With a good contact in Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks, and success with the Sequoia sets of cards, together we chose scenes for Kings Canyon.
There were probably 5 drawings, but I can only find these 4 samples. You can see that I finally got comfortable drawing the textures of landscaping.
After publishing the notecard set of Backcountry Structures of Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks, I moved into the front country of the park. That’s where most of the people visit, and now I had connections in the organization that stocked the ranger stations and visitor centers in the parks.
I didn’t save any labels, so I don’t know if this is when I switched to 4 cards per package instead of 5, or if I lost a sample card along the way. I remember taking the photos for these drawings, because my niece went with me. There was a long line for photos in front of the General Sherman Tree, so Ashley and I got in line. When it was our turn, she went up to the tree and then laid on the ground behind the sign so I could take a photo without any people in it. The other visitors were quite puzzled by this, but I was thrilled by Ashley’s innovative solution. I think I actually drew her into the picture of the Four Guardsmen, but now I can’t see details that small.
To be continued. . .
Confidence grew with each set of cards I drew, printed, and sold. Tulare County was too small – look out California, because the Central California artist is heading your way!!
In the 4th grade, we studied the 21 California missions, which were built in the 1700s and 1800s by Franciscan priest, Junipero Serra. Even back then I loved old buildings.
I chose 5 of the 21, with some sort of logic that I can no longer remember. There are 2 missing pictures here – San Juan Bautista, and the one near Oceanside, whose name I have forgotten.
This California mission idea was suggested by a friend, and although my inner cautionary voice told me not to do it, I ignored that intuition, dismissing it as pessimism.
Should have listened.
I printed the largest quantity yet, and went to my regular outlets, which bought them in small cautionary quantities. Next, I hit the road with my best friend to sell these. Alas, none of the 5 missions wanted them because they only cared about their own place. I wasn’t willing to break up the sets, and it was crazy hard to find gift shops in towns where I knew no one. I tried Harris Ranch, a huge tourist place along Interstate 5, smack dab in the middle of the state. It took many phone calls, several appointments, lots of free samples, and finally I realized that this was not profitable, because in addition to the distance, their gift shop buyers quit every few months.
I finally consented to selling the cards individually to some of the missions, had one very nice gift shop in Carmel who wanted the variety pack, and kept selling tiny quantities to the local stores.
Eventually I got real, and gave all the remaining cards to every fourth grade teacher I knew.
The lesson there was to listen to that inner cautionary voice and not dismiss it. Although one might not be able to articulate why something doesn’t feel right, there are usually solid reasons behind the reluctance, even if it is only manifested as hidden sense inside the intuition.
At least Judy and I had a great time on our road trip.
In 1993, Trail Guy went from being seasonal Maintenance Guy to Road Guy, a fulltime job with Sequoia National Park. This meant I could really focus on my art, since he had a better income. A friend invited me to move my studio into her gift shop in Exeter, and I was ON MY WAY!!! To where?? I didn’t know, but I was going, so there.
The friend was instrumental in teaching me about selling, marketing, display, professionalism, and even how to dress better. I will be eternally grateful to her for her tutelage.
My next notecard set was Backcountry Structures in Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks. I had been to most of the cabins but didn’t have photos of them all. The Park’s “History Boys” were helpful in providing pictures and information about these charming little cabins in remote locations, and excited that I had chosen this subject for drawings and cards.
You can see that my focus remained on architectural subjects, and the textures and shapes of nature were just too hard. I did my best, but yikes. To save some pride, here are my recent drawings of two of these cabins. They were on the blog in December, but here they are again.
More next week on pencil reminiscing. . .
After my booming (in my own little mind) success with the original set of notecards for Tulare County, Mineral King, and Visalia landmarks, I moved on. My memory is fuzzy about which card sets came next, and at what point I quit my job in the print shop. I worked from our little house in Lemon Cove and supplemented my income with a summer job baking at the Silver City Store, helping out at a friend’s Exeter gift shop for Christmas, and filling in at the printer when they had need.
The ideas continued to flow. Now it was time for Tulare County Landmarks II, which moved into other towns of the county.
Since this set included Lindsay, Tulare, Porterville, and Exeter, I found stores in all those little towns to sell the cards. I may have spent as much in gas expenses to drive around calling on the stores as my profits.
(The little circles are holes; these cards were samples for customers to see what was in the variety packages.)
To be continued. . .
It was thrilling to see my art come off a printing press as notecards. It was exciting to sell them to stores, and the ideas started piling in.
After Tulare County Landmarks and Mineral King Scenes, it was time to move to the city: Visalia Landmarks was hugely popular in the stores, which are now all closed.
I just trotted all over Visalia with my camera, taking photos without giving it a second thought, never asking permission, just excited to be out gathering new material for pencil drawings to be turned into little packages of notecards. It was fun to think of what to draw, fun to photograph it, fun to learn about and write up a description for the back, fun to be on my own figuring out how to do these things.
This was all done in the days of film cameras with its accompanying wait for the pictures to be developed. During that era, the magical and mysterious fax machine appeared, and we had no idea of email, cell phones, digital photography, the internet with all its huge changes to our lives. Pencils (and erasers) were all I needed.
This could also be called “Notecard Reminiscing” or even “Back in the Olden Days”.
Back in the olden days, I worked in a print shop and drew in pencil. Pencil drawings of Tulare County landmarks printed on notecards were my “side hustle”, now the cool way to refer to a second job. It was a hobby to make money, a business that I hoped would outpace my real job.
Because I have always been a note and letter writer, finding stationery and cards with local art was what I looked for any time I traveled. It came to my attention that there weren’t any for Tulare County in spite of the fact that we have Sequoia National Park, and that we feed the world. From my viewpoint in Ivanhoe, then Visalia, and eventually Lemon Cove, it seemed that we had subjects that were good enough to be proud of and drawn. At that time I was only capable of drawing architectural subjects, so that is all I thought of. (Looking back at my work, I’d now say I was barely capable of such things, but growth is good, unless you are a tumor.)
This was back in 1987, and I knew nothing about branding oneself (yikes, as if we are cattle?) or marketing. I loved to draw, and felt lucky to be able to work in a print shop and know people who helped me figure out how to make my idea happen, along with people who owned shops that wanted to sell my merchandise.
There was a distant foggy hope that someday I could be self-employed as an artist, but that was far off in the future, along with having a real studio, owning a home, and being old like a real grown up.
To be continued. . .
This painting is still on the easel, waiting for more visual information so I can properly detail the distant hills and mountains.
Trail Guy and I went driving around, looking for the spot where the original photo was taken. We couldn’t figure it out, but found several that were close.
Although we didn’t find the same view (I was elevated above the grove – where was this??), I now have some helpful details and a whole bunch of new photos from which to work.
Last week before the rain, the air was very clear. I had to work on Saturday, so in spite of having stuff to do in order to prepare for First Saturday, Trail Guy and I drove down to Lake Kaweah to enjoy the morning. This isn’t something I have done many paintings of; I’m not convinced anyone else will appreciate it, especially from the unfamiliar viewpoints of walking along the river in the lake bottom.
You can decide for yourselves if any of these views would appeal to people.
If I were a hobbyist, I could just paint what I want. I am a professional artist, so figuring out what my customer base is interested in is just part of the business of art.
A bunch of years ago some people in Three Rivers decided to try something new – First Saturday. Anyone who wanted to participate could do something special on that day, and the combined efforts of the participants would bring visitors to town.
Artists opened their studios. Artists came from other places and found businesses to show their work. Artists gathered at the Arts Center to show their work.
I did this a few times but not often. Lots of other things were happening on those first Saturdays kept me out of it, and there were other reasons, most of them boring.
Nikki, weaver extraordinaire, has participated almost continually and urged me to join. So, I will tomorrow, at her urging, along with a few others. Being available to the buying public is an important element of the business of art. (Duh.)
It might rain. It rained the last time I participated, and even as the “featured artist” with the appropriate theme of Wildflowers, attendance was very very low. (Friends stepped in for me so I could attend my uncle’s memorial service that very day, but the visitors didn’t know that would be the case.) I’ll be there this year, rain or no rain – no uncles left.
The way it works is that you go to the Three Rivers History Museum and get a map. Then you visit the places that sound interesting to you.
Maybe I’ll see you on Saturday. The hours are 11-5.
(Only this little studio will be open, not the painting workshop.)
