Just in time to see this great blue heron take off from the backyard and swoop up onto the roof of my studio. Fortunately the camera was handy, even though I had to shoot through the glass.
California North Coast
EBay Listing 6-22-09- Bald Hills Lupine
This is a scene from a once-in-fifty-years mass bloom of lupine up on Bald Hills Road in Redwood National Park. I was fighting a cold, but my husband drove me up there late one afternoon so that I could see it and get pictures. The location is about an hour from our house. Click to buy it here
Lupin Blooming in Redwood National Park
The word’s gone out and it made the front page of the local paper. There is a rare explosion of lupin bloom up on Bald Hills Road in Redwood National Park. My husband and I took the Jensen Healey out for a spin to go check it out this afternoon. I didn’t know what to expect, but went late in the afternoon hoping for good light. Interspersed amongst the lupin was darker purple larkspur, which added a good contrast of value and hue. Here’s some of the photos I shot:
Happy New Year!
We had a great time with family for Christmas, including a trip up to the snow, which was only about 20 minutes east of us since the level had dropped to 1500 feet, pretty low for coastal California. I may have to try some winter landscapes, not something I’ve painted much due to almost never being around snow.
Niki the collie loved it all- being surrounded by people who love him and his first experience of snow. His main interest seemed to be eating as much of it as I’d let him.
ALL THE BEST IN 2009!
Available Next Week on EBay- Small, Affordable, Original Oil Paintings!
Like many artists, I’m trying to figure out what my sales options are given the current economic climate. I’m also interested in seeing if I can sell art directly on the internet. And, a few months ago, I was showing some friends some of the small studies I do to work on various aspects of painting and one encouraged me to try selling them. Taking this all together, I have decided to offer a “new line” of small oils that I am calling “Studio Studies”, because, well, that’s what they are.
As anyone who paints most days a week knows, they do stack up after awhile and I have a few dozen that I’ve decided I’m willing to find new homes for.
I plan to start offering them a few at a time on EBay, starting next week. Here’s a small preview, starting with one that I photographed in progress, so it’s a short step-by-step demo of how I do these mostly 6″x8″ studies that usually take less than two hours. The idea is to quickly capture a light effect, so detail isn’t relevant. This should look familiar to anyone who has taken Scott Christensen’s Ten Day Plein Air Intensive, because that’s who I learned this approach from and I really like it.
STEP-BY-STEP 8″X 6″ STUDY (from last Friday’s post)-
An image I shot up on Dunraven Pass in Yellowstone National Park at first light. What I was working on the was the color temperature shifts from shadow to light.
Here’s a couple more. First a demo that I did in about an hour at the Marin Art Festival of a small kangaroo which I photographed at a zoo.
And a landscape a few minutes from our house looking east from Clam Beach to the bluff. It was summer and the foxgloves were blooming. They’re not a native, but they look like they belong here in Humboldt County.
Finally, since I strongly believe that artists should help and support each other, here, from Alison Stanfield, who runs ArtBizCoach, is some solid advice on “Community”. Thanks, Alison! (Hope it’s readable. Let me know if it’s not.)
ART THOUGHT FOR THE DAY
The artistic mind is one that takes years to develop. Painting never gets easier. Struggle is not something that one goes looking for. It will find you. Just give it time.
Scott Christensen, The Nature of Light
Susan Fox, American Artist 