Redbud Festival is Coming!

Redbud Festival in Three Rivers is an annual arts and crafts show at the Veterans Memorial Building.

This year it will be on Saturday, May 7 and Sunday, May 8. (Yes, that is Mother’s Day).

I’ve been painting a few pieces to add to the collection for sale, in case anyone is interested in anything besides coloring books.

 

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Three Rivers House Commission, Finished?

Is the oil painting commission of a Three Rivers house finished yet?

These are some close photos of detail that I added to the painting.

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Step back a bit for the whole view, including the beginning of sycamore leaves. “The beginning” meaning the start of the leafing out of the tree. When all these other things are in bloom, the sycamore is barely showing. That’s why we can peek through its branches and see poppies on the hillsides.

IMG_2803Now I have turned it on its side so I can paint both the bottom and the top of the canvas.

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Am I finished with this painting? Is the painting finished with me?

Time will tell. . . that’s how my dad used to say it. I like “more will be revealed in the fullness of time”.

And if I am finished, then it needs a signature, a really good official photo, and a coat of spray varnish.

 

Remember When Life was Simpler?

Life used to be simpler. We have gizmos, devices, technology now that is supposed to make our lives easier, but think about these things:

  • Remember when your phone didn’t follow you everywhere, demanding continual response?
  • Remember when you could just go to the doctor and get help without filling out reams of papers, and wondering if you would be able to afford the visit?
  • Remember when you didn’t have to know the name of medicines and their possible side effects?
  • Remember when you just ate food and didn’t think about glycemic index, cholesterol, gluten, veganism, or happy chickens?
  • Remember when you had never heard of identity theft?
  • Remember when people didn’t cuss on TV or talk about private body functions and then try to sell medicine for them?
  • Remember when you had never heard of a “carbon footprint”?
  • Remember when you never considered whether something was organic or local or sustainable?
  • Remember when you could have a lawn without feeling guilty about it?
  • Remember when a fire in the fireplace was a normal guilt-free way to add warmth and comfort to a cold evening?
  • Remember when you only needed a password if you were playing a spy game with a friend? Something common, like “open sesame”?
  • Remember when “carbs” were called “starches”?
  • Remember when the only thing you backed up was your car, and you did it by putting your arm across the back of the seat and actually turned your head instead of watching a little television?
  • Remember when you could ride in the back of a pick-up? Or drink from the garden hose?
  • Remember when there were drinking fountains and no one carried around expensive bottles of water? You drank when you were thirsty, not when you needed to “hydrate”. . . “Hydrate”?? What is the matter with everyone?
  • Remember when you wore sneakers for every activity?
  • Remember back before you had heard of “plantar fasciitis”, “carpal tunnel syndrome”, “irritable bowel”, “acid reflux”?
  • Remember when you got home from vacation, and all you had to do was collect the mail at the post office?

Yeah.

That’s why people like to color. It returns us to a simpler activity that we enjoyed in simpler times. It requires no special skill, no guilt, no medical terminology, no technology or user name.

This is why I made a coloring book. Easy. Simple. No password required.

Heart of the Hills

Heart of the Hills: a Three Rivers and Sequoia Coloring Book  is available at the Three Rivers Mercantile, Kaweah River Trading Company, Three Rivers Historical Museum or here.

That last one probably will require a user name and password. If you see me around, I’ll have a few in the trunk of my car. We can do business that way. Simple.

$15 each plus tax. Easy.

Closing in on the Final List

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Hard to tell if anything is different here. We’ll call this the beginning of another day of painting an oil commission of a Three Rivers house. That archway is bugging me, and now I know what it needs.

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Too small to see. Guess you had to be here.IMG_1501

Time to work on the edges. IMG_1502

Another umbrella, please! and could you grow some branches on the sycamore while you’ve got that paintbrush out? Oh, before you change paint color, will you plant a few daffodils?

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Whoa. This looks a bit precarious. I scooted the painting over as far as possible and then crouched down beneath it to paint the bottom edge.

The list is much shorter now, although there are new items on it.

  1. Paint the middle section of the bottom.
  2. Add more little branches and twigs to the sycamore.
  3. Add the beginnings of leaves to the sycamore.
  4. Spend some time evaluating the details and just nit-pick it to pieces.
  5. SIGN IT!
  6. photograph
  7. let it dry
  8. varnish
  9. let it dry more. . .
  10. DELIVER!!

This painting makes the Oak Grove Bridge waiting oh-so-patiently in the background seem like child’s play. I’m coming, Bridge, just hang on. . .

 

Who is the Boss of this Painting?

Can you see any changes or improvements in this oil painting, a commission of a house in Three Rivers?

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I keep painting, but I don’t know if it is making any noticeable improvements. A little dab here, a little lighter there, make this darker, straighten out that edge. . . am I just licking the canvas??

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A dear friend suggested a few changes in the hills and background trees. She was right. The changes are an improvement. More may be required.

A window now has a frame.

The gravel path on the right has changed color.

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Here is what I think remains to be done:

  1. the right end of the house
  2. grow the sycamore
  3. put texture into the gravel path on the right, just some in the closest areas in the sunlight
  4. build the archway
  5. push the hills back farther
  6. lighten the porch post on the left
  7. tighten up the rocks near the archway and add growies
  8. add another umbrella

Sometimes I make these lists, begin an area, and then discover a whole new place to work on.

I thought I was the boss of this painting, but it seems to be the boss of me.

Three Rivers House In Spring Oil Painting

The saga of the commissioned oil painting of a house in Three Rivers in spring continues. (I know that was too many prepositional phrases but how else can I ‘splain this??)

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I made progress on the landscaping last time. This is an immensely satisfying project, because there are so many different areas, colors, shapes and textures.

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Weird, but true. Sometimes I have to turn the painting so my hand can move the correct direction. I haven’t learned to use a maul stick and am not interested as long as I can rotate the canvas (it’s a bit of a problem on a mural).

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More tightening up of the architecture was needed. Those windows! They will need to be revisited a few more times before we are finished here. “We”? ‘Twould be nice to have a little help on those more difficult parts, but I’m speaking in the royal We here.

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Can you see any improvement? The gravel walkway is looking more gravely, although in person it still resembles a stream.

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Hey! A tree grows in Three Rivers. Can you see the beginnings of the sycamore on the far right? I have replanted the tree since in the photos it only has these non-sequitor-heil-hitler-arm-like branches shooting into the scene. Unacceptable.

List of Slightly Related Items

I’m not sure how these 4 items on this list are slightly related other than they pertain to Three Rivers, sort of.

  1. This is my 8th blogiversary!!

  2. I sent an email to the people who have bought or expressed an interest in my work during the past year or so to ask if they’d like to be on my mailing list. Occasionally I sent an email telling of new things or shows or just to say hey. If you would like to be on that list, leave a comment below or email me using the contact button beneath About The Artist in the menu above.
  3. The coloring books are here! You can order from this link: Heart of the Hills. If you order using this link and Paypal, please send me an email with your mailing address because Paypal always tells me “no shipping information available” or some such baloney.heart seekers Look at these heart seeking students from Westmont College in Santa Barbara. Who would think that about-to-graduate seniors would be so interested in a coloring book?? Lovely group of folks, and I was very honored to have them stop by my studio. 
  4. Have a look at some spring photos around our place in Three Rivers because it is beautiful, and because Trail Guy was Builder Guy for me this week.

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This is in my herb garden, where I think of stuff and Builder Guy makes it for me. Don’t you wish you had a cute hanging thing like this? Don’t you wish you had an herb garden? Don’t you wish you had a Builder Guy in your life? Don’t you wish I’d shut up and just show you the photos?

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A Spring Walk in Three Rivers

Happy Birthday, Mom!

On Easter Sunday in the afternoon, Trail Guy and I took another spring walk in Three Rivers. Let’s skip the chit-chat and look at the pictures.

This is the view up toward Case Mountain.

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Here is Alta Peak with its elephant and Moro Rock.

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Fiesta flowers

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The flume above Dinely Drive; forgive us our trespasses. . .

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Hen and chicks? I don’t knowwhat this is, besides a beautiful succulent.

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The lupine were still going strong.

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Then, I found this rose at home.

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And thus we conclude a spring walk in Three Rivers.

House Oil Painting Commission

commissioned oil painting

I figured out that I could paint from looking at the photos on my computer screen. It is a little annoying that I have to keep waking it up, but I can deal with some annoyance.

As I worked on this, several parts were not visible. So, I stepped out my door.

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Would you look at that! Poppies on the hillside, poppy paintings drying on the steps. Poppies everywhere.

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It’s pretty handy to just look out the door at the configuration and colors of the hillside I am painting. There have been California poppies on this ridge since late February, so it doesn’t matter where I put them in the painting. They keep showing up (popping up?) in new patches up there.

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Painting from back to front is the normal method for oil. That means the furthest thing first – the sky; the hills come next. That paper has a sketch of the various hill details that I made while standing outside. I leaned two jar lids against it on the easel so it would stay put while I used it for reference.

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Halfway through the day, the mail came and there was my long-awaited photo! Stay tuned, because more will be revealed in the fullness of time.

Tomorrow, I’ll show you more of the beauty of Three Rivers in the spring.

 

Spring in Three Rivers, continued

Sometimes it feels as if Spring in Three Rivers lasts for about 20 minutes. This feeling causes me to not want to leave the area, not even to go to Exeter for a day to teach people how to draw, which is something I love to do.

With apologies to the writer of the song “The Most Wonderful Time of the Year”, I believe with all my heart that Spring is the Most Wonderful Time of the Year.

Have a look at a few days last week of enjoying Spring in Three Rivers. It is just photography, not art, but it is always a source of inspiration to me.

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