If I draw from top to bottom, left to right, it cuts back on the opportunities for smearing. The background hills are very forgiving, a good place to begin this commissioned pencil drawing of a very fine house in a serene setting.
Pencil Progress
Back to the Drawing Board
I love to draw, and it is good to just sit quietly with pencils and paper, doing something simple that has no sadness attached.
In December, I took photos of a house. It took 2 sessions, much conversation, lots of thinking, and finally narrowing it down to 3 views.
Something about my blog has changed, forcing all photos into a square format; I don’t know why it changed and can’t figure out how to fix it. So, these photos are cropped here in spite of being rectangles on my camera and computer—more evidence of “upgrade” as a euphemism for “complication”.
The customers chose Option B. Tomorrow I’ll show you the beginnings of the drawing.
Finished
A little unfinished business here on The Blog: finished pieces you haven’t yet seen in their official photographic documented form.
Drawing Lessons
Drawing in pencil is my favorite thing. My second favorite part of my business might be helping other people draw in pencil. One afternoon a week, I teach 5 small groups of people for one hour per group. Each participant works on his own drawing at his own pace. Her own drawing at her own pace. (Nope, I will NOT use the plural “their” when discussing the singular participant.)
My students are FABULOUS people. Each one has his own reasons for attending, her own goals for lessons; I enjoy each individual and the unique blend of each group.
There is a mix of ages (6th grade is the youngest I accept) and a mix of skill levels. Have a look at some of the recent work.
Today’s featured oil painting at Anne Lang’s Emporium:
I CANNOT Attend
This time of year is all about events. All the events are about raising money. That seems to be the normal reason for a party/dinner/anything in Tulare County. Everybody needs money. The causes are endless, and they are all good.
The latest event that I am involved in is an auction at the Courthouse Gallery in Exeter. “Involved” means I support the gallery and donate to their auction each year. This year I have given them this drawing.
I don’t normally give away original art, but the Courthouse Gallery is special. They provide a fabulous place for me to teach drawing lessons and have done so since January of 2002.
HOWEVER, I CANNOT attend auctions where my work is for sale. The stress is too much for my little sensitive self. What is no one bids? What if no one likes it? What if a board member of the gallery has to buy it and donate it back because no one wanted it? What if it only sells for $10? (The price on this original pencil drawing of Sequoias, professionally framed and matted, approximately 11×14″, is $350.)
You can go to the auction. It is a fun afternoon/evening, whatever it is called at this time of day. They always have good hors d’oeuvres and wine (so I’m told).
P.S. I don’t know why my name isn’t on the flyer. Maybe they know I am too chicken to attend. Maybe they weren’t sure I would donate something. Maybe they don’t know how much I appreciate them. But don’t let this little oversight stop you from attending!
Today’s Anne Lang’s Emporium featured painting
Making a Cabin Scene
Happy Birthday, Shirley!!
Making a cabin scene is different from just making a scene.
A cabin owner requested a painting of her cabin as a gift for her husband. (He only looks at the blog when it is about Mineral King AND she forwards the link to him, so I’m not ruining any surprises here.) She wants it to include a view that normally doesn’t show with the cabin, and requested a square format.
Because this is a little difficult, all this mind-reading, designing, and putting together things that aren’t normally together, I didn’t make a scene but began with sketches.
She asked for square, so I showed her two squares plus a 6×18″ and this cabin painting; she agreed with me about this size and shape working well for her idea.
I thought I was out of this size of canvas, so I ordered some more. After they arrived and I was putting them away, I saw that I already had some that size. Someone around here could use an assistant, or perhaps a better administrator. Oh well. . . they won’t go to waste.
They all start ugly. No need to be afraid for me or the painting or the customer or the husband. No one will need to make a scene. (But wait! Is this creative??)
A risk of this sort of photo-combining is that the 2 photos might have the light coming from 2 different sources. Would the customer or the viewer notice? I might be able to cheat, but it might bug me forever. So I began reworking the color on the mountains, because it is easier than figuring out how the cabin shadows could be reversed. I pushed more paint around until my fingers got cold and my efforts felt ineffective. This is far enough for now.
Realizing the problem of conflicting light sources almost caused me to make a scene, but that would have only served to upset Tucker and Scout.
Finishing a Drawing 20 Years Later
In 1998, Jane Coughran and I published The Cabins of Mineral King*. Some of the drawings crossed over the center seam of the book to cover 2 pages. Some of the drawings were an odd shape to accommodate words.
This is one of those drawings (only photographed, not scanned and touched up for the web, so the background looks gray instead of white):
A member of this cabin family asked me if there were any drawings of the cabin remaining. I remembered this very large drawing with its odd shape. He and I looked at it together to see if it could be completed, and how he’d like it to be completed.
This is the result of that conversation. Highly satisfying! (but that little rude voice asks, “Yes, but is it creative?”)
*The only way to get a copy of The Cabins of Mineral King is to get lucky on Amazon or eBay. Good luck!
A Sore Subject
A drawing student of mine recounted a conversation she had with an elderly artist from here in Tulare County. She told him she was taking oil painting lessons from someone in the area, and the old artist said, “That’s not creative – that’s just copying”.
Ow. That struck a nerve with me. What is or is not “CREATIVE”?
To be clear, it was not the words of my student that caused me to say, “Ow”. It is the subject matter that causes me insecurity and doubt. My drawing student is a lovely person; by reporting this interchange, she opened up an opportunity to discuss it and examine why it is a difficult topic.
I draw from photos, almost 100% my own, and way more often than I like, I have to combine photos to CREATE the scene I’m looking for.
I also teach people to draw, by COPYING photos.
How else can they learn to see?
How can you be CREATIVE with graphite if you don’t know how to see proportions, understand values, drive a pencil in a manner that it is an extension of your hand?
How can you be CREATIVE with oil paint if you don’t know how to see proportions, understand values, mix colors, or drive a paintbrush in a manner that is an extension of your hand?
How is it not CREATIVE to take a color photo (or several) and make a picture look beautiful and interesting in black and white and shades of gray?
Sorry, Elderly Artist. I think you are nice and usually a friendly man, you mean well, and you paint prolifically. Your work may be CREATIVE, but personally speaking (which is the only way I can speak), I think your work is just weird.
So there.
P.S. This topic is reminiscent of the ongoing conflict between studio artists and those who paint plein air. I imagine there is a similar situation between those who read music and those who play by ear. IT IS ALL VALID, PEOPLE, ALL OF IT!
Final Final Cabin Thoughts, Maybe
There are three distinct parts to cabin-ness:
- The building itself – small, rustic, basic, simple, often without electronic amenities. (But wait! What about the cabin pictured above?)
- The setting – rural, semi-secluded, in the mountains, taking an effort to get to (But wait! Have you ever been up Highway 180 to Wilsonia? And do these cabins look semi-secluded to you?)
A Wilsonia road 
A Wilsonia neighborhood - The culture – slower, focused on people instead of technology; a place to play, recreate and relax, mostly outside; a place where meals and fireplaces become events in and of themselves; returning to nostalgic pastimes either of our youth or of some idealized youth of our parents and grandparents.
It seems that the culture part is the strongest determining factor of cabin life. Some of our cabin neighbors gathered in another location for several summers, due to illness of one of their group. One of them told me, “We do Mineral King things in Seattle, and Mineral King is present with us there.” (I probably paraphrased it beyond all recognition – Forgive me, Sawtooth Six!)
P.S. Most of the drawings in this post are part of the book The Cabins of Wilsonia, available here.
A Few More Cabin Thoughts
The posts called Cabin Thoughts (Part One, Part Two, and Part Three), were popular among my readers, generating conversations through comments, email, snail mail, and in person. Now that our cabin is closed for the season, I’d like to share a few more thoughts.
A dear friend of many years, Natalie, sent these thoughts, titled “What a Cabin Means to Me”. (Nat, I did a tiny bit of editing – hope it clarifies rather than changes your intent.)
- Secluded from the general public and hard to get to
- In the mountains
- Small and rustic, having only basic amenities, and no room for isolation.
- Not a second home, but more of a make-do-and-relax kind of place where there is no television or phone service. A place where you interact with family and friends by sharing meals, playing cards and other games, sitting by a fire, hiking, and just cherishing the quietness of the outdoors.
Once again, mountains, small, rustic, games, firesides, food, outdoors, friends and family appear. I think Natalie’s ideal cabin would separate her family from outside influences, causing togetherness among themselves. This is a theme I found multiple times. . . a desire to unplug and simplify in order to focus on the ones who are most precious.
Our Mineral King cabin is definitely a cabin but varies from Natalie’s thorough and excellent definition in several ways.
- It isn’t hard to get to if you don’t mind the poor road, and it is highly visible if you hike a popular trail. (This is the World Wide Web, so I am being vague on purpose.)
- It is a second home to us, but not in the sense of a home with all the luxuries you may be accustomed to (our first home is purposely lacking a dishwasher, microwave, garbage disposal and heated towel racks, and we’re just fine, but thanks for your concern).
- The cabin no longer has a telephone; we tell people to leave a message on the answering machine at home, and we use the cabin neighbor’s phone to check messages. (This makes up for 36 years of cabin neighbors using our phone.)
- Neither one of us likes to play games; in the evenings we listen to the radio, Trail Guy reads out-of-date newspapers that friends bring up to him, I read library books and knit.
There is no single definition of “cabin”, but there is a feel to a place that makes it a cabin. I will share a few more ideas about it tomorrow. Then, maybe I will be finished with this topic. (No promises, because after all, my business is called Cabin Art.)