It was very hot and dry in Alexander Valley yesterday. I spent my afternoon standing in the shade of an oak grove on the family ranch, painting one of the oak trees that survived last years fires. The threat of fire was everywhere, still. Ash scars and burned out stumps are in the foreground. Smoke from the glass fire currently raging over the hill near Mt. Saint Helena drifted into the Valley and filled the landscape with an ominous warm haze. Once again it is a tinder box.
Finally got away from my desk but I only had an hour before the sun set, so I quickly drove to the other side of San Anselmo, parked near the bald hill trailhead, walked a few feet past the gate and just started painting. The temperature started to drop, it’s the first time a while I needed a jacket while painting.
I ran out of panel boards to paint on, oh the joys of social distancing, finally made some more and am back at it. Here’s an oil sketch of a bush in my yard. (Nerium oleander)
This afternoon I drove to the family ranch to enjoy a social distancing mother’s day BBQ. Emerging from self isolation I found just seeing family in person to be a great joy. After lunch I stood off to the side drinking a cold ale and painted our rickety old barn. How this pile of dry fuel wrapped in a thick blanket of kindling survived the Kincaid fires is a mystery to us all.
My painting kit is light and small enough now that I can fit it all into a back pack. Today I rode my gravel bike out to Alpine Lake and painted a tree next to the side of the water.
I painted the unkept hillside to the south of my house from my living room window. Gravity is slowly pulling this little staircase down the slope. I probably should do something to fix it before it rolls off a small cliff and into my car. That sounds like a lot of work to fix though so instead I’ll just ignore it for a little longer and keep painting.
I hand ground and mixed the green paint from some Gamblin Chromium Oxide Green Pigment.
Another quarantine painting. This is the view looking down my driveway toward Terrace Ave, San Anselmo. In addition I made a time-lapse video of my painting process.
I painted the driveway behind my house.
A Persidio lunchtime painting from January. looking south from the picnic table at the Persidio Institute on a misty afternoon.
Looking west towards one of the Baker Beach overlook parking lots, in the Persidio, San Francisco. One of about twenty five Lunchtime paintings that I’ve made since the beginning of the year. My plan was to paint about two or three every week on my work lunch break. Hopefully I can get back into the office by summer. Until then, time to start painting the sites closer to home.
