Christina’s Garden-Echinacea, ink and watercolor, 5×7 in
While the rest of the country is dealing with icy cold, we’re having a warmer-than- summer winter in Northern California. Instead of hunkering down and getting “rainy-day” tasks done at the computer I’m out walking for hours every day in the 72 degree sunshine with my pup. I love it but I miss winter!!!
Christina’s Garden 3: Kangaroo Paws, ink and watercolor, 5×7 in
Although these flowers were sketched in a friend’s beautiful garden during the actual summer months of 2013, my roses are still blooming and spring flowers and fruit tree blossoms are bursting out everywhere, despite the lack of rain. It’s weird to see brown dry hills in January.
Christina’s Garden 1, ink and watercolor, 5×7 in
Every day I look at the weather report, hoping to see rain in the near future, but it’s just not there. They’re saying this may be the driest year in 500 years. I read it’s already the driest winter in California recorded history. Since last winter ended I think all we’ve had are 2 days of minimal drizzles.
Until we get some winter weather, my semi-drought of blog posting will probably continue along with the sunshine that pulls me outdoors and away from the computer.
Apricots and Butter Jar, oil on panel, 10×10 inches
I like to spend New Years Day reflecting on the past year and looking ahead to the new one. While last year’s review post was full of artistic accomplishments, 2013 was a mixed year. It started off about art and ended with diversions, digressions and Dog. And in the middle I spent the summer studying Flemish oil painting technique with Alex Zonis, resulting in the painting above. (I took photos of each step along the way in this painting and will post about the process very soon.)
January 2013: Urban Sketchers show and painting dogs
Cocoa: Dog Portrait, oil on panel, 8×8″I
The year began well. I completed this commissioned dog portrait (one of five I did in December/January) and my Urban Sketchers group had an exhibit of our sketchbooks and hosted a sketchcrawl for the community.
February and March 2013: Sketching and Painting
Waiting and Watching at Peets, ink, 5×8″
I continued having fun sketching and completed several oil paintings (a decent portrait and some mostly unsuccessful sunflowers).
Poultry Panorama (2-page spread in my sketchbook).
April 2013: Spring sprung; creativity flowed
Crab Apple Paired, Oil on Archival Panel, 10×8″
April was a creative month, with several oil paintings completed including my favorite above. I started sketching in an 8 x 11 Moleskine (see bus sketch below) and attended a sketchcrawl, several museum shows, and the Codex Book Fair.
El Volado the Mexican Bus, ink & watercolor, 8×11″
May 2013: Every Day in May
May was the best month of the year because of the Every Day Matters “Every Day in May” project. I had so much fun doing daily sketching!
A UK publisher asked to include a couple of the May sketches in a 2014 book on sketching.
June 2013: Started Flemish painting class and more dog portraits
Sam, A Dog Portrait in Oils, Oil on Panel, 8×8″
After completing another commissioned dog portrait I began studying the Flemish oil painting method with Alex Zonis over Skype. The result was the Apricot painting at the top of this post, with more than 10 layers of paint, and three months work. I will post about the process soon.
July 2013: Hosted First West Coast Sketchcrawl
Coit Tower, from Levi Plaza, SF Sketchcrawl 40, ink & watercolor 7×5″
My Urban Sketchers group worked hard for much of July to prepare for hosting the first 3-day West Coast Urban Sketchcrawl in San Francisco and Oakland which was a great success with nearly 75 people each day. Meanwhile, I continued working on the apricot painting.
August 2013: Show at the Collector Gallery
My wall in the group show at the Collector
August was a month of many successes: after a lot of prep work for the show at the Collector gallery, I sold 5 paintings and a print (4 at the show, 2 from my website, 3 of which went to France and Switzerland). I continued working on the Flemish method apricot oil painting with Alex; still the only oil painting in progress in the studio.
September 2013: New York Art Adventure!
New Makeup for New York, ink and watercolor, 7.5″ x 11″ spread
I bound a new sketchbook and shopped for things I needed for my trip to New York City after deciding my funky, frumpy Berkeley visage wouldn’t cut it in NY. FINALLY finished the Flemish method oil painting of apricots!
Battery Park, Statue of Liberty, Ellis Island, ink and watercolor, 5.5×7.5″
The NYC trip was fantastic! I had a blast, visiting with New York artist friends, going to museums and sketching the city. I didn’t want to come home!
October 2013: A sketchcrawl and the flu
Jack London Cabin and Wolf Statue, ink and watercolor, 10×7 in
I did very little sketching or painting in October as I was sick nearly the entire month from a bug I caught traveling that lasted three weeks and finally required antibiotics. I did manage to get to a sketchcrawl at Jack London Square.
November: Thanksgiving and surgery
Thanksgiving Centerpiece, ink and watercolor, 5×7.5 in
I recovered from the October illness just in time to have a planned surgery on Halloween to correct a long-standing problem. The supposed 2-3 week recovery time took nearly 5 weeks. I was very grateful to be well enough to attend Thanksgiving dinner, my first real outing all month. I did very little sketching and no painting in November, due to limited mobility and energy.
December: It’s all about the DOG
My new dog Millie sketched from life, ink and watercolor, 5×5 in
I’ve wanted a dog for years and finally, just as I recovered from surgery I found my perfect pup. I’ve had 5-month old Millie for one month and she is so much fun. We’ve been walking 3 to 7 miles in nature every day. She’s a 20 pound Formosa Mountain Dog, who was rescued with her litter in Taiwan and shipped here by a rescue group for adoption. When I met her it was love at first sight.
Millie in a silly winter sweater
I’ve done very little artwork or blog posting while working out a routine with the dog and my two cats in December, recovering from surgery in November and October’s flu bug. Now it’s a new year and I’m finding my way back to painting and sketching again (and hopefully more regular blogging)!
Millie and I on adoption day
Looking ahead in 2014
My goal for 2014 is to continue to explore and focus on how (and what) I most enjoy drawing and painting, and then work more consistently with that approach and subject matter. I also want to focus on being more present and connected to nature, the seasons, weather, and the calendar, and reflecting that connection in my art.
Canadian Goose, Knox Miller Park, ink and watercolor, 5×7 in
After an extraordinary autumn and early winter, with many things other than art going on in my life, I’ve gotten way behind on posting. This goose isn’t really a Christmas goose, it’s a summer goose, as are the rest of these sketches from Knox Miller park.
Knox Miller Park Clouds, watercolor, 5×7 in
Knox Miller Park in Pt. Richmond is so pretty, with a lagoon of sorts, grassy meadows and the bay and mountains of Marin in the distance. The birds were all sketched from photos, the little landscape above was the only sketch I managed to do on site, after arriving late and feeling poorly that day.
Knox Miller Goose, ink and watercolor 5×7 in
Silly goose. My first attempt at drawing him from a photo.
White Pelican, Knox Miller Park, ink, watercolor and gouache, 5×7 in
I struggled and struggled trying to draw and paint this unusual white pelican from a blurry photo. I ended up adding some gouache to get back some white, which never really works well.
Birdwatching at Albany Bulb 1, ink and watercolor, 5×7 in
While I was having my car’s oil changed at Toyota Albany I took a hike down to the SF Bay Trail to sketch. I followed a confusing bike and walking path that goes up onto an overpass and then down under the freeway. It leads to the marsh on the way out to Albany Bulb, a spit of land homesteaded by the homeless that the city is constantly trying to reclaim. There were birds everywhere, including the beautiful, delicate white Snowy Egrets that always delight me (above).
Pigeons on the Freeway, ink and watercolor, 5×7 in
I even spotted birds living right on the freeway walls; the family of pigeons above didn’t seem disturbed by the constant roar of cars. The hike was a bit isolated, and it felt spooky walking under the freeways, even on a sunny weekday morning. Fortunately the few people I saw along the way were polite bicyclists. No trolls living under these bridges like the Brothers Grimm fairytale I remember with horror from my childhood.
Birdwatching at Albany Bulb, ink, 5×7 in
While I was sketching, a man was photographing birds nearby and he told me the names of the birds we were seeing, and how to differentiate them. I made notes on my sketch as I tried to figure out the basic shape of the birds.
90 Ladybugs for Mom’s 90th Birthday, ink and watercolor, 5×7 in
One of the many things I have to be thankful for this holiday season is that my mother just turned 90! I made this little birthday card for her with 90 ladybugs on it. Ninety sounds like a big number but when illustrated with ladybugs it doesn’t seem like that much.
She is still going strong, living independently in her own home, driving in the crazy L.A. traffic, cooking her own meals, and managing her own affairs. A few years ago she bought a computer and though it drives her crazy with its seeming capriciousness, she usually wins the battle to find her email, read it, and even print it when the stars really line up right.
She doesn’t paint anymore, but you can see a gallery of her artwork here from around the 1950s. Below is my favorite of her paintings: my grandmother Gertie.
My mother’s oil painting of her mother, my grandmother
Thanksgiving Centerpiece, ink and watercolor, 5×7.5 in
My sister Marcy hosted our Thanksgiving dinner and my niece Sophie made the stunning table centerpiece that my sketch above doesn’t do justice to. We added a new tradition to our Thanksgiving dinner: The thrift-shop Tacky Holiday Sweater Contest (below).
Tacky Holiday Sweater Contest Winners
Mine was no doubt the ugliest but Robin’s (on the right) got extra points for being ill-fitting. It’s too bad you can’t see Nilla the dog’s lovely sweater, complete with jingle bells and ornaments. She only looks like a giant because of being closer to the camera. Britney (center) got extra credit for her Walmart faux-patent-leather skin-tight leggings to go with her Vegas-grandma-style sweater.
During a special after-hours access for artists event, we visited Filoli to explore and sketch this amazing historic site. I started by sketching the doorway to the walled gardens (above).
Filoli is only 3o miles south of San Francisco but of another time and place entirely. Built in 1917 and lived in until 1975, the 654-acre property includes a 36,000 square foot Georgian country house and spectacular 16-acre English Renaissance garden.
Filoli Garden Panorama, ink and watercolor, 5×14 in
After touring the house (where we spotted original Sargent portraits of the family) we only had a couple of hours left so I decided to set a timer on my phone to force myself to sketch quickly and keep moving. It created an unpleasant sense of urgency in a place that could have been all about serenity. I should have relaxed, explored the entire grounds, and then sketched my favorite spots.
Filoli Pool, ink and watercolor, 5×7 in
Instead I spent time sketching the pool (interesting shadows; but not an original feature of the estate) so missed the spectacular rose gardens which I caught a glimpse of on my way out. I will definitely return for the next artist access day.
Empress Hornblower at Sunset, ink and watercolor, 5×7 in
Sounds like a great title for a children’s book, no? The Empress Hornblower (above) is part of a fleet of party boats moored behind the ritzy hotel at the northern Berkeley marina, an area long-time residents remember as the old Berkeley dump.
Before “ecology” and “global warming” were common words, cities dumped their garbage, old cars, construction rubble, etc. in the San Francisco Bay. As they filled in the bay with garbage, they created new land on which they built housing, freeways, and, when they finally closed the dump, parks and hotels.
Wanna Be Cantaloupe, ink and watercolor, 5×7 in
My tenant (I own/live in a duplex) loves to garden so I put in a raised bed for her and we prepared the soil along the side of our property for flowers and veges. When she planted cantaloupes I warned her they wouldn’t thrive in our foggy climate but she ignored me.
They were cute but never got bigger than chubby cucumbers, and probably most of that was skin. She pulled them out before she left on vacation in October. I didn’t have the heart to ask her if she ate them or put them in the green bin for recycling.
World Journal News Box at Clark Kerr, ink/watercolor, 7x5x5.5 in
Although cold autumn weather and even snow already arrived in much of the western hemisphere, always radical Berkeley begs to differ. We had an unusually unfoggy and warm summer, a toasty fall, and now, with temperatures in the 70s we’re back to summer again. So far 2013 is the driest year in Bay Area history with less rain than any year in recorded history, all the way back to the Gold Rush.
After a delay posting work from the summer due to various health issues, at least it doesn’t feel awkward to be posting them now, thanks to our seemingly endless summer.
In the sketch above, this bright red Chinese newspaper box on the Clark Kerr Campus immediately drew my attention. Clark Kerr was built in the 1930s as a residential school for the blind. When blind students began mainstreaming into regular public schools, the University of California Berkeley bought the complex for student housing. Clark Kerr’s beautiful, serene grounds and Spanish style buildings provide an oasis of sketching opportunities in the middle of a busy urban area.
Lima, Peru, ink and watercolor from Google Streetview, 4×5 in
I love doing the Virtual Paintout, strolling around a city in Google Streetview and picking a scene to paint. This sketch is a preliminary study for an oil painting still in progress. The location is Nicolas de Pierola and Jr. Cańete Streets in Lima, Peru. Here’s a link to the map: http://goo.gl/maps/hQdsp.
Below is the original screenshot plus a few other streetview pictures from around Lima. Although the city looked very beautiful, I’m often drawn to funkier parts of town.
Original Scene
Front Porch Sitters
Funny little motorcycle/car hybrids
More motorcycle cars
Bimbo bread. Hope it doesn’t have the same meaning in Spanish!
Jana Bouc, Artist 