Santa Ana River 5 Vespertine painting

"Santa Ana River 5 (Vespertine)"
watercolor on paper, 2014
6" x 18" (15.24cm x 45.72cm)

This is my painting for the article "The River in Me" by Susan Straight for Orion magazine. See previous post.

The client wanted to see more color than my more urban versions of the river to communicate the lush verdant arroyo and river banks of the author's essay.
If you are not familiar with Southern California's landscape much of it is either desert or savanna, dry most of the year. But the river basins are teaming with green lush vegetation and wildlife year round.

I was happy I visited the site because I learned that at this time of day with the river sitting down in the arroyo the long streaking shadows are gone as the sun drops behind the hills but there was still plenty of light in the landscape.

We originally talked about showing some evidence of the manmade as you can see in the some of the sketches in my previous post but we arrived at this one (sketch 3) and I was happy with it.
When you are down in the arroyo, although there is some of the manmade, you do feel like you are away from the city and the final painting reflects that as well as that same feeling in much of the article.
What did remain was the distant dry desert mountains of Southern California in the background.297

Santa Ana River 5 Vespertine sketches

"Santa Ana River 5 (Vespertine)"
pencil on paper, 2014

This is a recent commission for Orion magazine. Today the thumbnail sketches, tomorrow the painting.
My art is featured in the current January/Feburary 2015 issue.

I was contacted by the magazine after they found my Santa Ana River series while researching an article for their magazine. The article titled "The River in Me" by Susan Straight is about the authors experiences with the northern section of the Santa Ana River here in Southern California.

After some emails back and forth I decided to visit the site in person. The northern section of the Santa Ana River is more rural or natural than my more industrial/city versions I had done previously and I needed to get a feel for it so I could be as true as possible to the site and especially the author's vision of it.

I did some value thumbnails and sent these six for approval.
We decided on number 3.

Vespertine refers to the hour before sunset, not quite dusk or twilight. Poetically it is the magic hour.
While visiting the site I made it a point to really pay attention to the quality and the amount of light and I was surprised how much light is still in the landscape that final hour, more than I expected, much more than dusk but still a different quality than earlier in the afternoon.

As part of my research I took photos of course and although I originally planned to do color sketches on site. Once there I changed my mind.

The alternative was to simply stop and pay attention, make mental notes or write down thoughts. I have found I will remember more when I make it a task in itself.
Photos are good for the technical information and on-site sketches are only good to a point when it is late and the light is changing by the minute. We can get caught up in making the sketches and miss a lot of change. I might get down a color sketch or two but I gained much more by simply observing then committing it and trusting it to my memory.295,296

Watercolor Landscape - Storm

"Storm Over Cajon"

watercolor on paper, 2014

9" x 13" (22.86cm x 33.02cm)
For Sale at DAILY PAINTWORKS, CLICK HERE

Direct link to painting here

Although I would describe myself as a fair weather person I love stormy weather. It always makes for a great painting subject.
A nice dramatic storm rising from the Cajon Pass, the long climb from San Bernardino to the high desert, is about to pounce on the Mojave Desert.291

Watercolor Landscape - Old Tree

"Old Tree"
watercolor on paper, 2014
9" x 13" (22.86cm x 33.02cm)
For Sale at DAILY PAINTWORKS, CLICK HERE

Direct link to painting here

A simple watercolor of an old tree hemmed in by lush green healthy ones. They seemed to be huddling around it, as if in a protective manner. I simplified the dark mass of trees to better play-off the lines of the foreground.

I also liked the shapes of this landscape, the troughed out foreground and the odd irrigation pipe loop so I painted it. That's it.290

Watercolor Landscape - Palm Grove

"Palm Grove"   SOLD

watercolor on paper, 2014

9" x 13" (22.86cm x 33.02cm)

This palm grove near home made for a simple subject but challenging compositional design. Its simple design motif of the palm tree shapes could too easily lead to a boring design of repetitive shapes.
The right cropping and ratio of positive to negative shapes is what makes it work. The only trees shown in their full outline are the yellow green ones which are not big within the overall composition.

I took a more graphic approach for this watercolor using value for atmospheric depth but ignoring the rule of warm foreground to cooler bluer colors (only) as the landscape recedes, except for the distant tree line of blue and purple.
I like to test various ways of depicting distance and here I put the coldest color, blue, in the foreground, a blue green in the near middle ground, changing to a yellow green in the far middle ground. The far background falling into the cooler range of purple and blue.
The alternating cool, warm, cool still does a good job of showing distance - cool foreground, warm middle ground, cool background.
The color saturation and intensity falls somewhere in the middle of the scale but is low chroma.
I like to do simplistic studies like these to work out ideas for the more involved paintings. That way I am not committing huge blocks of time only to find out it did not work.289

Road w/ Pipeline

"Road w/ Pipeline"
oil on panel, 2014
6" x 9" (15.24cm x 22.86cm)
For Sale at DAILY PAINTWORKS, CLICK HERE
Direct link to painting here

Here's a landscape not far from home. It's an unstable area under constant land movement as it slowly slides into the Pacific Ocean. Because of this the pipeline must be above ground and the road requires year round maintenance. After a rain the road can get cracks and vertical drops of several inches overnight.

To make for a better midday painting and give the hillside a dark richness and I dropped in a soft shadow from passing overhead clouds. That also made for a better separation of foreground and background.288

Cuts Like a Knife

"Burnscape 10"
oil on panel, 2014
6" x 8" (15.24cm x 20.32cm)

This a recent painting from my Burnscape series which has been dormant for a while.

Burnscape Series - Living in Southern California and seeing so many wildfires it would be easy to focus on the destruction. My attraction for the burned landscape isn't for its destruction... but instead how it modifies the landscape, turning it into a charcoal terrain... it is rebirth, the way Mother Nature intended.
It is how She manages her jurisdiction, by controlling dense undergrowth. We usually get in the way.
Man has traditionally prevented fires, the growth becoming so thick that when fire does occur it is devastating. Another topic on the Man vs Nature theme.

This one is similar to my "Burnscape #4 (Charred Pine Stand)".
Trees are meant to survive natural wildfires where the brush is low to the ground, the fire sweeping through too quickly, and frequently enough, to wipe them out. These pines were burned too much to survive.
Here I included the dirt road which stands in stark contrast to the blackened soil and slices through the landscape like a knife.286

Click the Series-Burnscape label to see them all.

Seascape Cliff Shipwreck

"Seascape Cliff Shipwreck"
oil on panel, 2010
3.5" x 5" (8.89cm x 12.7cm)
private collection

This is another version of the same painting from the previous post.
The biggest difference is the addition of the shipwreck which made it more fun. Other than that the cliff is very similar in color but the background is cool green here, cool purple and orange in the previous.
You can see how in this one there is more separation of the cliff and background, primarily through value.

This is part of the reason for doing studies.266

Seascape Cliff Crashing Waves

"Seascape Cliff Crashing Waves"
oil on panel, 2010
3.5" x 5" (8.89cm x 12.7cm)
private collection

Here is another small seascape study I did as a gift a few years back. Much like the previous post you can see the saturation of palette is the same. That is what I was doing at the time.

Again, like I said in the previous post, I am looking back at these earlier studies to retrace my thoughts and then decide if there is anything in them I want to pursue for a 2014 series.

I currently have about 15 or 20 works in progress at different stages, in 4 or 5 different series (genres) and various sizes so I don't have a lot to post just yet. I thought I would share these for now.

I have another slightly different version of the above I will post next.
You can at any time click the 'seascape' LABEL and see all the recent and past seascapes and gain a sense of what I am looking towards for a new 2014 series. 265

Zen Seascape

"Seascape Sunset"
oil on panel, 2009
3.5" x 5" (cm x cm)
private collection

Here is a small seascape study I did as gift a few years back.
Besides the recent ones I have been doing, exploring different directions, I also have been looking back at earlier ones I did.
Sometimes I had thoughts, recorded in these studies, that got lost in the shuffle of other projects and paintings.
Now is the time to consider which ones I will reincarnate for a seascape series.

I stood on the cliffs just before sunset on a calm day at low tide, the water smooth as glass except near the shore where the gentle waves washed over the rocks, radiating these circular ripples. The deep rich saturated colors of sunset reflecting off the water like a stained glass window.

I remember it as having a zen like quality and realized that a view including the sky would turn out to be just another sunset painting and that the sensation (zensation?) was actually in the foreground, no distant horizon was needed. In fact including too much might have defeated it altogether.

I am reminded the sea has many moods, from the stormy to the meditative.264

Seascape Dark Rock Study

"Seascape - Dark Rock Study"
oil on panel, 2013
5" x 7" (12.7cm x 17.78)

In my recent seascape studies here is an oil painting. The dark rock against all the white boulders made for a good study in the colors of white on a bright sunny day. I pushed the saturation quite a bit on this one.

If one like this makes it to a larger more finished version I may likely pull back a bit on the saturation. Part of experimenting is pushing things to really find out what can be done. This allowed me to focus on the color cast of each area.262

*I photographed this painting while wet so most of the white specks are glare highlights. When dry I will rephotograph.
*12/28/13 I've uploaded this more accurate pic. Gone are the white highlight specks. Any left are the white of the board showing.

Seascape Tide Pools 2

"Seascape Tide Pools 2"

watercolor on paper, 2013

6" x 9" (15.24cm x 22.86cm)

For sale at DAILY PAINTWORKS

Direct link to painting here

Here is another exploratory seascape. I am doing these in preparation for larger works.
As I experiment with light, atmosphere, seasons, palette, design, moving the horizon up and down etc, I will begin to hone in on one or more series within the larger seascape motif.

This one and the previous "Seascape Tide Pools" both are fair weather versions.260

Seascape Tide Pools

"Seascape Tide Pools"
watercolor on paper, 2013
6" x 8" (15.24cm x 20.32cm)
For sale at DAILY PAINTWORKS
Direct link to painting here

One of my goals for 2014 is to do more seascapes. I am beginning to do these smaller watercolors to search out what direction I will take with them. In this painting, at low tide, the tide pools remain relatively calm even when there are waves.
I am sure I will do others of these tide pools since the rocky pools offer some great patterns.259

Seascape - Zorn Palette

"Seascape (Zorn Palette)"
watercolor on paper, 2013
5" x 7.5" (12.7cm x 19.05cm)
For sale at DAILY PAINTWORKS
Direct link to painting here

Here is a small watercolor seascape done in Anders Zorn limited palette of ivory black, white, yellow ochre, and vermillion.

The challenge of course was no blue for sky and water. No matter though. I used the white with black to get a cool gray for the distant clouds, black with yellow ochre to get a green gray for the water and generally saved mixes of vermillion and yellow ochre for the rocks. There were a few mixes of three colors but that was for subtly in keys areas, primarily to help turn form.255

*If you saw this previously the color was too warm. I've uploaded a more color accurate pic. 12/12/13

Trackside Watercolor Landscape

"Trackside"
watercolor on paper, 2012
6" x 8" (15.24cm x 20.32cm)
For Sale at Daily Paintworks, CLICK HERE

Here's another done in a looser approach. I only do the barest line drawing of the big shapes, then find the image in paint. A landscape in Oceanside California, trackside on the scenic Amtrak route.
For me this is a departure from the usual industrial railroads I do. It is more landscape than railroad, the only hint is the shed at the edge of the tracks, which are represented by the only straight line in the composition.
This is similar to the approach I used on this cityscape.206

Boulder in Burnscape

"Burnscape #3"
watercolor, graphite on paper, 2007
9" x 12" (22.86cm x 30.84cm)

Here is an early watercolor from my Burnscape series.
I liked this view for the boulder and rock ledge in the foreground.
The white ash was put in more opaquely since there was no way to retrieve the white of the paper or effectively spare it out and build the forms of the hillside properly.
I do not mind this however. The ash sits on top and really pops out or forward, giving the scene greater depth, helps define the topography of the hill and gives it a cool blueish color against the warms of the hillside.

I could have tried a masking fluid but had none at the time and wanted to dive right into painting. In fact I never really use masking fluid anyway.
As other artists know, sometimes you need to strike while the iron is hot, jump right in when you have a sudden inspiration, no planning, just throw down paint and see what results from it.
Not all work out this way but when they do it can be satisfying.

I was happy with this one because I managed to achieve a certain richness of tone and color relatively effortlessly.
I did not have to fight the usual watercolor battles ending up with an overworked painting.173


Click on image for larger view

Urban River 4

"Santa Ana River #4"
watercolor on paper, 2012
8" x 11" (20.32cm x 27.94cm)

Number 4 in this series. This view looking north shows more of the power corridor that runs along the river and the straight vertical concrete walls instead of the sloping walls of previous versions.

This is the time of day, late afternoon, when the light is blue looking east and that certain pale green and yellow looking west, just before the golds, oranges, reds, pinks and purples take over at sunset.
Much more peaceful and introspective than the fiery finish of sunset I think.168

#3 here
#2 here
#1 here

Click on image for larger view

Urban River 3

"Santa Ana River #3 Footbridge"
watercolor on paper, 2012
7" x 10" (17.78cm x 25.4cm)
For Sale at Daily Paintworks, CLICK HERE


Here is the third painting of this river. The other two, here and here.

Each explores the man/nature theme.
This one showing the man made structures of pedestrian bridge in the middle ground, two traffic bridges and the power poles and towers in the distant background. So more of this composition is of the man made vaguely looming over nature.

I experimented by placing the more saturated color across the middle with the top and bottom nearly monochromatic and more loosely painted.
This one was done on hot pressed paper which takes the watercolor differently. Besides being untextured (like cold pressed) watercolor washes heavy with pigment tend to go down slightly softer around the edges, as though the surface has the slightest bleed. It also seems to dry to a more velvety finish. I like the difference but it will take some time to get used to it.166

Click on image for larger view

Urban River 2

"Santa Ana River #2"
watercolor on paper, 2012
8" x 11" (20.32cm x 27.94cm)
For Sale at Daily Paintworks, CLICK HERE

Looking forward to a new year as I have set many goals for 2012. Of course that now means signing the date '12. Darn, the two ones of '11 were so much easier. Oh well.

Here is my first finished piece of 2012, literally done on January 1st. This is the second of this urban river.
Much like the first, done in oil, it's the juxtaposition of the natural and man-made world that I find fascinating to study.
The lazy meandering river takes its time moving through the frame from right to left. The razor sharp line of the highlighted bike path slicing across the picture, the verticals of power poles and towers and the flat plane of the river bank contrast nicely with the organic flow of water and vegetation. 164

Click to see "Santa Ana River #1"
Click on image for larger view

Urban River 1

"Santa Ana River #1"
oil on cradled panel, 2011
12" x 24" (30.48cm x 60.96cm)
For Sale at Daily Paintworks, CLICK HERE


Urban nature is a sort of oxymoron. It took years to come to terms with seeing our rivers encased in concrete banks as part of the natural world. I could never quite call them rivers.

But this is how we modify nature as it passes through our cities before being returned back to nature and into the ocean. There is a push and pull of man/nature going on. Concrete and manicured rock banks, then natural silt islands and vegetation growing in the middle. Nature briefly contained and on display. Ebb and flow.

I do see the beauty in both, the smooth hard man made surfaces and the delicate organic forms of nature. They simultaneously compliment and contrast each other.140

Click on image for larger view