Noci

For many years my father brought his entire family – three generations of us – to an annual event at the Louis Martini winery in Glen Ellen. Acres of cabernet grapes surround an old white clapboard farmhouse, an ancient-looking two story stone barn and a large arbor covering twenty or more picnic tables and benches – where the families of Il Cenacolo members (an Italian cultural club from San Francisco) had early autumn lunches in the wine country. It was a real treat for all of us to be there – it’s not open to the public. No polish, no glitz designed for tourists – a working vineyard. Like a rusty piece of farm equipment, it had soul that can only come after many years of honest work.

I took photos of figs, peaches, and, one year, these walnuts bursting from their husks. The image haunted me. Would it make an interesting painting? Are they recognizable as walnuts? The light isn’t “striking” – the day was overcast. I always paint “the light.” The image wouldn’t give up.

While on vacation, sitting on the beach on the island of Kauai, I transferred the drawing to watercolor paper. I rubbed graphite on the backside of a black and white image, printed on plain, letter-sized paper, and outlined the shapes to my paper with a ballpoint. Then, I started painting the “fuzzy background” using a tiny travel palette – sand already stuck in the blobs of watercolor paint, from the beach paintings I’d done before.

Painting this way reminds me of how simple it can be: just basic tools, and enough fascination and appreciation for the world we live in, to make art of it.

11 1/4"x11 1/4" - October-November 2022 - Watercolor on Paper

Cozy

Apple blossoms have to be the cutest of flowers.

In bud, they are chubby, cherubby, even. They have floppy petals tinged with pink and are in bloom at the same time as the leaves. Gotta love pink and green together. These are from the Gravenstein tree at my folks - the big yard where our family lived the second half of my childhood.

The first of three (so far) 11 1/4" square pieces I've done, I took a quarter sheet of Arches 300lb paper and squared it off. A fun, fuzzy-background first, then petals - and the subleties of light and shadow. This painting gave me something to work on when I didn't have it in me to take on the current big one underway.

11 1/4"x11 1/4" - throughout 2023 - Watercolor on paper.

Anuenue

Seems I can't tire of plumerias.

Yet another image gathered on a walk on the southside of Kauai. These were from a tree on Waikomo road, right in Koloa Town.

This one gave me fits. I couldn't get these flowers to truly live right away. I asked myself how it did so in my reference image but not my painting. More shadowing, blue, green, violet. It pays to persevere!

I have fun hunting for names - often Hawaiian names for Hawaiian flowers - "anuenue" means "rainbow."

11 1/4"x11 1/4" - Winter 2023-2024 - Watercolor on paper.

Afresh

A birthday gift from the artists in my watercolor group, this rosebush is named after Coretta Scott King. The red-pink buds hid the mostly-white petals within, awaiting their bloom time. A fun surprise!

All the drops on this one bud meant it was to become its very own painting.

"Afresh" because the rain cleans everything for a new start.

7.5"x7.5" - April 2023 - Watercolor on paper

Orangy

My fifth persimmon painting - the first that is actually life-size.

It's the smallest of my "little ones," barely seven inches square. I started it at least a dozen years ago - abandoned because I wasn't into small then. So, it shuffled around in my stuff until the summer of 2024 when little paintings became a thing. So satifying to finish it.

The color is the star. Layers of who knows what I used back then, covered with some Transparent Pyrrol Orange and Quinacridone Coral. I wanted the color to say something.

6 3/4"x6 7/8" - Finished July 2024 - Watercolor on paper.

Dangly

A fuchsia!

Yet another painting born from an image I collected on a walk home. This was near Nancy's front door - two doors down from our Fairfax house. I have been hankering to paint fuchsias for a long time. There are frilly-skirt-like, fancy varieties that keep wooing me. One day.

This one is a good start. It holds its own on this little piece of paper and gave me rich color to work with.

It dangled itself in front of my attention and asked to be painted.

7 1/2"x7 1/2" - August 2024 - Watercolor on paper.

Glow

Peace roses from the garden.

I put them in a little cream vase and set them next to a mosaic glass cylander in the bay window of the pink room. Early afternoon light made it all so pretty.

I cropped in close, so it's kind of hard to tell where the petals end and the pieces of glass take over. We are only painting shapes and colors, anyway.

Started on the shore of Lake Tahoe. Little paintings are very convenient beach entertainment! A perfect summer pasttime for this girly artist.

7 1/2"x7 1/2" - August 2024 - Watercolor on paper.

Pick-me!

Strawberries for breakfast.

What a treat to go out in the yard, around to the sunny side of the Fairfax house, to find ripe berries hanging over the edge of the terra cotta pot they are growing in. They had to pose for a picture before being picked.

Even the white, underripe one was fun to paint. Ok, maybe not fun, but interesting! Painting around light seeds and shiny highlights with red paint takes focus and patience - and a good drawing - at least for me it does.

7 1/2"x7 1/2" - August 2024 - Watercolor on paper.

Smile

Plumeria flowers are fun to paint.

The petals do this curly-swirly thing that is a thrill to make happen in two dimensions on paper. These were from a tree on the west end of Poipu, Kauai, across from the seawall where we sometimes watch the sun go down.

I started this on Zoom for the Watercolor Wednesdays series I did in 2022, and finished it that fall on Kauai.

It just made me happy, and all those curves looked like smiles.

7.5"x7.5" - October 2022 - Watercolor on paper.

Shiny

Walking along Woodland Ave in the center of San Anselmo, Califonrnia, a rose asked me to take its picture.

Fast forward a few years, we are all in lockdown with a global pandemic and I'm asked to show how to paint the curl of a petal over Zoom. This rose had nice curvy petals - it would do the trick. I painted it small so it would easily fit in the screen. The largest of my paintings I have to lay across them to paint into the middle.

All that sunlight, the petals were just - shiny!

9"x9" - May 2020 - Watercolor on paper.