More Painting to Country Music

Same playlist as before. Same poor singing (on my part). Same kind of day racing by*. New paintings.

I was feeling kind of proud of this one until two different people who saw it asked if it was wildfire. 

I hate HATE HATE wildfire. (Am I being unclear here?)

After studying it, I added some blue to the bottom of the sunset-colored clouds and subdued the clouds a bit.

I relayered the distant hills, relayered the greenery, and then started all those rocks.

This will look better when you see it in person. It is intended for a show in 2024, so I may relayer everything several more times. 

Then I painted some oranges for Exeter’s Mural Gallery.

Finally, I began a painting of my friend Ed’s buffalo herd in Missour-uh, as he pronounces his state. This one is for a show at CACHE in October, as is the painting of the three cattle you saw last week.

I wonder if rock music would cause me to paint faster? 

Nah. Probably not a good idea to listen to things that I find irritating. (But I do love LIttle River Band—has anyone borrowed my CD and not returned it? —and like Toto, Kansas [or maybe it was Boston] and Don Henley.)

*How can all those sad country songs make me feel so happy? Because the music is wonderful!

More Little Painting on Another Big Painting

 

If you have been reading my blog for the past 2 months, you have noticed that I haven’t been doing much in the way of artwork. Something just went silent, not “artist’s block” because I never run out of ideas. What was it? Two things: spring was so beautiful that all I wanted to do was work in the yard, and sales have dropped significantly so I didn’t want to keep building up inventory. (Too much stuff stresses me out, whether it is possessions, noise, items on a calendar, or people at a gathering; please forgive me for referring to people as “stuff”.)

After working on the Yokohl Oak painting, I worked a bit more on the big painting that I was hoping to someday hang in my dining area. It was just sitting quietly on the easel next to the oak tree, patiently waiting for some attention. The heat wasn’t too bad, I had an interesting podcast to listen to, and I had just killed a mosquito. (There is always one.) Why not keep painting?

It felt a little bit too hard, but my experience tells me that putting brush to canvas is the best way to overcome the feeling of inadequacy. So I dabbed a bit at those upper marks to turn them into oranges.

I couldn’t find a paintbrush that would cooperate. All the little ones did that annoying thing of gathering lots of paint but not releasing it. So, I moved into less detailed areas, just defining dark and light clumps, and actually counting the trees that appear in the front to match them with the trees in the photo. This is not because I need to be a Xerox machine; it is because in order to understand how things look, I need to actually LOOK at them. (or at a clear photo)

Getting better, but still lots of work ahead.

I am not in a hurry. This is for me, and I can take as long as I want and be as detailed as I desire. (“It’s my painting and I’ll draw if I want to, draw if I want to, draw if. . . “)

Someday this painting of the areas of Tulare County that I find so beautiful will be completed, Lord willing, and my vision don’t expire. (How many clichés can I butcher here?)

If you came here for Mineral King news and are disappointed, you can check the Mineral King website to see if anything new has been posted.

And I Thought I Knew These Mountains

For awhile I had a link in these emails of my daily blog post to take you to the site on the internet so you could see the photos. Now there is some tomfoolery happening with my blog, so I am not putting the link in until it gets sorted out. If you would like to see the pictures, go to jana botkin dot net (written this way to confound the evil robots who are messing things up.)

After figuring out how to get the right third of the mountains correct, I worked my way back across the canvas, using a darkish blue to delineate the parts I could see. I marked the center of the picture be able to gauge my progress.

Wait! Where is Moro Rock?? It didn’t show up well from the top of Rocky Hill, and I forgot to be sure that it appears in the painting. I thought I knew these mountains. Recalibrating. . .

Why didn’t I know that the other 2/3 would be just as confusing?

Just my usual approach—the triumph of hope over experience.

Time to study all the photographs again and make some new sketches. I needed to see the section from Sawtooth north to Castle Rocks, and then the farthest north section from Castle Rocks to Moro Rock. Each photo had different information, and some were just useless. This made it easier, because there were fewer solutions to choose from.

I made the contrast weirdly strong in order to see details, and also put a few lines on some of the photos. Here are just two samples of what I was working from:

 

Sometimes there is a longer distance between Sawtooth and Homer’s Nose, sometimes Sawtooth barely shows, sometimes trees block peaks, and the light is always different, causing changing shadows that make it hard to recognize peaks.

There comes a point when decisions have to be made and paint must be applied. So, suck it up, buttercup, and make some progress here.

I believe these mountains are correctly placed, correctly sized, and accurately shaped. 

The next step could be either to detail the distant mountains or to get all the foothills accurately placed.

Accurately placed from which viewpoint?

I thought I knew these mountains.

 

 

Finding Information (Instead of Woo-woo Inspiration)

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I was procrastinating (and yardening) in order to think. Sometimes procrastination is simply waiting for inspiration. If you are a person of faith, that is a time of waiting for the Lord to show the way through some of life’s more puzzling situations.

One of my puzzling situations was how to paint the mountains accurately on a commissioned oil painting when I didn’t have the right photos. Sure, Part A is in Photo A, Part C is in Photo C, but then Photo B doesn’t match or fit because it was taken from a different location or there is a tree blocking what I need to see.

I can fake mountains and foothills pretty well, but this particular painting is calling for accuracy. Well, actually, Mr. Customer is calling for accuracy in the mountains, and I fully understand and endorse his desire. The point of the painting for him, besides recalling a moment in time, is to be able to see specifically which peak is where. 

I had a good start, but there were some significant difficulties, such as what happens between Castle Rocks and Sawtooth. I could make a few white dabs, but when Mr. Customer and I try to name peaks, our efforts would be stymied by misleading information. (Heaven forbid that we participate in dis and mis information!)

The answer came while having lunch on Rocky Hill.

Let’s crop and enhance it.

Nope, this isn’t the span of mountains I am seeking. It’s in this photo, but those beeves are in the way.

I cropped out the cattle, messed with the exposure so the mountains were very distinct against the sky, and VOILA! (That is French for THIS IS WHAT I WANT AND NEED! Maybe. I don’t speak French.)

Was I seeking inspiration?

Maybe. People who aren’t artists think there is some sort of woo-woo inspiration thing that causes artists to do our thing.

I am more practical. There is beauty everywhere, subjects that would make great paintings, but as a professional, I have to take into account what my customers (and potential customers) want.

So, more than inspiration, I was seeking information, but needed help to find it, and then, right on time, the Lord provided. (If you are not a person of faith, you might credit “the universe”. That’s too woo-woo for me.)

 

 

 

Somewhere North of Tahoe, Completed!

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My drawing students and I have all experienced an odd phenomenon: we can look at a piece of our art and think “DONE”, and then look at a photo of it either on a camera or on a screen, and see everything that isn’t quite right. 

While studying the painting in the photo above, I made a list.

  • fix dark halos around sage
  • sage needs shadows on the ground
  • more splinters and cracks on log
  • better shadow on ground by log
  • shadow by log clump of sage
  • add light stems to sage
  • more gravel by log
  • bump up the ridge so not so straight
  • smooth out clouds on the right (some strong edges need to be softened)
  • tree on right looks unnatural – needs a bit more darks, and make the light parts more consistent
  • Fix 2nd tree on the left. The darks aren’t right – connect them? Add some light on the left side?
  • Finish sage on the bottom left of painting and the bottom right – missing details
  • slightly greener grass in meadow
  • dark patches added to meadow

That’s a long list, but each item is a small maneuver.

While I was engaged in this exercise, the customer emailed to say they are coming to town on the weekend, and no rush, but will it be ready? 

YES, IT WILL!

Have a look as it progressed to completion. These are tiny corrections, so you may not be able to discern the difference between before and after that list of details was finished.

 

This last photo is signed. When it is dry, I will spray varnish it and take the best photo I can. 

I have been communicating with the wife; this place, somewhere north of Tahoe, is special to the husband, who took the reference photos. I wonder if she has been showing him the emailed progression photos.

 

 

Seven More Photos of Progression

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The session began with the commissioned oil painting in an odd size on Masonite board looking like this. 

I planted a tree on the left and indicated where 2 small trees would go next to the larger one.

The distant shrubs got a bit more details. Maybe. Maybe I was just licking the painting with the brush at this point.

The pair of smaller trees has some form now. Trees are growing in the distance on the right side.

Now there are definitely trees with definition on the right side, definitively.

Now I have started cleaning the various greens from my paintbrush by spreading them on the lower shrubs, which I am sure are sagebrush. This place might be similar to Mineral King in elevation, because it shares many characteristics.

Now the meadow has more paint, and the log has more details.

I am starting to really like this painting, which I have decided to call “Somewhere North of Tahoe”. Too bad I didn’t get my donkey in gear earlier this morning or I could have this painting finished now.

 

 

Petite Poultry Paintings

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It was a little too dark for painting well. But these petite poultry paintings could be painted by holding them in my left hand, tilted toward the window for better light while painting. 

I added a second layer to each one.

Then I did my favorite part: drew the details with a tiny paintbrush.

From there, they got moved to the living room in the house with the wood stove for drying. They will look better when scanned (after they dry, of course), because there is that bothersome shine to wet paint which makes photographs look inadequate.

Cluck I, Cluck II, and Cockadoodle-doo, completed!

Odd Job and Phooey

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A woman contacted me via my connection with the Arts Consortium This is Tulare County’s designated arts council, an active and helpful group.

She had a request for a custom oil painting, which on the surface sounded normal. We began discussing via email, and eventually I learned the odd particulars of her job. She has a window in her home which looks out onto the neighbor’s wall, about 1 yard away. The window is a very specific measurement, and she would like a painting to exactly fill the space, 16-3/8 x 29-7/8″.

That is not a standard size. (Bet you already guessed that one.)

The customer, living in a city, has access to many businesses, such as a place that makes custom canvases.

Before she called the company, I remembered that when I first was learning to oil paint, I painted on Masonite, primed with many coats of flat white house paint. Back in 2006, I bought a sheet of 4×8′ Masonite (also called “panel board”), along with a table saw (which I put in the front passenger seat of Fernando*), and then Trail Guy cut the boards to the sizes that I requested. (Nope, I’m not risking my fingers on that machine.)

I looked through my scraps, but none were large enough to cut to size.

So, I took the pick-em-up truck to Vise-grip (AKA Visalia) to buy a sheet of Masonite, hoping I could buy a 1/2 sheet. At the least, I was hoping they’d be able to cut the full sheet into 4 pieces, but just in case they couldn’t, I left Fernando at home. 

Alas, the correct saw at the big box store was broken. So, I bought the giant sheet and some really helpful guy with a really foul mouth helped me load it after he saw me wrestling with it in the parking lot. (He was not an employee: remember this was a big box store, not known for helpfulness).

Trail Guy figured out how to cut it to the exact dimension.


Then, when he was figuring out where to store the excess, HE FOUND A SCRAP FROM BEFORE THAT WAS BIG ENOUGH!!

Phooey. 

*Fernando is my ’96 Honda Accord coupe. “Coupe” means two doors. You’re welcome. I try to expand people’s vocabularies here.

Whooping it up on the Canvases

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The customer told me which mountains she wishes to see in her 11×14″ painting. So I started.

Sky, mountains, foothills, indication of distant groves, indication of closer groves. Then, it was too wet to continue. This might be an excuse; sometimes when painting these scenes, I hit a place of thinking it is too hard and that I can’t do it. (pathetic, no?)

So, time to move to the 18×36″ painting.

Working on a new sky layer gives me an opportunity to think about what I want to do here.

I think I want some overhanging branches, loaded with oranges. This means I have to make up some stuff, move some trees, bringing in some closer ones. And why not? I made up the snow-covered mountains in the distance. If I am painting this to please me, then yippee skippee, I can just go hog wild and really whoop it up.

I sure do know how to live, eh?

Happy Birthday, Little Sister!