Some small pieces from Mt Washington.

Sometimes one only has a couple of hours to paint. This is a great chance to exercise simplification and try a small piece with the biggest brushes you can find. These two pieces are from Mt. Washington.

California Art Club Paint Out South Pasadena

This painting was done last Saturday during the California Art Club paint-out in South Pasadena. I drove around for a bit and saw this fabulous hydrangeas...and the orange cat in the sun. Of course tabby was long gone by the time I got to paint but i tried committing him to my memory. Almost every neighbor in Filmore St. came out to see the painting except the owner of the house.

After the accident.

I had a bad accident in my left hand that required tendon surgery. My father recently had another brush with bad news of the medical kind. Our reaction was the same : My father painted everyday this summer in his beloved Euskadi. As soon as my cast was off I launched with more urgency into painting. Nothing else seems to matter. Not my search for a new house (which must have a studio of some sort), nor whether I ever become famous or wealthy as long as I can pay for paints, not negative relationships or even distractions regarding whether I am a good enough painter or even questions off faith and self-value.

Renoir had to have his brushes tied to his hand so he could paint due to his rheumatism. I am a fan of that even if I don't like Renoir.

I started painting in a quite unexplored area of Los Angeles pictorically. About 80 years ago, Wilshire Blvd. encompassed everything that was happening and it was a glistening Art Deco mecca. Today it is a third Korea Town, a third salvadorean ghetto and a third everything else. The mixture makes for some interesting "canyons" that produce surreal landscapes at sunset or when it rains.