Cool Enough To Paint the Kaweah Post Office

(I don’t mean that I painted the building.) I am referring to the weather in my painting workshop, equipped with a fairly adequate swamp cooler, unless it is over 95 and/or humid.

Every year people say, “It has been such a hot summer!” as if that is news. Every summer in Tulare County is a hot one. My theory is that if it starts mild, you pay in September and October. This is the real world, muchachos, and you are in it.

Kaweah Arts had two oil painting versions of the Kaweah Post Office for sale. This is a quaint little old building three miles up the North Fork of the Kaweah River, which, until recently, was the smallest operating post office in the United States. Alas, it sold, and the new owner closed it. It is still cute and quaint, so I didn’t paint out the images on those canvases.

However, I decided that I could do a better job.

BEFORE:

One would think that I could just make this up without a photo after painting it about 20 times (if you count the do-overs, it is probably more). One might be right, but one isn’t going to know, because I won’t be attempting it AND I might not need to paint it any more. 

DURING:

BEFORE:

 

DURING:

These are hard to photograph while on the easels. When they are dry, I’ll scan them for you (and for my records, of course.)

This is a first for the aloof Jackson. He has never inspected my work before.

 

Finished and Begun, New and Improved

Finished

(Improved) North Fork of the Kaweah, 10×10″, $150


(New) Two Big, 6×12″, $125

(New) Giant Tree, 10×10″, $150

Begun:

 

The oranges are sold; the pumpkins are on standby, because if the other pumpkin painting doesn’t sell, this base coat just might become something else.

More Paintings to Sell

I fixed the two river paintings and then worked on another sequoia painting. It is good to have backup inventory for the places that sell to folks on their way to Sequoia. It is good to have backup inventory for all the places that sell my work, currently four, but Silver City will be closing soon for the season.

I have learned that the best sellers have light on the edges of the trees along with a burn scar. It doesn’t matter which trees I paint, or if I can tell you where they are in Sequoia National Park or even if they happen to be in Kings Canyon or Balch Park. Just big trees, sunlight, scar.

As usual, I’ll scan this when it is dry to show you. It is called “Too Big”, a 6×12″ oil painting on wrapped canvas for $150.

Facelift, Figuratively Speaking.

The heat backed off a little and two places that sell my work requested more. 

I started with the river painting do-over. It sat on an easel with its buddy non-selling river painting. . .and got a facelift. . .…but we will wait until the bruising subsides and the stitches get removed.

I mean we will wait until it is dry enough to be scanned before doing an actual comparison.

What’s Wrong With This Picture?

Sometimes when a painting has been hanging around for awhile, I have to ask myself a question that is hard to answer: What is wrong with this picture?

This painting has been hanging around too long. It is the North Fork of the Kaweah River in Three Rivers, looking downstream from what used to be known (maybe still is) as The Airport Bridge with Blossom Peak(s) in the distance.

This is what might be wrong:

  1. Blossom Peak(s) in the distance need to be more separate from the trees in front of them.
  2. The main rock needs to be blurrier where it contacts the water.
  3. The sky looks murky.

Stay tuned to see if those changes fix the painting. 

A Week of Mineral King, Chapter 5: Eagle Lake

Yesterday we stopped at the Eagle Lake dam, a steep hike on a tough trail out of Mineral King. 

Wait—isn’t there supposed to be a lake? Isn’t that the purpose of the dam? 

Well, oops. The dam either didn’t get closed last fall or it got opened too soon this summer. Looks more like Eagle Pond.

However, these gentlemen caught quite a few fish (catch and release, using a spinner).

Little Sis replaced her cat ears with a Kevin jacket (ever seen “Up”?). We watched the raindrops on the pond while discussing circles, ripples, and shiny places.

The Farmer found a checkerboard as he explored the edges of the pond, formerly known as Eagle Lake. My guess is that some youngsters’ phone batteries died so some oldsters showed them this primitive, non-tech game.

The exposed rocks in the lake are bizarrely geometrical.

This is the “normal” view of the lake, looking back toward Mineral King.

And this is looking toward the upper end of the lake. 

I’ve painted it from a similar angle.

Enough recreation and lollygagging. Time to make like a cowpie and hit the trail.

The Farmer found this rock, and we all thought it would make a great paving stone but had the good sense to leave it as a concept rather than a reality. It is a weird geologic formation, not someone’s early attempt at mosaic.

Does this look like a trail to you?? I turned back toward Eagle Lake to take this photo, because even though I’ve hiked it many times, it still astonishes me.

Finally found some flowers. These are Pride of the Mountains. Sawtooth is in the distance, with its “shadow”, Mineral Peak just to the right.

Well, yea. A little bit of good trail bed.

Haha. Fooled you. Climb over these rocks, you mountain goat.

After the rocks, I stopped taking photos with the exception of two more of the scene that I have been struggling to paint for 2-3 years now. (Not gonna show you that sorry mess today.)

With 2 miles left to go, Little Sis ran out of gas. She asked for breaks about every 20 yards. That is the slowest mile I have ever walked on a trail, and we were quite relieved that her pa was waiting at the White Chief junction. They did a pack shuffle, and she rode the last mile on her pa’s shoulders. I chased Big Bro for awhile at a rapid pace, marveling that the child never ran out of steam, never slowed, never complained.

Those are two amazing children who accomplished a huge journey on foot.

Tomorrow, we will return to White Chief, our favorite destination.

Sold in Summer

If you can’t see the photos, go here: cabinart.net/blog. 

Sales have slowed down a bit, which makes me concerned for my sellers and their businesses. However, I remain both busy and optimistic with some new projects pending. That will appear in another post.

Sequoias, some poppies remaining from spring, one commission, and the rest was Mineral King, of course. No pencil drawings this time.

 

But, summer isn’t over, not in weather, nor the calendar. Of course, the calendar says September 21 is the beginning of fall, but everyone knows that Labor Day is the other bookend to Memorial Day, holding together those weeks that remind us of the beach, fluffy reading, swatting mosquitoes, fireworks, watermelon, road trips, cowering in the A/C, and a sense of NEEDING to be off work.

Thus we conclude another peek into the (seasonal) business of art.

A Repair and an Agreeable Customer

If you can’t see the photos, go here: cabinart.net/blog.

Repair

This returned painting now has a cleaned up sky, new snow on Bearskin and new whitewater in the creek. I photographed it wet, which is why the color looks patchy. It is not actually inserted in the frame, which is why it looks unframed. Duh. I just propped it in the frame so I could photograph it.

Redo for an Agreeable Customer

 This sign was well used and loved for 10 years.

The customer asked for a larger one this time, so I ordered a 20″ round instead of the 12″ version. After applying 3 coats of exterior paint to both sides, I decide that the back of the round would make a more interesting sign than the flat front. The customer is very agreeable, so that’s what I will do.

I used oil paint on the first sign because I was unable to achieve a satisfactory level of detail with mural (acrylic) paints. Because this one is bigger, I am going to try it in the mural paints, and then if the detail needs to be tightened up, I will finish it off with oil paints.

I love these custom jobs for agreeable customers with no deadlines.

 

 

Hot Day in the Orange Grove

If you can’t see the photos, go here: cabinart.net/blog. Just another hot day at the easel, painting another orange grove.

Is it an “orange grove” or an “orange orchard”? We tend to call it “orange grove” or “orchard”. Some people call it a “ranch”, but I have yet to see any cattle in an orange grove. 

Commissioned Oil Painting

The swamp cooler kept me at the easel working on this commissioned oil painting until early evening. Growing leaves takes some time, particularly on a 16×20″ custom oil painting.


Reference Photos

In spite of being a familiar subject to paint, the piece is a challenge due to the melding of multiple scenes in multiple lights with multiple sizes and perspectives. My goal is consistency, believability, and of course, beauty. Always beauty, along with as close I can get to truth while fabricating the scene.

Here are a few of the dozen or so photos that I referred to. (Not showing the children because I respect people’s privacy here on the World Wide Web).

I love this photo. If I could have figured out how to put the children in this one and have the sizes all make sense AND be large enough to paint some detail, I would have used this one.

The painting still needs orange blossoms, and might need a wind machine. And because I believe it depicts the best part of Tulare County*, I will probably keep polishing it, drawing with my paintbrush, not wanting to quit.

Good thing there isn’t a deadline.

*I asked Ecosia (a new-to-me search engine instead of DuckDuckGo) to find me information on “the best of Tulare County” and it went to the Exeter Sun-Gazette, an article about Tulare County leading the nation in illiteracy. Sigh.

 

 

Still Painting Mineral King in the Heat

For those of you who subscribe and read the blog post on your phone: if you can’t see the photos, go here: cabinart.net/blog.

Again, I say that painting elevation while down in the heat has no benefits, other than in one’s imagination. Sawtooth, visible from Mineral King in this painting, is 12,343′ in elevation; Three Rivers (where I live) is 1000′. They say (“they”? who is this?) that the temperature drops 3 degrees for every 1000′ gained in elevation. You can do the math if you’d like; I’m too overheated.

This isn’t quite finished. When it is dry, I will do some nitpicking, careful evaluating, and then will make corrections and plant wildflowers. Of course I will plant wildflowers—do not doubt me on this! 

P.S. The color looks washed out here – does heat affect photography too??

Links to other posts about painting Sawtooth:

  1. Department of Redundancy Dept.
  2. Lots of Sawtooths (Sawteeth? Nah)
  3. Almost finished with the Sawtooth paintings
  4. You just won’t believe this one
  5. Back to Sawtooth
  6. Really Painting Sawtooth Again