That Oregon Coast again

Today, 28 Mar 2016 it snowed... from before sunup until late in the afternoon, We need the water but I think it killed lots of buds on the trees.... which means no fruit this year for the early blossomers. My indoor lemon trees have bloomed and this seasons crops are on the branches.... and I'm loving it. :-)

So early one morn I was walking along the Oregon Coast and just before the river delta I caught this image. It was better than my painting with it's sparkling beauty and sun shinning thru the river's canyon. Maybe next time I paint it I can get more into it.

 A healthy environment is essential to a livable Oregon and a strong economy. Ted Kulongosk

This activist loves Oregon more than he loves life. Tom McCall

The redwoods you can see in Muir Woods are nothing like the redwood titans that stand in the rainforest valleys of the North Coast, closer to Oregon. These are the dreadnoughts of trees, the blue whales of the plant kingdom. Richard Preston

You can't get away from trees, farming and sustainable living with these Oregon quotes because that's what Oregon is all about. In my painting you can see the trees on that blue mountain in the background ... they are everywhere and even the beach scenes have trees close at hand.

oil on mat board 7x12

Bright Spot in the Morning Fog

On one of my early morning walks in Oregon while taking pictures I saw the fog burning off and things started getting brighter. Sunlight seemed to stream in every now and then lighting up bright spots. It was cool and refreshing and enjoyable. I was glad to be there.


“Under the thinning fog the surf curled and creamed, almost without sound, like a thought trying to form itself on the edge of consciousness.”  ― Raymond Chandler, The Big Sleep

“Ben Bernanke is like an economist on a misty morning, because he hasn’t the foggiest clue.” 
― Jarod Kintz, This Book is Not FOR SALE

“When the fog lifts on this economy, I think we’ll find a lot of people refusing to ever turn off their caution lights.”   ― Jarod Kintz, At even one penny, this book would be overpriced. In fact, free is too expensive, because you'd still waste time by reading it.

Oil on Mat Board  8x10

Poppy Field

Poppies are so delicate and I haven't painted a field of them before.

I sing the Poppy! The frail snowy weed! The flower of Mercy! that within its heart Doth keep "a drop serene" for human need, A drowsy balm for every bitter smart. For happy hours the Rose will idly blow-- The Poppy hath a charm for pain and woe. Mary A. Barr Quotes

And would it not be proud romance Falling in some obscure advance, To rise, a poppy field of France?  William Alexander Percy Quotes 

And far and wide, in a scarlet tide, The poppy's bonfire spread.

Bayard Taylor

Oil on Mat Board  7x11

Beyond Repair

Another old barn biting the dust ... sad to see all these relics of past ages returning to the earth. Maybe I can capture some of them in paintings before they go... and before I go  :-)

We spend the first half of our lives trying to grow up and the other half trying to figure out how we got so old!

You don't stop having fun when you get old, you get old when you stop having fun.

I made all these great musicals with Judy Garland. It was all about me going into a barn and saying: 'Let's put on a show.' That's what me and Judy did. Mickey Rooney

Oil on mat board  8x10

My Days are Gone

Barns like people get old and sometimes useless  :-) ... but not always. anyway, I gave this a try with my knife ... do you like it?

t is a rare and difficult attainment to grow old gracefully and happily.

The excitement of learning separates youth from old age. As long as you're learning, you're not old.

If you don't do anything stupid when you're young, you won't remember something funny when you're old...

Oil on mat board  8x10

The old red barn

I did not go out and paint this on the farm... too bad... yesterday was a very nice day.

This mug of mine is as plain as a barn door. Why should people pay 35 cents to look at it?  Spencer Tracy

The moon is brighter since the barn burned.  Matsuo Basho

Mommy smoked but she didn't want us to. She saw smoke coming out of the barn one time, so we got whipped.  Loretta Lynn

Oil on mat board  8x10

Sunset on the Oregon Coast

We saw some incredible sunsets on the Oregon coast... this is hardly representational but it will have to do for now.

Keep looking up! I learn from the past, dream about the future and look up. There's nothing like a beautiful sunset to end a healthy day.

Rachel Boston

There's never one sunrise the same or one sunset the same.

Carlos Santana

Get outside. Watch the sunrise. Watch the sunset. How does that make you feel? Does it make you feel big or tiny? Because there's something good about feeling both.

Amy Grant

You can see my latest works at pinterest.com/ imondabeach

Oil on mat board  6x8

2 Fat Pears in a bowl

Today I am posting part of the painting process. I took the black W/c paper and sketched the outline of my drawing.  Next I did a value study  in whites and shades of blue to blue-black.. This is what it looks like at this stage.  Next stage I add color... matching the values but not paying attention to detail. Finally I finish off with the color & the details.

Oil on Water color paper  7x10

What's for Breakfast?

Well this tasty treat did not last long.

I want it said of me by those who knew me best,that I always plucked a thistle and planted a flower where I thought a flower would grow. - Abraham Lincoln

Life is like a grapefruit. Well, it's sort of orangy-yellow and dimpled on the outside, wet and squidgy in the middle. It's got pips inside, too. Oh, and some people have a half a one for breakfast.  Douglas Adams

Because at some more flexible period he had advanced from oranges to grape-fruit he considered himself an epicure.  Sinclair Lewis, 'Main Street' (1920)

oil on canvas paper  5x7

An apple a day

I love apples... they taste good... they look good... and they are good for you.

Eating apples is good on so many levels. There's fiber in the skin that's really good for you. It helps with digestion and helps you absorb all the nutrients of everything you've eaten that day. Apples are a really good thing. Rebecca Romijn

Why not upset the apple cart? If you don't, the apples will rot anyway.

Frank A. Clark

I also eat fruit instead of drinking juices. That's something I've read up on. I think that if you drink a lot of fruit juice you take in way too much sugar. You'd be better off eating a bunch of strawberries or apples.

Kris Humphries

oil on canvas paper 6x8

Lemons and more lemons

These are fresh lemons... from my refridge and that "bubble" is actually a float for fisherman's nets.... and old one at that.... it's glass ... just a glass bubble now. My good friend, another artist, from Texas sent it too me. This is the first time I've painted it into a picture but it wouldn't be the last.... I'm just getting started.

When life gives you lemons, squeeze the juice on your fresh, wild salmon ... I said that. Here's what others say:

“When life gives you lemons, squirt someone in the eye.”  ― Cathy Guisewite

“When life gives you lemons, you don't make lemonade. You use the seeds to plant a whole orchard - an entire franchise! Or you could just stay on the Destiny Bus and drink lemonade someone else has made, from a can.”   ― Anthon St. Maarten

“when life gives you lemon, take it. don't waste food”   ― giselle marquez

oil on canvas paper  8x10

Pear Apple & a Pitcher

Can't seem to end it with the pears... I love pears. I have one left from the bag of organic bosc pears I bought at Costco. Maybe I'll pick up another bag Monday or Tuesday. Oh yea, the organic apple is also one I bought. I try to eat an apple a day.... don't always make it but I'm working on it.

Trying to get some mood and atmosphere in these paintings.... and be painterly.... that means broad brush strokes that show after the painting is finished. I keep working on it.

It is, in my view, the duty of an apple to be crisp and crunchable, but a pear should have such a texture as leads to silent consumption."Edward Bunyard, 'The Anatomy of Dessert' 

The pear is the grandfather of the apple, its poor relation, a fallen aristocrat, the man-at-arms of our domains, which once, in our humid land, lived lonely and lordly, preserving the memory of its prestige by its haughty comportment."
Francois Pierre de la Varenne

Oil on canvas Paper

8x10

Flaming Pear

I know that this looks like the other painting I did of a Riviera & a Mason Jar... I painted it again this time added a few things extra. The photo came out a little dark so the grape in the lower right is a little difficult to see. Heh heh ... but it's there. The background colors make it look like it's on fire... maybe it is.... a poached pear. :-)

Oil on canvas paper  8x10

Royal Riviera and a Mason Jar

Here is the Royal Riviera and a Mason jar with the upgrades

End of the box

Here are the last pears from the box.... yes I ate them all. So I painted a little more on this trying to incorporate Matt's suggestions. Looking better, eh?

Oil on canvas paper 6x8

Bosc standing

I bought a bag of these at cosco.... almost gone now...... this is a "refined" painting I did a while ago.
I think it looks better now.

Oil on canvas paper  6x8

Dish of Pears

Well only one pear fit in this dish... a LARGE pear. this is the latest version. Hope you like it.

Oil on canvas paper  6x8

One Green royal Riviera

Well they came in a box of 12 pears ... mostly green... but they did ripen up nicely so I go to eat them all. My photography is not all that good yet but I'm working on it. Some of the transparent colors seem to disappear but I think this is better than the first posting of this pear.

Bartlett Pear

My very tasty Bartlett pear. Couldn't wait to eat it. Delicious. I think I improved it a bit from the first one. What do you think?

Tomatoes again

I pulled out  several paintings after Matt 's critique and tried to improve them so I will post the "improved" paintings. Sometimes the changes will be very subtle and sometimes the changes will be very noticeable. I'll leave that part up to you.

Enjoy.

Oil on canvas paper 6x8

High Peaks

 Still thinking about Arizona.

Everyone in California lives on a white, sandy beach.” False. The only people who live on California beaches are vacationers from Arizona, Utah, and Nevada who own condos.
– Erma Bombeck

 You know you’re from Arizona when you drive two miles around a parking lot looking for a shady place – even in the dead of winter. – Author Unknown

 You know you’re from Arizona when you feed your chickens ice cubes to keep them from laying hard-boiled eggs.  Author Unknown

Gotta go back

Well I left this one unfinished because I need to go back to Arizona. I love Arizona.

What most people don't understand is that UFOs are on a cosmic tourist route. That's why they're always seen in Arizona, Scotland, and New Mexico. Another thing to consider is that all three of those destinations are good places to play golf. So there's possibly some connection between aliens and golf. Alice Cooper

There's not a single person in Arizona today who would say the Grand Canyon was a mistake. Stewart Udall

Oil on canvas paper  8x10

Reminiscing

I had such a great time visiting the Grand Tetons in Idaho and Wyoming I had to go back .... just kidding... it was a mental "go back". Totally day dreaming and wandering back to the scenes of days gone by. Loved it anyway.

Theodore Roosevelt
"We have fallen heirs to the most glorious heritage a people ever received, and each one must do his part if we wish to show that the nation is worthy of its good fortune."

"We are prone to speak of the resources of this country as inexhaustible; this is not so."

"...wild flowers should be enjoyed unplucked where they grow."

"It is not what we have that will make us a great nation; it is the way in which we use it."

"We have become great because of the lavish use of our resources. But the time has come to inquire seriously what will happen when our forests are gone, when the coal, the iron, the oil, and the gas are exhausted, when the soils have still further impoverished and washed into the streams, polluting the rivers, denuding the fields and obstructing navigation."

"I recognize the right and duty of this generation to develop and use the natural resources of our land; but I do not recognize the right to waste them, or to rob, by wasteful use, the generations that come after us."

"Nothing could be more lonely and nothing more beautiful than the view at nightfall across the prairies to these huge hill masses, when the lengthening shadows had at last merged into one and the faint after-glow of the red sunset filled the west."

There are no words that can tell the hidden spirit of the wilderness, that can reveal its mystery, its melancholy, and its charm."

"The farther one gets into the wilderness, the greater is the attraction of its lonely freedom."

Oil on canva paper 8x10

It's white today

Hope this is an indication of the Winter to come. A couple days after the Winter Solstice and we have a nice covering of snow down here in the valley.  I love Winter. Tomorrow the sun may come out.


And there is quite a different sort of conversation around a fire than there is in the shadow of a beech tree.... [F]our dry logs have in them all the circumstance necessary to a conversation of four or five hours, with chestnuts on the plate and a jug of wine between the legs. Yes, let us love winter, for it is the spring of genius. ~Pietro Aretino, translated from Italian


[W]hat a severe yet master artist old Winter is.... No longer the canvas and the pigments, but the marble and the chisel. ~John Burroughs, "The Snow-Walkers," 1866


Winter is a time of promise because there is so little to do — or because you can now and then permit yourself the luxury of thinking so. ~Stanley Crawford, A Garlic Testament: Seasons on a Small New Mexico Farm, 1992


One kind word can warm three winter months. ~Japanese Proverb

Tomatoes from my garden again

My Grandson's wife told me that her mom pulled up the tomato plants at the end of the year and hung them indoors to ripen the last of the tomatoes that were hanging on the vine still green. Not having a barn or shed I hung them in the guest room which has a large South facing window which warms up the room nicely during the Winter. It works fine. I love tomatoes..... salad, soup or in a snadwhich... whatever.

I love judging food by its smell and feel and taste. The healthiest tomato isn't always the perfect one that's been covered in pesticides.

Sheherazade Goldsmith 

The federal government has sponsored research that has produced a tomato that is perfect in every respect, except that you can't eat it. We should make every effort to make sure this disease, often referred to as 'progress', doesn't spread. Andy Rooney

Oil on canva paper  5x7

The fishing shacks at Monterrrey

When you go down to the boardwalk at Monterrey this is one of the first things you will see.... it may be one of the most famous and most painted sites. It seems a little tilted... but then maybe I was on the down-slooped sidewalk.... maybe my head was leaning .... maybe I just goofed when painting this one. Well, there it is, the fishing shacks at Monterrey

Never stop doing little things for others. Sometimes those little things occupy the biggest part of their hearts.

California is a fine place to live - if you happen to be an orange. Fred Allen

Earlier today, Arnold Schwarzenegger criticized the California school system, calling it disastrous. Arnold says California's schools are so bad that its graduates are willing to vote for me. Conan O'Brien

oil on Canva paper 6x8

Meandering on the Beach

I just can't leave the Oregon beach. Just about every morning we were out there walking up and down... North and South. The view was always different because we wandered around at different times of the day but the sun always made long shadows about mid-morning because it had to rise above the hills to the East........ and it sometimes took a while to burn off the morning fog. There was always someone else running or walking or picking up sea shells.... and an occasional dog prancing about. So who can't feel good at the beach.

The weather and my mood have little connection. I have my foggy and my fine days within me; my prosperity or misfortune has little to do with the matter. Blaise Pascal

Sunshine is delicious, rain is refreshing, wind braces us up, snow is exhilarating; there is really no such thing as bad weather, only different kinds of good weather. John Ruskin

oil on canva paper  8x10

Rocky shore line

Still painting pictures of the rocky Oregon coastline on a warm almost winter day ... it,s only 6 Dec so we are a few days from winter. The sun has dipped way down in the southern sky and shines over to my desk part of the day which is really, really nice. I love it when the sun shines thru those big windows.

“Keep your face to the sun and you will never see the shadows.”  ― Helen Keller

“Even for me life had its gleams of sunshine.”  ― Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

“What sunshine is to flowers, smiles are to humanity. These are but trifles, to be sure; but scattered along life's pathway, the good they do is inconceivable.”  ― Joseph Addison

“Some people are so much sunshine to the square inch.”  ― Walt Whitman

oil on canva paper  8x10

On da beach

It's a little dreary here today... but nice. Cloudy skies and not too bright... but I like it .... but not as much as the beach ... ahhhhhh , the beach. Who could not like the beach

 And me? I still believe in paradise. But now at least I know it's not some place you can look for. Because it's not where you go. It's how you feel for a moment in your life when you're a part of something. And if you find that moment... It lasts forever. - Richard

A simple life is good with me. I don't need a whole lot. For me, a T-shirt, a pair of shorts, barefoot on a beach and I'm happy. Yanni

To go out with the setting sun on an empty beach is to truly embrace your solitude.  Jeanne Moreau

oil on canva paper  6x8

Looking for shells

One day I went walking early in the morning. It was the normal foggy coast and it was beautiful. Down by the edge of the rocks were a couple of young folks.... I say young... I was going to say a couple of old geezers but then I remembered.... I'm probably older than they are. It was a good day to be looking for shells.

Those who live by the sea can hardly form a single thought of which the sea would not be part.

The loneliness you get by the sea is personal and alive. It doesn't subdue you and make you feel abject. It's stimulating loneliness.

So, would you visit me in a dream.. By the sea water, memories...Floating on the breeze...fantasies, would you visit me????

Oil on canva paper
6x8

Oh see the sea

My soul is full of longing
For the secret of the sea,
And the heart of the great ocean
Sends a thrilling pulse through me.
- Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.

 To reach a port we must set sail –
Sail, not tie at anchor
Sail, not drift.”
― Franklin D. Roosevelt

 Sea-fever

I must down to the seas again, to the lonely sea and the sky,
And all I ask is a tall ship and a star to steer her by,
And the wheel's kick and the wind's song and the white sail's shaking,
And a grey mist on the sea's face, and a grey dawn breaking.

I must down to the seas again, for the call of the running tide
Is a wild call and a clear call that may not be denied;
And all I ask is a windy day with the white clouds flying,
And the flung spray and the blown spume, and the sea-gulls crying.

I must down to the seas again, to the vagrant gypsy life,
To the gull's way and the whale's way where the wind's like a whetted knife;
And all I ask is a merry yarn from a laughing fellow-rover
And quiet sleep and a sweet dream when the long trick's over”
― John Masefield, Sea Fever: Selected Poems

oil on canva paper  6x8

life in the Fields

OK so Monday there was no plein air paint out because it was raining or snowing. We got snow this week Very nice. . Maybe we should have gone anyway... but maybe I wouldn't have gone. Now next week  I will be in school for a couple days so I will miss the paint out... maybe I will go to the portrait society and paint the live model.

I painted from a picture I had taken in the area earlier. I have lots of picture references.

Earth and sky, woods and fields, lakes and rivers, the mountain and the sea, are excellent schoolmasters, and teach some of us more than we can ever learn from books.  John Lubbock

Remember to be gentle with yourself and others. We are all children of chance and none can say why some fields will blossom while others lay brown beneath the August sun.  Kent Nerburn

I don't have to take a trip around the world or be on a yacht in the Mediterranean to have happiness. I can find it in the little things, like looking out into my backyard and seeing deer in the fields.

Queen Latifah

Start where you are. Distant fields always look greener, but opportunity lies right where you are. Take advantage of every opportunity of service.   Robert Collier

That's it for today.





Oil on canva paper  6x8

Dreaming of the Coast again

I signed up for another workshop on the coast ... will I ever learn..... but it will be fun anyway.

You need to lose yourself and disappear in the depths of the repetitions? Find a coast and watch the repetitive waves! Soon your mind vanishes away and when your mind disappears you disappear!” 
― Mehmet Murat ildan

“The coast is an edgy place. Living on the coast presents certain stark realities and a wild, rare beauty. Continent confronts ocean. Weather intensifies. It's a place of tide and tantrum; of flirtations among fresh- and saltwaters, forests and shores; of tense negotiations with an ocean that gives much but demands more. Every year the raw rim that is this coast gets hammered and reshaped like molten bronze. This place roils with power and a sometimes terrible beauty. The coast remains youthful, daring, uncertain about tomorrow. The guessing, the risk; in a way, we're all thrill seekers here.” 
― Carl Safina, The View from Lazy Point: A Natural Year in an Unnatural World

You spoke to her, in hidden dreams...and smiled at her through open doors. She felt your secret love surround her at times. And while alone she felt your breath, heartbeat and more... Serenity of hers is never-ending, soothing....it leads, lures, calls you... Ah, timeless burning flame!.. Her kiss is ocean salty water, you drink and thirst increases...you long and pray for more...” - ― Oksana Rus

Well here is my sketch for the day.... Lover's Leap Monterrey California

Oil on canva paper  6x8

Hanging out in the meadow

Life isn't about waiting for the storm to pass... It's about learning to dance in the rain.
- Vivian Greene

Life isn't about finding yourself. Life is about creating yourself.
- George Bernard Shaw

Go out and enjoy what you have near. It might be better than you imagined

Carson River near Genoa

Oil on canva paper 6x8