One day we had no internet. This also meant no cell service (because we don’t have cell service at our house the cell phone works off the wifi) and no landline. So no podcasts, just concentrating on the current painting in silence.
I remembered my stereo and popped in a CD when I got tired of my loop-di-loop thoughts. Just sat and drew with my paintbrush and listened to music while painting this classic Tulare County scene for the Long Way Off show.
After I took a plein air (on location) painting workshop, I tried to incorporate some new techniques into my normal studio method of painting. I didn’t like the results, and apparently, no one else did either, because those paintings didn’t sell.
This one in particular was troubling, because I thought the subject matter would overcome any difficulties.
After goofing off for weeks, I decided to warm up to painting by improving this little loser.
When it is dry, I will scan it so we can all scratch our heads in bewilderment about how I could have ever thought the painting might sell in its earlier state.
Guess I was blinded by love for the subject matter of Tulare County’s best features.
P.S. I didn’t mess with the orchards or wind machines because they look fine.
If you are getting this post in your email, go to the internet and type in jana botkin dot net (type it in computer style, not the way it is written here).
Sales have been slow. I am not defining “spring”, precisely, and it isn’t over yet. However, I am not producing very much: just editing and formatting 2 different books, teaching drawing lessons, communicating occasionally with the folks on 2 different pairs of murals, and wondering if there will be any reason to paint towards selling at the Silver City Store this coming summer.
Lest you think I am bored, your Central California artist is never bored. I am yardening, meeting up with an old friend from high school, cleaning out closets and rooms at church, yardening some more, reading, knitting, walking with my neighbor, and yardening (in case you were wondering.)
My blog seems to be back to normal, so if you are receiving my posts via email and can’t see the photographs, tap here to go to the blog on the internet.
The large oil painting commission has taken quite a bit of thought and time. It feels very important to make it the best I possibly can. This is difficult for a non-perfectionist, whose main drive is to complete projects rather than do things perfectly. However, as a grownup, I am capable of overcoming my natural bent when it is the right thing to do.
I photographed the painting while it was upside down on the easel.
Then I flipped and cropped the photo, enlarged it to fill my computer screen, and studied it.
This is a weird phenomenon, one observed and used by my drawing students and me. Things often look fine until you see a photograph on a phone, camera, or computer screen. Suddenly the flaws appear.
The result of my study session is a red oval around each part that didn’t look quite right.
Then I mixed up the right colors and began making minuscule corrections. My plan was to photograph the corrections for you, but all wet paint was shiny and looked terrible in the photos. So, never mind that plan.
I lifted it off the easel to sign it and saw that the bottom looked terrible.
Then I looked out the painting workshop door and felt happy in spite of the little hitch in my git-along.
Here it is on the easel, ready for the official photograph. In spite of looking tiny in this setting, it is way too big for my scanner.
Wait! You haven’t seen the edges yet!
Finally, paint the bottom of the canvas, and the painting is finished. (Still wet)
I think you need to see it in person to truly appreciate this commissioned oil painting of my current favorite scene of Tulare County to paint for the very patient and accommodating Mr. Customer.
My blog seems to be back to normal, so if you are receiving my posts via email and can’t see the photographs, tap here to go to the blog on the internet.
I am slowly working on the commissioned oil painting, and wandering around the yard while waiting to hear about two mural projects (each with two murals) and wondering about several subjects.
Sometimes while thinking about the painting, I amble around the yard.
I am wondering if the host of my website will sort out the evil robot situation, if I will be able to make the oil commission match Mr. Customer’s vision, when I will hear about those upcoming murals, when I might be able to start, and why the deer haven’t eaten all these irises and roses.
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.)
Mr. Customer and I had a texted conversation about his commissioned oil painting.
Me: Is this starting to look like what you are wanting?
Mr. Customer: It is!
Me (knowing that he is a very encouraging and positive person and needing to verify things a bit further): I have made the mountains as perfect as I know how but I am faking the hills in front of them. The only place the mountains looked that clear and perfect and visible was from Rocky Hill, but from there the hills were just one solid ridge. Hence, fakery.
Mr. Customer: Pretty darn close
Me: I aim for believability. No one memorizes the actual configuration of the hills, and most people only know a few specific peaks. But even those look different from every viewpoint. So as long as you are happy, then I am happy too.
Mr. Customer: I will be happy. Just so you know.
Yippee skippee! I am happy too!
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.)
The commissioned oil painting of mountains is challenging. I paint a little, get stuck, try to figure out which photo is my guide for whatever section I am working on, paint a little more, and then take a break. Here’s how that looked a week or so ago.
Yeah, no problem, I got this figured out.
Wait, where am I? These rocks aren’t lining up with the right peaks. Where’s a pencil??
Yeah, I got this figured out.
Hunh? Time for a break. I’ll just survey things in the yard, pull a few weeds, decide the next priorities.
Does that mean yard priorities or does it mean oil painting priorities?
These weeds are sure pretty. But remember, one year’s weeds equals seven years seeds. . .
(Oh yeah? Then why do I have prolific weeds in the areas that I have been weeding for 24 years?)
The iris around the pillars are supposed to be prettier than the weeds, but they haven’t bloomed yet.
STOP IT! YOU ARE SUPPOSED TO BE PAINTING.
I walked back to the painting workshop but kept seeing beautiful things and weeds on the way.
Finally got back to work.
Oh no. Now I have to figure out the foothills, again working from forty-eleven photos.
In case you were wondering, I LOVE to work at home, both in the yard and in the painting workshop.
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.
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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.)
If you receive these posts in email and the pictures in the post don’t show for you, tap here janabotkin.net. It will take you to the blog on the internet.
Mr. Customer gave me permission to show his 12×36″ commissioned oil painting in progress on the blog.
This 10×20″ oil painting has been hanging around (literally), waiting its turn at the easel. It is just part of the series I began back in February to build up the inventory of my favorite subject in a variety of sizes and shapes.
Hmmm, I think I may have overdone the size exaggeration of Castle Rocks.
This 18×36″ oil painting is one that is destined to hang in the dining area of my house, IF I ever complete it and IF it doesn’t sell (because I can always paint another one).
Thus we conclude eensy progress on three oil paintings of the best things about living in Tulare County in the spring, after a wet winter, when there is snow on the mountains, fruit on the trees, green on the hills, and gratitude and happiness in my heart.