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Dolphin at Loon Point

"Dolphin at Loon Point" 8 x 10. Watercolor. 2015.


 Walking down the sand to find that view I had taken months ago with my camera. I knew Loon Point was a special from the photo I took of huge cliffs on the sandy beach next to turquoise navy water.

I retraced my steps to where I took my reference photo and immediately remembered why I had been drawn to this beach again...on the top of the steep cliffs perches a bright white heron was standing on the top of the very steep cliff looking down to the ocean...while in the ocean appeared a flock of Brown Pelicans diving the water for fish and out of the low tide rocky shore popped a pop of dolphin swimming together and then swimming off. ANd in the middle of the madness appeared a harbor seal looking to see if I was joining in on the the fun.

Once I began sketching the life around me kept appearing and more pelicans appeared and left and more dolphins appeared and left and and the rocks held the animals out of the water such at the mussels and sea anemones and limpets and barnacles and more.

I decided to sit closes to the water to paint as to not miss the action in the water. Dolphin felt very comfortable coming so close to shore to swim in the low tide shallows and around the rocks of the crashing waves, just a few feet form where I was sitting and watching.

I ended up getting out my watercolor paper to try and capture the activity of the animals right in the ocean. SO I painted a piece quickly as I was sitting on the wet sand and a few times the ocean got me and my camera bag and my paints and paper and the last straw was the lid to by water canister. After finding my things I took off down the beach where families of travelers were riding horses on the beach in the water and dogs were marching around wit their owner.

ANd in the distance a boat speeding by following once again another pod of dolphin out farther from the shore...

So I dedicated my watercolor to the dolphins in the sea....which was splashed my the ocean as well before I left..

Aloe Blooms

"Aloe Blooms" Watercolor & Colored pencil. 2015.

I enjoyed these twisting aloes...so beautiful with the stems.

Aloe Variegated Watercolor

"Aloe variegated" Watercolor. 2015

Another live plant that was an inspiration for this botanical painting.

Butterfly Beach in a Storm

"Butterfly Beach in a Storm" 8 x 10 inches. Copyright 2015

Windshield wipers and quick brushstrokes allowed me time to mix my watercolor colors in my lap as my Arches watercolor paper became almost too saturated to finish. By the time I finished my last brushstroke the fog engulfed the view and I drove home. Enjoy!

Trinidad Scorpion Pepper

"Trinidad Scorpion Pepper" Watercolor. Copyright 2015.

Striped Succulent in Watercolor

"Striped Succulent " Watercolor. 2015.

Getting my hands back into botanicals and wanted to include the latest painting. 

It started with a preliminary sketch, then onto the transfer of the image using my light table and then this final painting.  I hope you like it. It's especially important during this time of low water usage to find suitable plants for the garden. 

Yellow Lupine and Flying Finches.

Yellow Lupine and Flying Finches" 81/2" x 11".Watercolor. 2015.

After embracing the current drought situation in California, I decided to pull out a watercolor painting to finish when the gardens had water and the finches were flying carelessly about eating the seeds from these lovely yellow flowers. The yellow lupine appeared at the Santa Barbara Botanic Garden in which I snatched this scene in memory of when the flowers were in bloom.  I wanted to post it now to bring back that feeling of joy you get when taking in the color yellow.  A happy feeling.  I hope you embrace this sunny painting full of life and yellow.

Porch with a View

"Porch with a View" Watercolor. 2015

Watercolor painting from a porch with a view. Blooming coccolithophores phyto plankton are turning the water a turquoise color. What a way to celebrate World Ocean Day!

Muddy Puddles at More Mesa.

"Muddy Puddles at More Mesa:, 81/2" x 11", Watercolor. 2015.

I painted this watercolor in honor of the rain that fell the morning I went out hiking at More Mesa and caught a view of the first muddy puddles that this town had seen in a year of heavy drought. This is a good beginning to the winter season in anticipation of the flowers soon to bloom!

Aloes Blooming with a View of Santa Cruz Island

"Aloes Blooming with a View of Santa Cruz Island", 8 1/2" x 11", Watercolor. Copyright 2014.

These orange and red colored aloes are found blooming along sunny slopes along the California coast.  You will see patches of this firecracker red scattered along the Santa Barbara bluffs. I spent a few weeks observing these aloe. I wanted to paint this piece required waiting for the aloe flowers to get to he right height and vibrancy before the painting was ready to start. If I were to wait to long the pollinators would have turned these flowers into seeds and then the colors would be lost.  The painting was started plein air but finished in my studio.  Enjoy!

"Love is the flower you've got to let grow."--- John Lennon

Sunset on Inspiration Point

"Sunset on Inspiration Point" 8 1/2" x 11". Watercolor. 2014.

"I dream of painting then I paint my dream."---Vincent Van Gogh

This painting was inspired by a hiking trip to the top of Inspiration Point in Santa Barbara. The sky turned a magnificent purple and pink as the sun sank into the ocean. I hope you are inspired as much as I was by this wonderful collection of colors.  

Sunrise in the Mesa

"Sunrise in the Mesa"8 1/2" x 11". Watercolor. 2014.

This is my first sunrise painting. I keep thinking about how many people (including myself) miss out on the west coast sunrise, only really admiring the sunset over the water. Here is a first of a series of landscapes I plan on doing in honor of this beauty of the golden light over the water.

Nature sketching beach walk.

"In every walk with nature one receives far more than he seeks "---John Muir

Objective:

To travel lightly and be open to nature sketching and try out some gesture sketches in my field notebook. To leave technology behind and rely just on my own field journal to record what I found. 

Observations:

My walk started on May 2, 2014 at twelve noon down the steep steps at Mesa Lane in Santa Barbara California. With the high noon sun straight above me I was prepared to hike a coastal hike with only my backpack full of the very basics, a bag of sharpened prismacolor pencils, my 5x8 inch blank paged sketch book, a mechanical pencil, a few hardness of the graphite pencil, sturdy walking shoes on my feet, a few trail bars a water bottle and my sunscreen. 

Within a few steps of the beach I found some mussel shells, beautiful and blue, and wanted to capture the color of the shell and the sand. Plopped down next to the mussel was a live sea snail still holding onto some brown kelp. I tossed the live animal back in the ocean, then carried the mussel shells down the beach to the perfect spot to sit and sketch.

I heard that the days you leave your camera and phone and ipod behind are the times when the most wildlife appears...that was true again for me today as I saw several whales cruising by spouting from the shore. Migrating north to Alaska for the summer. A couple groups of common dolphin pods cruising the opposite direction. People were walking along the shore oblivious to the faint spouting out in the ocean while walking their dogs and chatting with friends.  How much do we miss when we are caught up in the daily life of computers and cell phones and schedules. 

I plopped down again near the whales to observe them for a bit and took the time to do a series of gesture sketches of sea birds and humans as well. Not worrying about what the images look like but to get a feel for the movement of the people and the animals. 

An interesting harbor seal that couldn't get enough of the paddle boarders splashing in the water, and endless dog walkers and beach lovers out to enjoy the sunny day. I spent some time observing a beautiful mussel shell I saw sitting in the tide and took some time to take in the joggers and my attempt at getting a good enough bird observation without binoculars or a guide book. I am not sure if the tiny shorebirds I found were plover or sandpiper but there was definitely flocks of curlew cruising by.

This walk made me realize how much sea bird identification is a mystery to me.  I came home with my sketches realizing I needed to add much more detail in the birds to get a proper identification.  Was it a plover or a sandpiper? I plan on spending much more time in the field with my sketch book. What a great way to celebrate this planet we live on.   

Species List:
grey whales, common dolphin, a harbor seal, curlew, brown pelican, mussel shell, lobster molt, sea snail species, shore birds possibly plover or sandpiper, tern species, many other shore birds...

Drawings and Sketches:

Fall Colored Farmer Market Fruits

"Fall colored Farmer Market Fruits", 7"x 9 3/4", Gouache. 2012.


I ventured to the Palos Verdes Sunday farmers market to give painting on location another try.  I bought beautiful organic orange persimmons, a tasty bunch of purple grapes, a bright red pomegranate and a bunch of bright cheery yellow flowers and laid them out nicely on the table right next to the stands.  I brought my gouache paints again to capture the scene right at the market. I hope it inspired you to cook a holiday feast.

Plein air painting at the Yellow Vase.

"Some plein-air painters take considerable time to find just the right spot to paint before steeling down to work and others are painting in less than two minutes of arrival.  Often, it is the painter who sets up immediately who does the best work." ---Linda Blondheim

In the spirit of preparing for painting on location at coffee shops and restaurants of my choice, I enlisted once again the help of my artist friend Holly to join me in painting.  With only a about 2 hours before we had to leave we sat down and got to work.  Holly brought a photograph she had taken that she would paint from, and I came ready to paint whatever my eye was drawn to, to see how it would work out.

In the end Holly was able to finish her painting on location where I had to bring the half finished piece home to give it some final touches.  I loved painting at this site and would really love going back again and doing another painting inside or from photograph. I really can appreciate the challenges plein air painters face when coming to a new location. I will be more like Holly the next time I sit down to paint plein-air again.

Organic Apples! 5 different varieties.

"Give me juicy autumnal fruit, ripe and red from the orchard"---Walt Whitman

After thinking about the last entry with the cupcake I realized it wasn't fair to completely shut out all hope for desserts in my life.  So here I went to Whole Foods today in preparation for a Thanksgiving full of gluten, dairy and sugar free recipe options.  What better time a year to come together and share a meal with family and friends and who says it has to be bad for you and put on the extra pounds and make you feel sick afterwards...the meal could be created with the freshest organic ingredients and reducing as much processed canned goods as possible.  That is my challenge for the next week to get ready for our firs all out healthy Thanksgiving meal.  

The first step was shopping for the organic apples today in preparation for the apple tart and apple stuffing recipes that will be made later in the week.  I found 5 varieties of Organic Apples: gala, mc intosh, braeburn, golden delicious and cameo.  I plan on peeling coring and slicing these apples up later in the week into thin slices and putting them in a pecan crusted apple tart or possibly the apple pie itself.  

I painted these bright healthy beautiful apples in gouache because I wanted to start getting the vibrancy that the watercolor doesn't always give me in a quicker time.  It was only one coat for the background bowl and a few coats for the foreground apples and they were done.  Much faster and the same ease as the watercolor.  The affect is much more opaque though so what do you think?  Delicious?  

Organic Apples, 5 different varieties, 7" x 9 3/4", Gouache.

Cupcake and Coffee.

"Coffee should be black as hell, strong as death and sweet as love"....turkish proverb

After spending some time over at my sister's house, I realized that her living room is practically its own boutique.  It inspired me to take one of the cupcakes that Pam made for her baby shower, and a cup and saucer from her cabinet, and a blue runner from her wedding table and put it all together to replicate what it would be like to paint this same scene in a cafe on location.

Here are you can see the line drawing to complete painting all in a row.  I enjoyed painting the cupcake and coffee and look forward to painting in a cafe again soon.

Coffe and Cupcakes, 7"x 9 3/4", Watercolor.

..

Fall Colored Flowers in mixed media

  "Flowers are those little colorful beacons of the sun from which we get sunshine when dark, somber skies blanket our thoughts." ---Dodinsky

On my search for something to brighten up the house for the fall,   I stumbled upon this lively bouquet at Trader Joes. I was immediately drawn to the bright fall colored palette with the canary yellow center of the group.   I brought the flowers home, put them in a vase and realized was taller than my eyes could see.  So I put it on the floor at eye level, soaking up its beauty, while I  brainstormed how I wanted to paint this piece.  

The intensity of the color of the flowers reminded me of another piece I did of a cactus flower with a blue sky.  I started that piece on a white bristol board with a watercolor wash for the bottom layer of the sky and the blossoms, and then went over it with colored pencil which really made the color pop. 

For this piece I decided to try this same mixed media affect with my Canson drawing paper pad and began sketching the preliminary drawing directly on the paper. I have done watercolor mixed media with colored pencils before but never with this brand of paper. 

The first photo is the start of the watercolor done on the drawing paper.  I used bright colors to bottom paint under where I wanted the flowers to be extra vibrant. 

The second photo is the completion of the prismacolor colored pencils layer on top of the watercolor. Colored pencils on top of white paper can take a while to get the intensity of color I was looking for.  I like the effect of the intensity of the color, but the canson paper tended to buckle up and bubble so if I were to do this again I would be tempted to try a bristol board or a heavier paper.

The third and fourth images of this mixed media piece I decided to come back in with pen and ink line drawings on top of the last image.  I have a complete shot and a somewhat close-up of the center flowers.  I hope you like it and can't wait to hear any comments.  

Fall Colored Flowers. 9" x 12", Mixed Media.

Flowered Plate on Placemat

"Flowered Plate on Placemat" Watercolor. 2012.