San Francisco Experience

I finished this painting last week and had it framed and ready to send to South Africa. When I found out the rate for shipping, I found another way to send a gift. I could have bought a one-way plane ticket for the shipping cost.
The planes make this painting of interest. The steepness of the hill is evident with several planes below and wires overhead. The silhouettes of people leaning toward the subject help to resolve the conflict of verticals and direct the viewer.

The Fixer-Upper

This house was on a photo I had from Mendocino, CA. Today, in California, there was cold with wind and I canceled my plans to go outside and paint. Instead, I played with the painting and tried a lot of different shapes. Notice the 3 eucalyptus trees in the left background and the puddles in the foreground. The laundry on the line was a balance to the painting. There is a lot in this painting and I usually only feature one subject with everything else subordinate. This is what happens when plans suddenly change. It was fun experimenting.

Wet on Wet Watercolor Painting

Have you ever tried to paint on a wet surface with watery color. You need to keep a couple of steps ahead with your plan and get it all on before the painting dries. One can add a couple of drops of glycerin to the water to slow the drying. It is difficult to judge the intensity of the color and, in general, it dries at a much lighter value than it appears at first. This is my attempt at a 15-20min wet on wet watercolor. The second one was done with more intense color because of the experience with the first.


This one took even less time, and I was able to save the whites. It is uneven with the intensities but the water reflections are somewhat forgiving. An artist I know that is successful with this technique uses only Lanaquerelle watercolor paper. This is more blotter-like and gives soft edges to everything.
I think that I will need a lot of trials to get one of these wet-on-wet paintings to my satisfaction. In the meantime, I will stay with washes and dry into wet.

San Francisco Streets

This is a painting of Chestnut St in San Francisco. I was on Stockton and looking down. Had plenty of people to talk with as it was a nice day and many were out. I will have to go back and move up one street to do Lombard, the crookedest street.

Plein Air Painting in Martinez

Last week went off to Martinez, CA to paint with a plein air group. It was a good experience that included new friends, a cookout, and a very friendly critique of everyone's work. There were plenty of good works from this group that meets weekly.
Martinez is a major train hub and I doubt that many get a full night of sleep with all of the whistles that sound from arriving and departing trains. I loved it.
My painting was done on the edge of the marsh with the bright sky emerging. There was no egret, but I needed a focal point and some balance to the weight of objects on the left side.

Davis Joints

Got out early Saturday morning to paint and got a close-up viewpoint of two Davis eateries, side-by-side. The shadows were the attraction for me along with the warm colors of both buildings. The lost edges and cool notes gave me great satisfaction with the painting. There were plenty of early risers from the nearby hotel who were in town for a football game.

It's all about laundry

I have shown this one before but found myself painting another laundry scene yesterday. Must be my helping out at home that has focused me on domestic activities. One group washes in the river and the other hangs the laundry out to dry. Do you know that the ordinance in my town had to be changed to allow hanging laundry out to dry! We are all going green.