holding it in my hand while painting and require tighter control, taking a disproportionate amount of time to paint. If I price by size, which is how the buying public makes sense of pricing, after Stem & Stone takes its agreed upon and fair bite out of the price, I am essentially working for less than minimum wage.
I speculated that is the reason many artists choose to paint loose and fast. I could try that method, but then the people who know my work would wonder if I’d been dropped on my head, had tried to paint left-handed, or lost my reading glasses.
Sigh. Sometimes it is really hard to be a professional artist.
HOWEVER, I did a rough sketch for Stem & Stone to see if it fit the vision.
*Stem & Stone is owned by a dear friend whose retail judgement I trust completely.
The fourth and final day’s plan was to complete leaves and add birds. So, that’s what I did, very systematically, working from right to left. Yes, that’s backward, but I chose that direction because it involved less couch moving.
After studying real oak trees for awhile, I thought I could be more realistic about the leaves than the previous days brush-tapping style. Nope. Never mind. Fast horse viewing might be a little inconvenient inside a room, but that’s what the leaves will require to be believable.
I had to move the couch to reach the left side. No big deal, because it scooted very easily on the waxed floor of hideous old linoleum squares. (I wonder how long before we view fake wood-look linoleum as hideous.)
After the leaves came the big challenge, which was the gravy on top, or maybe the cherry on top, or maybe just dessert: details, drawn with my paintbrushes, using colors other than greens and browns.
That was so fun that I did it again.
And a third time! Look, I even signed it. Not big, not my normal way. This is my church, not an advertisement for the public.
There’s the whole thing before the furniture got put back in place.
With the furniture back in place, we have an inviting gathering place in a room that used to be kind of institutional and quite junky. (Pay no attention to the institutional table and the upside down table in the center of the rug.)
And try to disregard the 1970s bentwood rocker with the grody-looking upholstery. (This is a church without any money, so everything has been donated, which contributes to the decorating style that is a blend of Shabby Chic and Early Garage.)
Here is a view that is fairly inviting. And that blue jay won’t poop on your head even if you sit on the couch.
I’m wishing I’d saved some of the Before photos from two years ago so you could fully appreciate the long road of decisions, negotiations, and hard work that led to this current situation.
