Farming With Paint?

This day’s oil painting session went from an olive grove to a walnut grove. (Grove or orchard? Same thing.) The day ended with a potential cattle ranch.

The last olive grove painting session left me with this mess to tackle, layer by layer.

I began with improving the trunks and branches. Here you can see one of the main reference photos.

Next I put in leafy texture.

The front gnarly trunk needed detailing, and now it needs to dry. After it dries, I will fix anything that is looking wrong, and then, if the paint is flowing well, if the force is with my brushes, and if I become one with the canvas, I hope to put in some close branches where you can see leaves and olives.

Time to visit a walnut grove. Clearly, this is a walnut grove, no?

No. It is not clearly a walnut grove. All the lined up trees seemed difficult (read “impossible”). I started with the closer trees.

Here you can see the main reference photo. It was a little tricky to condense a rectangle into a square and do it believably. I don’t feel the need to put in every tree. I do feel the need to have the trees line up in their rows. (How do farmers plant their orchards so perfectly?)

I got tired of brown, so I moved to the distant horizon line and put in the sunlit green in the distance, and then patches of sunlight on the ground. It isn’t as close to finished as the olive grove painting, but I ran out of daylight and the cats wanted to reclaim the workshop as their cafeteria and dorm.

But first, I erased the center line on the road of this painting. There was a bit of a pickle here: I want cows, but that means a fence, and without a real photo of a fence in this position, it is too risky in terms of believability. I could do it if it meant saving all the women and children, but this doesn’t come anywhere near that sense of desperation. So, I messed up the center line and the asphalt, and when it dries, I will try to make it look like dirt or gravel, which means the cows won’t need a fence.

It was really getting dark out. I was cold, tired of difficult decisions, and the cats wanted dinner, so that was the end of my day of farming with a paintbrush in the groves, orchards and ranches of Tulare County.

Little Things Mean a Lot

It often just comes down to the little things, the details, those finishing touches on a painting that bring the most satisfaction. Here are five paintings that I added little things to on a single morning of painting.

Tucker wanted to know if I was going to be there for awhile.

Big Oak: I studied this painting for awhile and decided the dirt patch at the bottom might be too large— “might be” was enough to make me go back to touch it up.

I signed it too. Wow. Was that worth the effort? Maybe.

Square Orange Grove: I thought this was finished but maybe I wasn’t convinced, because I didn’t sign it. Trail Guy asked me why I hadn’t put orange blossoms on the close trees. Ummm, I forgot. . .

Excellent! And now it is signed too. All it needs is a title (I’ve been calling it The 16×16″), photography, and varnish.

Take Me Home: I tried to put a single leaf in tight detail on the road. It looked dumb. So, I put in texture to resemble dirt, rocks, sticks, and basic dirt road debris. Then I signed it. I don’t want to work on this painting anymore. (But I will if someone tells me something that would make a measurable difference.)

Homer Barn: I had forgotten to put the trees on top of the left hills, and the road wasn’t quite right. I worked on the shoulder of the road and added a layer to the field on the right.

Now I have to decide if it should have cows on the right, which will mean it needs a fence. I’ll just wait on these decisions until the road and other new parts are dry.

Dry Creek Wildflowers: more lupine and leaves on the skeletal tree were needed.

This could be signed now, but then again, I might keep “polishing”. I might want to keep this one. . . maybe I’ll just keep working on it so it isn’t ever quite ready to sell.

Yeppers, Tuck, I was here long enough to bore you to sleep.

And thus we conclude another tour through painting the prettiest places in Tulare County.

A Three-Painting Day

Three paintings of Tulare County scenery were brought closer to completion on a productive day of painting. Two were fun, and one is still riding the struggle bus.

Not a lot to say about this other than I photographed each step.

It was fun to detail the unusual barn, and now I need to detail the road and lower right pasture.

This painting is really fun. I filled in green around the rest of the poppies, added more green in the lower regions, built the oak tree (needs the beginnings of spring leaves), and put the lupine stalks in place.

I took this painting to a life-long friend for her input. She has a great eye for design and has assisted me in the past. She suggested more of an overarching canopy and more detail on the road (which was also suggested by my friend and blog reader MB). I got this far on the canopy before the light ran out.

Maybe adding tire tracks, more light, and some dirt clods will be all this piece requires before it exits the struggle bus.

Big Oak Tree

Did you know that Tulare County is home to the largest oaks in the country? The valley oak, quercus lobata is not what this big oak tree is. I found this tree somewhere along Dry Creek Road. I didn’t get close enough to know what kind, but I can tell by the shape that this isn’t a valley oak. It is unusually perfect, almost symmetrical, and all without ever having been pruned (except when cattle chew on the lower leaves.)

Sky and distant ridge.
Distant waves of wildflowers, closer blades of grass.
Added wildflowers, a rock, more blades of grass and a few limbs because I couldn’t wait to get to that tree.
Details in the grass, another rock, and details in the dirt.
Finally started on the tree.
Am I finished? Time will tell.

Once it is dry, I will sign it, paint the edges, and either photograph or scan it, so you can see it with its brighter and more accurate colors.

Layer by Layer, Little by Little, II

Nope, it’s not Moro Rock.

Layer by layer, little by little, these two paintings are inching ahead in spite of the Central California artist’s desire to park indoors by the wood stove with a book.

The top one is 12×16″, an odd barn along Dry Creek Road, known as the Homer Barn. The bottom one is 11×14″, some perfect oak tree with wildflowers beneath on some perfect day of driving Dry Creek Road, in Tulare County, California’s flyover country. But don’t forget that we feed the world. (And don’t move here either, because we are all fat, uneducated, poor, and the air is terrible.)

Green and Orange

Poppies and oranges are two of my most popular subjects. Orange and green, green and orange. Orange is yellow and red; green is yellow and blue. I’m getting more relaxed about the specific shades of each, focusing more on values, which is Artspeak for darks and lights.

This painting will take awhile, because I want it to be perfect. Do I always say that? Prolly not. I’m not a perfectionist. It takes discipline to keep returning to the same painting over and over when I just want to cross it off my list and keep going on to the next one. BUT, I have learned that it is better to be a little annoyed during the process than embarrassed later.

This one has been very fun. It seems finished now, but chances are that I will see small things to correct once it is dry.

Finally, this one has orange trees that are green but the ones on the right are really wet and shiny.

This is an excellent example of how to not photograph a painting.

All three paintings show the beautiful parts of Tulare County at the prettiest time of year. When these are finished, I will begin one in the fall season. It won’t be orange or green.

Another of Tulare County’s Prettiest Places

Maybe “Tulare County’s Prettiest Places” would be the right name for my show at CACHE.

But what if I want to paint other places too?

Who will want other places? My fan club (fall down laughing) is based here in Tulare County.

Enough already with the speculation and analysis—let’s paint.

This is Rocky Hill Drive, probably the most popular outdoor place to run, walk, and bikeride in Tulare County.

WAIT—”Popular Pretty Places”?

Stop it and just get on with the painting, will ya?

You can’t go up on Rocky Hill itself, only up between Rocky Hill and Badger Hill. But in the very flat land of the flatlands, this is the only place for walking uphill or downhill.

This 6×18″ oil painting needs better detail on the orange trees, the shoulders of the road, and maybe even some work on the center line once all this paint dries a bit.

Returning to My Favorite Subject

Orange groves, foothills, and mountains remain my favorite subject to paint. (It used to be the Oak Grove Bridge, and who knows what it will be next?)

I painted this to hang in my dining area, but put it on my website and then, lo and behold, it sold! (off the website—I didn’t open my front door to customers)

No problemo—I just started another painting.

Then, I just left it on the easel for months.

After starting all those small paintings for Kaweah Arts, I finally went back to this painting. If I don’t get it finished soon, suddenly it will be October and then it will go to the solo show and then it will sell without ever hanging in my house first! The urgency. . . !!

Details, details. All those close trees needed details. Of course, once I’ve put all those leaves on, the oranges will need more color or shaping. Then I’ll decide to add blossoms. After that, the ground will need some debris. Next, I’ll decide to put cows on Wutchumna (the hill). Maybe all the distant rows will need refining, the hills reshaped, the mountains improved. . .

Never mind. How about starting another one?

I do love me some orange groves in the foothills with the Sierra in the distance. These subjects are a real benefit of life in Tulare County. (But DON’T move here. It is in California, where people are leaving in droves. Wait—what is a “drove”?? Aren’t people leaving in U-Hauls?)

Bumbling Along With One, Almost Finishing Another, and Finishing a Third

Your Central California artist bumbles along on one Tulare County oil painting, almost finished another, and finished a commission. Let’s start with the bumble.

The differences are subtle between the before and the after version. In the after version, the lower left corner makes more sense, and there are more branches on the trees.

Before
After

A neighbor-friend stopped by to bring her recyclables because we share garbage services. She works alone at home as I do, and sometimes we just visit for awhile, perhaps our version of hanging out at the water cooler. (Pay no attention to those garbage cans.) She expressed an interest in my current projects, and when I showed her my challenging painting, together we came up with a couple of ideas for improvement. I will continue to bumble along on this difficult painting.

But wait! I made two more adjustments, and then photographed it more carefully. My neighbor approved, which gave me hope. (There will be more adjustments, corrections, and added details.)

I thought I was finished on the Lower Dry Creek Road oil painting. However, the closer fence posts might require some wire. On the other hand, I might not be capable of such minuscule detail. It still needs a signature and the edges to be painted.

Better detailing and color on the golden hills, the dam, the trees. Cattle, fenceposts, wildflowers, done. Maybe I can put in wire on the fence. Maybe I can do a little brain surgery while I am it. . . not feeling capable of wire. . . will it matter?

Better detailing, stronger colors, and a signature now done on Sawtooth #34, a commissioned oil painting for JL’s son. This one is only photographed, not scanned, because it is wet.

Painting Early Summer on a Winter Day

Dry Creek Road is one of Tulare County’s gems. At the bottom of this country road, there are cattle, irrigated pastures, wildflowers in spring, and views of layered hills (beer cans too, but we will ignore those). This painting combines several of these elements, and depicts late spring when a hint of green remains while summer’s golden hues are emerging. I used two different photos, and combined the pieces that best represent this route in my 60+ years of driving it. (Fear not—the first 16 years I was just a passenger.)

sky first
farthest hills next
moving closer, working forward on those hills
closest hills
all the greenery

By the time the painting was this advanced, the cold was advanced on my feet. I brought the painting into the warm house to dry, and the next time I work on it, I expect to draw a few details with my smallest brushes.

P.S. Is that Terminus Dam back there? Yeppers, it is!