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Art business Drawing Gardening Ink and watercolor wash Outdoors/Landscape Painting Plants Sketchbook Pages

Between a Rock and… a Request for Help

Moss Rock Grows Moss, ink, Pentel Brush Pen & watercolor
Moss Rock Grows Moss (typo--it's 2011!) ink, Pentel Brush Pen & watercolor

After ten years this very large rock sold to me as a “Moss Rock” and installed in my front garden has finally grown a patch of moss. It looked so pretty and the day was unseasonably warm and sunny so I couldn’t resist going out to sketch it. I sat on my porch and drew the mossy rock while my usually indoor kitties joined me in the sun.

And now my request for advice:

I need help figuring out how to sort/store my oil paintings. I have at least a hundred oil paintings and plein air studies on panels (probably more) that I’ve done over the past few years. I’m sure for some people it’s simple: just sell them all.

But if you’re like me and still have many paintings on hand, I’d love to hear how you organize, catalog, store and/or protect them from damage. I have many watercolors on paper in large flat files sorted by subject matter, with drawers labeled accordingly. But I haven’t figured out a good system for my oils.

When I get a request from someone wanting to purchase a painting it can be challenging to find it and I always have my fingers crossed that it hasn’t gotten damaged.

My questions:

ORGANIZING: Do you store your paintings by subject? Size? Date? Inventory number (requires entering in art tracking program)? OR…just skip the organizing and spend the time painting instead?!!

STORAGE: Should they be separated with wax paper when stored touching each other? Does it matter if they’re in the dark?  My garage is fairly dry but not insulated so is affected by weather. Is it ok to store oils on panels in Clearbag envelopes to protect their surface?

At the beginning of the year I usually sort through the past year’s paintings stored vertically on shelves like books in my studio. I dump the losers, label the keepers, and move older paintings to shelves in the garage. This year I had the flu during my two-week holiday vacation so never did the “dump and sort” so paintings have piled up in the studio shelves and storage closet and there are more drying.

Any advice or suggestions would be greatly appreciated!

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Berkeley Drawing Ink and watercolor wash People Places Sketchbook Pages Urban Sketchers

Second Line Parade: Treme New Orleans Brass Band

Treme Brass Band sketches, ink & watercolor
Treme Brass Band sketches, ink & watercolor

To celebrate their 50th anniversary, Arhoolie Records held a “second line parade” led by the New Orleans-based Tremè Brass Band. The parade started with a fantastic concert at Berkeley’s Civic Center Park

In the video below you can see and hear the band (and me trying to sketch them, looking like a bobble-head doll as I look up at the band and down at my sketchbook. I’m at top right of the screen, starting around 30 seconds in, wearing bright green.)

After they played 20 minutes or so, we danced (and sketched) along behind the band to the Berkeley BART station, with many people twirling handkerchiefs or parasols in the air as is the tradition in second line parades. They performed another brief concert, and then more people joined in the parade as we moved along Shattuck Avenue.

Playing by the BART station
Playing by the BART station (note guy recording sound with mic on boom)

The parade ended at Freight & Salvage on Addison Street where we were again treated to more great Dixieland music. By then I was pretty far back in the crowd so gave up trying to draw the band but noticed these guys on the roof videotaping the event as we arrived.

Gathering at Freight and Salvage
Gathering at Freight and Salvage

This was one of those “It doesn’t get any better than this” experiences: Fantastic live music, sunshine and sketching! I knew the sketching would be challenging because of the constant movement, so only had as my goal to have fun and give it a try. I definitely had fun!

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Art theory Oil Painting Painting Still Life

Limited Palettes 2-Color Studies

Clockwise from top left; all also include white: Cadmium Lemon Yellow + Sevre Blue; Cad. Yellow + Viridian; Cad. Yellow Pale + Permanent Rose; Ultramarine + Perm. Aliz., oil on 12x12" panel

Following in the footsteps of Kathryn Law’s 36 (!) color studies inspired by the Peggi Kroll-Roberts Limited Palettes video, I returned to doing more of my own. As Kathryn explains on her post, it’s all about learning what your colors can do.

The four at top I did yesterday, after switching back to regular oils (mostly Winsor & Newton). Below are some that I did previously using Holbein Aqua Duos water-soluble oils that I fell out of love with.

Dioxazine Violet & Quinacridone Red
Dioxazine Violet & Quinacridone Red; warm light, cool shadows

Dioxazine Violet & Cad Yellow Deep, V.1
Dioxazine Violet & Cad Yellow Deep, V.1

Dioxazine Violet & Cad Yellow Deep, V.2

Ultramarine Blue & Cadmium Orange; cool light, warm shadows

Phthalo Green and Cad Lemon Yellow; warm lights, cool shadows
Phthalo Green and Cad Lemon Yellow; warm lights, cool shadows

This is a really fun exercise. The idea is to discover about all the variations of value and hue that you can make with just two colors (plus white) and to experiment with using both cool and warm colors for the light or the shadows. It can be done with any medium (with watercolor you’d use two colors and vary the amounts of water instead of adding white).

Doing exercises like this is also a great way to have fun with paint when time is short or if there’s a big scary painting that you’re not quite ready to begin.

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Berkeley Drawing People Places Sketchbook Pages Urban Sketchers

Brennan’s Bar Sketches

Brennan's Validates
Brennan's Validates

Sketching at Brennan’s Bar and Hoffbrau in Berkeley is always fun. When we met there for Tuesday night sketching last month Cathy had just returned from her sketching workshop that was held at Disneyworld in Florida so the first part of the evening was her amazing show and tell. You can see her Disneyworld sketches on our Urban Sketchers blog here and here and Micaela’s Brennan’s sketches are here.

Muffin-top guys at the bar
Muffin-top guys at the bar

If you’re unfamiliar with the term “muffin-top,” it’s the bulge protruding above the belt from wearing too-tight jeans, especially widespread [pun intended] a few years ago when fashion dictated ever lower waistlines on pants with shorter tops).

 

Warm-up sketch at Brennan's
Warm-up sketch at Brennan's

This was my first sketch of what I saw in front of me, just trying to do something simple to warm up before tackling more complicated stuff.

 

 

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Landscape Oil Painting Outdoors/Landscape Painting Places Virtual Paint-Out

Romanian Winter Hayride (Virtual Paintout)

Romanian Winter Hayride, oil painting on panel, 9x12"
Romanian Winter Hayride, oil painting on panel, 9×12″ (SOLD)

After rambling around Romania, seeing beautiful summery farmland, busy cities, and a shepherd walking his sheep down a village street, suddenly it was Christmas with nativity scenes in front yards and this wonderful snowy hayride (virtually, of course via Google Streetview for the Virtual Paintout).

Romanian Winter Hayride Reference Photo
Bicaz-Chei, Romania: Winter Hayride Reference Photo

Yesterday I’d tried painting a different Romania scene (below) but soon realized I was laboring joylessly on a hopeless painting, fighting paint the consistency of toothpaste. I gave up, scraped off the panel (glad I’ve gotten smarter about when to cut my losses), and returned to Google’s wonderful new MapCrunch.com where I found the above photo.

Continue reading “Romanian Winter Hayride (Virtual Paintout)”
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Berkeley Ink and watercolor wash Interiors Painting People Places Sketchbook Pages

Sketching at Le Bateau Ivre (The Drunken Boat)

Le Bateau Ivre, ink & watercolor
Le Bateau Ivre, ink & watercolor

Le Bateau Ivre is a cafe I used to visit often when I first moved to Berkeley so it was great to rediscover it with my Tuesday night sketch group. The food is wonderful and the atmosphere warm and inviting. Le Bateau Ivre is in an old house on Telegraph Avenue and each room has its own charming personality and decor.

Details of the room and music
Details of the room and music and my drawing mistake

I fell in love with the classical music playing in the cafe and was holding up my iPhone to the speaker, hoping that the Shazam or Soundhound apps could guess the recording. The owner of Le Bateau Ivre saw me and asked if the music was too loud. I explained what I was trying to do and she ran to get the CD and showed it to me. I took a photo of the cover which I later pasted on to this page. The CD was Heinrich Ignaz Franz van Biber: Sonatae a Violino solo of 1681.

Categories
Drawing Food sketch Ink and watercolor wash Life in general Painting Sketchbook Pages

When Being Behind Is a Good Thing

Slowing Down With a Latte and Mini-Scone at Peets
Slowing Down With a Latte and Mini-Scone at Peets

Falling behind and worrying about catching up can be stressful when it’s about work not accomplished, tasks not completed. But in the case of my blog, being behind on posting is a good thing. It just means I’ve been doing lots of painting and sketching with less time for the computer (a goal for this year).

I did the sketch above on the day I was preparing to leave for a weekend painting workshop. I reminded myself that I was officially on vacation, which allowed me to slow down enough to stop and sketch while out walking to do errands instead of rushing back home to get packed.

This sketch came in handy last week at work, when I wrote and illustrated a blog post for our literacy organization’s blog. My post’s subtitle was: “Two birds with one stone” (intentionally leaving off  “kill”). Our clever editor suggested changing it to “Feed two birds with one scone.”  So then I needed a sketch of a scone to accompany my two birds. Since I always have my sketchbook with me I was able to scan the scone sketch. You can see the result on our Reading Apprenticeship blog here.

And I will get that backlog of artwork posted soon!

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Drawing Ink and watercolor wash Interiors Other Art Blogs I Read Painting Places Sketchbook Pages Urban Sketchers

Honda of El Cerrito: Sketching Cars

Honda of El Cerrito, Ink & watercolor
Honda of El Cerrito, Ink & watercolor

The El Cerrito Honda dealership was kind enough to allow our Tuesday night urban sketchers group to come and sketch in their showroom. There were chairs and tables for us to sketch and paint in comfort and interesting architecture and cars to draw. I remember boys drawing cars all the time but never thought that someday I’d go out of my way to draw cars too.

The artist Rebeca Garcia Gonzalez told me that she likes including cars in her paintings because they remind her of jewel-like candies. In this post she not only included cars, but got a passerby to stand and pose for her and included him in the painting!

 

Shark Honda, ink & watercolor
Shark Honda, ink & watercolor

I drew this car at the end of the evening and it was so close to me that it got way out of proportion and then started looking like a shark with whatever that thingee was on top. It’s good to develop the ability to see and draw cars because they’re everywhere, and leaving them out of a scene can look strange.

 

Artist Beth Bourland told me a funny story about this car sketch on her blog. She kept working on her drawing after the cars drove away. Some passerbys looked at her sketch and then at the empty street in front of her, and back at the sketch, wondering if she was seeing things.

You can see Cathy’s Honda sketches on our Urban Sketchers blog here.

Categories
Art theory Oil Painting Other Art Blogs I Read Painting Still Life

My Super Bowl (of apples) Sunday

Super Bowl of Apples, oil on panel, 8x8"
Super Bowl of Apples, oil on panel, 8x8"

I don’t really “get” football although I have fond memories of men (my father and others) gleefully yelling at televised games. I didn’t want to feel left out of the Super Bowl Sunday festivities so I celebrated in my own way: painting a Super Bowl of apples.

I love this old “Metlock California Pottery” bowl which I think might have been my grandmother’s. I use it for my big lunch salads nearly every day. It’s also a great popcorn bowl.

Plane Divisions chart, from Hensche Colour Study pdf
Plane Divisions chart, from Hensche Colour Study pdf*

At last weekend’s workshop with Peggi Kroll-Roberts, one important bit of guidance she gave me was that “every plane has a color change and/or value change” and she diagrammed for me how to visual the planes of the cylindrical object I was painting (an old teapot), similar to Fig. C above. She encouraged me to see and paint those changes in value and color and I tried to do that with the apples.

I learned so much at the workshop and hope to return to her next session in March. It was also great finally meeting my friend Kathryn Law in person (she attended the workshop too). Kathryn has already posted her terrific workshop paintings with commentary on her blog. You can see her Workshop Day One here and Day Two here.

*The diagram above was from a  source completely unrelated to Peggi Kroll-Roberts. I extracted it from the lengthy .pdf file “Colour Study,” downloadable from the website, Oil Painting Thoughts and Ideas about Henry Hensche’s approach to color study.

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Berkeley Drawing Food sketch Ink and watercolor wash Interiors Painting Places Sketchbook Pages Urban Sketchers

North Beach Pizza in an Old Berkeley IHOP

North Beach Pizza Berkeley, ink & watercolor
North Beach Pizza Berkeley, ink & watercolor

North Beach Pizza in Berkeley is housed in a former International House of Pancakes. Pizza is a sort of large pancake, I suppose, but I wouldn’t want it served with maple syrup. We had a good time eating, chatting and sketching the night away, six of us in one cozy booth.

North Beach Pizza, ink & watercolor
North Beach Pizza, ink & watercolor

I drew the pizza before sharing it with Cathy and Micaela (her sketch is here on our Urban Sketchers site.)