Category: Mineral King

Day Eleven on the Mural

After a very productive week in the studio, I returned to the wall today and was greeted by this sight:

This is Channel 26’s Great Day camera man and reporter Clayton Clark.

Clayton did a fake-out while I was unloading my supplies.

He wore a little thingie in his ear so the folks back in the Fresno studio could communicate with him. He did a little “teaser” every so often, and then interviewed someone every 15 minutes.

Here they are with Randy Groom, the new Exeter City Manager.

Clayton did some actual painting and enjoyed it enough that he painted when the camera wasn’t even on him. Made me feel like Tom Sawyer. 😎

I let him add his name to the helper signature section. While there, I found a message from Marilyn and the Uganda ladies! Made my day!

These folks saw us on teevee and stopped by to help.

This was definitely the most social and least productive day yet!

Nice place to escape the heat

Mineral King Morning, 11×14″, oil on wrapped canvas, $175

Mineral King oil paintings

Time in Mineral King (instead of just painting it)

A picture is worth a thousand words – here are 11,000 words for you to enjoy. Click on them to see them larger.

Entering White Chief bowl

This is as far as we went; still much snow remains

Lots of Blue Lips out!

The next day we went to Empire. This is an old road built by the miners and it is a great relief to find it after scrambling up a long steep slope.

Went high enough to see down into White Chief.

My goal was this nubbin at 10,500′. Michael went 200 feet higher, but my good sense (and lack of depth perception) caused me to wait. Waiting is seldom a problem for me.

We love this section of trail leading to Timber Gap (which you can see still has patches of snow). The phlox and blue lips were outstanding!

Because it was the Fourth of July, I looked until I found a patch of red, white and blue!

Mineral King marmot

Day Ten on the Mural

What a nice day to paint! It was a detail day, so large amounts of ground weren’t covered, but smaller amounts were fully completed. (maybe. . .)

Exeter murals Mineral King

Not as hot today – phew! The mules turned out well, but the final pronouncement of their worthiness is pending approval by my mule friends, the Weldons. I think they look great from the standpoint of light and dark ( “values” in Artspeak). However, I may have painted their legs too skinny or their ears too short or something else horrible if you truly know mules, as the Weldons do.

The lake got its first coat of paint. This lady told me she couldn’t draw a straight line with a ruler, so i handed her the paint brush and let her work on the water a bit! It only seemed right, since her name is Mrs. Purdey and that is a brand of paintbrush I like to use.

After my painting session, I had a knitting appointment. (Oh come on! You KNOW you wish you had such pleasant appointments yourself!) When I came back by the mural, it was in full sun and Betsy and I were quite pleased with how it looked. I’m usually gone before it is fully in the sunshine, so this was a great surprise.

Exeter murals Mineral King

Day Eight on the Mural (snow!)

Summer has truly arrived. It was hot on the lift at 9 a.m. so after working on the “snapshot” of mules, I put the machine away and stood on the ground where there was a bit of a breeze. It is definitely easier to visit with passers-by when we are both standing on the ground; Michael stopped by and had a small tub of snow in the back of his pick-up. Yup. Snow. It had been in the ice chest until he pulled it out to make room for the groceries. First, I used some on my wrists – it has been said that if you cool your pulse points, you will be cooler. Okay, I could always be cooler. After that, I set my water bottle inside the tub of (melting) snow. Then, my Frankenfoot was hurting a bit, so I took off my sandal and stood with my foot in the snowmelt. After that, I needed a bit more water for washing brushes at the end of my painting session, so the water got transferred to my brush bucket. Snow in Exeter in summer. Weird, but useful.

Peculiar sight

In Mineral King there are some critters called “marmots”. (Every letter is pronounced unlike “merlot”) To the untrained eye, they appear to be cute.

To those in the know, they are a PAIN. In late spring and early summer they have a peculiar habit of chewing on wires and hoses in cars. They like radiator fluid and are impervious to its poison that would kill your pet. By the second week of July, they have stopped doing this stupid annoying thing and then perhaps they can be called cute. There are many methods to try and thwart their destructive ways. A number of years ago, a ranger saw that Michael had the hood up on his truck and decided that must be a way to discourage the creatures. (In reality, the hood was up so he could see if they were in there chewing on things.) Now, many people leave their hoods up in the parking lots which gives the marmots easier access to their preferred snacks. Other things have been tried, but this one is the most effective:

Mineral King marmot

Day Seven on the Mural

When I arrived this morning, there was a section of mural that said “DO ME!” (perhaps I am exaggerating or hallucinating at that early hour). So, that section got completed today. Maybe. It may need more detail, but hard to say at this point.

You can see I am adding little patches of this and that in the lower sections. This is the way I use up the paint on my palette at the end of a painting session!

Had to tape off the borders of the additional “snapshot” area. I can see from this photo that it definitely needs more rocks.

Here is the whole wall. Decided to take this photo when I realized that I hadn’t removed the key from the lift, nor had I plugged it in! I’ll blame it on getting up too early in the a.m. instead of my being distracted. And distracted I was – wow, what a slate of distinguished visitors today! Look at this: my 6th grade teacher, my 21 mile walking partner and her husband, my shorthand teacher from Redwood High, a lady who bought a painting from me a few years ago and her friend, the premier rock mason/artist from Three Rivers, and an entire group of wayward youth from a place called Courage to Change! Those are just the visitors I can remember – this is a very social project!

Exeter murals Mineral King

Day Six on the Mural

Today there were lots of rocks and green patches to be painted. Most of the rocks look alike, and despite working from an 8×10 photo, they are teenie-tiny. After needing someone to send out Search and Rescue teams, I finally blocked out the area on the photo and on the wall, and taped the photo above.

I was still lost and confused. I drew a simplified “map” of the green patches, taped it below, and (sort of) duplicated the green shapes.

Time will tell if I did the right degree of detail in those areas. They may need to be blurred out, or they may need to be cleaned up.

This is how it looks with the mountain above. I also cleaned out my palette by putting a first coat on other areas that weren’t fiddly like those rocks.

Exeter murals Mineral King

Day Five on the Mural

What a nice day! The sun hitting me wasn’t a huge problem so I painted until it hit my palette at almost 2:30. Wow, good thing, because today I moved into the fiddly stuff – lots and lots of rocks. See?

There were lots of visitors today and I snuck photos of a few of them.

Monica and Inda found all 12 items in my other mural.

Louise and Katie showed me how folks will appear to be at Franklin Lake when the mural is finished. Hmmm, guess photographers will have to cut folks off at the knees for a realistic effect.

Claudia from Fresno brought Kristianna from Germany!

But Wait! There’s More! Looks like the projection difficulty will be turned into another sepia snapshot! More will be revealed. . .

Exeter murals Mineral King