"Bixby Bridge Big Sur" (oil on linen, 8" x 10") sold

 

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The famous view of the Bixby Bridge at Big Sur, California. Completed in 1932, the concrete span, one of the highest bridges of its kind in the world, soars 260 feet above the bottom of a steep canyon carved by Bixby Creek. I love Big Sur!

"Bixby Creek Bridge, Big Sur" (watercolor on paper; 9" x 12") sold

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I love Big Sur, California. Ocher and green hills, intense blues of the ocean, colorful wildflowers, the Bixby Creek Bridge, and so on. I visited it this summer, this time under sad circumstances. The coastal paradise was as beautiful as ever.

"Elizabeth at the Lake" (oil on linen; 11" x 14") sold

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The boyfriend of Elizabeth commissioned me to paint this painting of a figure in landscape as her birthday gift.  The peaceful setting is Emerald Bay, near South Lake Tahoe, CA.  One thing the couple were not able to do for their idyllic vacation was bring her dog Slick, which she would have loved. Tommy asked me to paint Slick, an English springer spaniel, into the picture with her.  How can I say no to such a sweet request?

"California Beach Kids" (oil on stretched canvas; 18" x 24")

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The family vacation to California back in 2007 concluded with a few days spent in San Francisco.  This trip led to so many paintings; "California Beach Kids" is the latest.  The setting is the beach at the Maritime National Historical Park, which includes a fleet of historic vessels, a visitor center, and a maritime museum.

After checking out the historic ships, we were people-watching.  Some brave souls swam in the cold water.  This group of kids, all decked in bandanas, were testing out how cold the Pacific Ocean water was.  A couple of boys were a bit more adventurous than the others. I hope you feel the fun atmosphere of the day.

"Happy Days" (oil on stretched canvas; 18" x 18") nfs

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I worked on this painting of my daughter, at the age of nine, on and off for several years; I finally feel satisfied.  The reference photo was taken during my family's vacation in northern California.  At Glass Beach, we scavenged the beach for pretty sea glasses as the sun set and the place became bathed in the golden light.

Whenever I look at this painting, my heart is filled with tenderness.  She is now a high-school senior, about to go off to college.  In my mind's eye, she is always about this big, or even younger; she is full of joy and innocence, ready to sit on my lap for a big hug.  These were the happiest days of my life.

"California Sea Stacks Sunset" (oil on linen; 12" x 12") sold

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Have you ever seen the sea stacks along the Pacific Coast?  These picturesque landforms, formed by erosion, consist of steep and vertical columns of rock in the sea near a coast.  My painting is of the stacks in Trinidad Head in northern California.  The setting sun transforms the summer scenery with wildflowers into an enchanting place where the sky, sea, and shore become one.

"Big Sur Blue" (oil on stretched canvas; 12" x 16")

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I don't know why, but whenever I think of the color blue, Big Sur, CA is the first thing that pops into my mind.  As I wanted to paint a "blue" painting, Big Sur is what I came up with.  Although I visited this beautiful place only once, I still dream of the intense blues of the Pacific Ocean from Big Sur! Obviously, I am not the only person who loves Big Sur.  All the previous paintings have been sold!

"Big Sur Wildflowers" (oil, 10" x 8"; sold)

"Big Sur Moment" (oil, 11" x 14"; sold)

"Big Sur Blue" (oil, 5" x 4"; sold)

"Carmel Mission" (oil on linen; 8" x 10") sold

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The Carmel Mission, from the late 18th century, is a Roman Catholic mission church in Carmel-by-the-Sea, CA.  I had the reference photo printed out six years ago and sat on it.  I have painted two other paintings of this beautiful place before, but the Mission's architecture with the two nonidentical bell towers was trickier.  Now it's Day Four of Leslie Saeta's 30 in 30 Challenge.  I decided to be brave.  What do you think of my efforts?

"Carmel Mission Garden Gate" (acrylic, 14" x 18"; sold) 

"Saintly Garden at Carmel Mission" (oil, 5" x 4"; sold)

If you send me your pictures to kimstenbergart@gmail.com, I may make paintings out of them.  How fun is that!  At the end of September, I will do a drawing and one lucky person wins a free painting.  You can buy the painting anytime, but there is no obligation.  Thanks!

"Big Sur Widflowers" (oil on linen; 10" x 8") sold

sold

Some places are so beautiful that they beg to be painted over and over again.  Big Sur, California is one of those places.  I visited Big Sur just once several years ago, but am still haunted by the memory.

"Big Sur Moment" (oil, 11" x 14"; sold)

"Big Sur Blue" (oil, 5" x 4"; sold)

By the way, today is the first day of Leslie Saeta's September 30 Paintings in 30 Days Challenge.  I will try to keep up with the challenge!

"Guarding Alcatraz Island" (oil on linen; 8" x 8") sold

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A seagull takes a break, while eating the famous San Francis sourdough.

Alcatraz Island is located in the San Francisco Bay, 1.5 miles offshore from San Francisco.  It is home to the abandoned prison, the site of the oldest operating lighthouse on the West Coast, early military fortifications, and a seabird colony (mostly Western Gulls).  Today the island's facilities are managed by the National Park Service.  As far as I can tell, due to the recent budget cuts, the island seems to be guarded mainly by the seagulls!

By the way, the seagull population is skyrocketing and the birds are taking over San Francisco. Don't feed the gulls and pigeons!

"Golden Gate Bridge on a Stormy Day" (oil on stretched canvas; 12" x 16") sold

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From the Marin Headlands, one can see a spectacular view of the Golden Gate Bridge and the San Francisco skyline.  It is even more spectacular on a windy, stormy day when there is a break in the sky.  I did another Golden Gate Bridge painting recently, as you can see below.  The earlier painting shows the famous red suspension bridge from Baker Beach, which stretches a mile below the rugged cliffs on the Presidio's western shoreline.  You can see the Marin Headlands in the distance.

I casually mentioned to my husband how I wished I had had more references of the bridge.  He said, "Really?  I have some."  He went to his computer right away and showed me the pictures he took while visiting San Francisco on a business trip last year. That's how the second painting above came about.  I don't know what I would do without him!

"Golden Gate Bridge" (oil on linen; 9" x 12")
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So which painting of the Golden Gate Bridge do you like better?  By the way, I am counting today's painting as one of my June Challenge series because it has a ship in it!

"Golden Gate Bridge on Sunny Day" (oil on linen; 9" x 12") sold

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The famous Golden Gate Bridge on a sunny day.  Fluffy clouds float by in the sky.  A red ship in the distance is about to glide under the bridge.  The red bridge casts colorful reflections in the choppy water.  I thought of Claude Monet's "The Bridge at Argenteuil" when I was working on the above painting.  I wrote about how much I admire Monet's painting three months ago.  Something about a bridge, boat, clouds in a blue sky, and reflections in the water makes a happy painting.  Don't you agree?

"Cypress Point, Monterey" (oil on linen; 8" x 10") sold

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Reference photo

Cypress Point is one of the many picturesque stops along the famous 17 Mile Drive between Monterey and Carmel by the Sea, CA.  We only had the time to stop and click many beautiful views on an overcast day five summers ago.  The Monterey Cypress trees in the middle ground looked wind-swept although it was not a particularly windy day.  I guess their branches are permanently bent due to the strong gales from the ocean.

"San Francisco's Painted Ladies" (oil on linen; 11" x 14") sold

sold

Reference photo

I love San Francisco.  It is the city through which I entered the United States back in 1984.  For whatever reason, the moon was huge that evening.  I thought that in America even the moon was magnificent!  San Francisco has got to be one of the most beautiful cities in the world. 

You've seen these houses in postcards, right?  According to Diana Hollingsworth Gessler's Very California: Travels through the Golden State, hippies in the 1960's began painting some of the Victorian houses in Alamo Square in wild colors (up to 20 on one house), thus the great nickname.

I meant to paint the above scene for years, but didn't.  The assumed difficulty in architectural drawing was the reason.  I can be such a chicken sometimes.  Yesterday I finally felt brave enough to do it.  That's the beauty of having a goal of working on a series.  It really gets you motivated.  "Painted Ladies of San Francisco" is No. 3 in my new series-"California Colors."  California, here I come.

"Big Sur Moment" (oil on linen; 11" x 14") sold

sold

Reference photo

As I wrote yesterday, I started a new series called "California Colors."  All the paintings of the series will be based on the pictures I took five years ago during a family vacation to northern and central California.  The occasion for this two-week vacation was a family wedding.  A nephew of my husband got married at a Napa vineyard!  It was the kind of a beautiful wedding you see in movies.  A lucky boy!  He and his wife now have two adorable kids and live in San Francisco.  A lucky couple! 

I had been to the city, but not to the rest of my favorite state.  So we made a vacation out of a wedding.  Why not?  Do you know what happened later in that summer?  A younger brother of the groom decided to get married six weeks after the said wedding, instead of waiting for a couple of years as he and his fiance had promised to the family.  The year of 2007 thus became the year of family weddings.  We made the two remaining boys swear that they would never ever get married in the same summer! 

The second wedding took place in Minnesota, my husband's home state.  We love Minnesota, but Minnesota is not California.  Besides, we were burned out of vacations.  We took just a few more days off in addition to the necessary time, in order to visit with relatives.  The trip didn't result in as many glorious pictures as the California one either.

We had only a day for Big Sur toward the end of our trip, which was a shame.  How can you explore this spectacular spot on earth in one day?  We made a lot of stops to take pictures, that's all.  But I still  dream of the incredible blues of Big Sur.

"Golden Gate Bridge in Fog" (oil on linen; 12" x 9") sold

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The idea for "Golden Gate Bridge in Fog" occurred while I was helping my daughter build four model bridges for her school science project.  She and her team were testing how much weight different types of bridges could bear.  Tying up the string for the cute suspension bridge below required a considerable amount of dexterity, which none of the girls didn't possess; so I came to the rescue!  Am I bad?

A model suspension bridge (balsa wood and embroidery thread)

One famous suspension bridge came to my mind--Golden Gate Bridge!  I had to paint it.  The reference photo I used showed the bridge shrouded in fog.  So, today's big challenge was this: how do I paint the vaporous nothingness, which covers about one half of the painting?  The initial sky color was too cool and monotonous; I warmed it up and introduced more colors.  You are probably wondering what colors!  Well, look very closely.  They are there.  Probably the most important thing in painting fog is the treatment of edges.  I deployed a lot of lost and broken edges to suggest the mystery of fog.

"Golden Gate Bridge in Fog" posed a bit of a drawing challenge as well.  Do you know what I do when I have trouble with drawing?  I paint upside down.  Most of the bridge and the distant landscape were painted in that way.  Funny, I am sure, but it works every time.  It forces my mind to see shapes, not things.  You can paint anything  if you switch your mind to see shapes.

By the way, I love San Francisco.  I think it is one of the most beautiful cities in the world.  It was this city to which I flew when I came to the USA to study 28 years ago.  Since then, I visited it a few more times, and every visit has been memorable.  My favorite spot is Lombard Street, the crookedest street ever!

"Golden Girl" (oil on canvas; 18" x 18") nfs

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Some paintings I do to sell; others for entering juried shows.  And there are paintings just for myself.  "Golden Girl" belongs to the last category.  The girl who is holding something in her right hand is my daughter when she was ten.  She had just found a piece of sea glass and was showing it off.  We were at Glass Beach in northern California.  Yes, Glass Beach--I didn't make it up.  Apparently, there used to be a bottling factory nearby and lots of broken glass made into the beach, hence the name.  The time of the day was obviously the sunset.

Reference photo

I had this girl when I was almost 40.  She was my dream child come true--healthy, happy, affectionate, and bright.  She just became a teenager this summer, and well....  She has changed quite a bit since I took the picture above.  Although I wouldn't change anything about her for the world, I still miss her when she could sit on my lap, be a flower girl, and pose for the camera gladly.  I miss those days. 


So I painted "Golden Girl" to remember my daughter at the age of ten, just as I painted her when she was a preschooler.  She was about three when she posed for a photo in a rose garden in Portland, Oregon. Of all the beauties I saw that day, she was the prettiest in my eye.

"Pretty in Pink" (watercolor, 17" x 12") nfs

I will probably do more portraits of my daughter, perhaps as a young lady, definitely as a bride, and hopefully as a new mother with her baby.  I am thankful for my family and my ability to immortalize their likeness in paintings.

"Sea Caves of California" (oil on linen; 9" x 12") sold

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Reference photo

Some vacations are more memorable than others.  The trip to California three years ago was one such happy memory maker.  There was a family wedding, which was held at a beautiful vineyard in Napa!  Visits with family were special enough, since we don't get to see them often as we live so away.  But one additional week spent just with my own family in the glorious light of California keeps generating a painting after another.  I must go back to California!

As I am focusing on water in Bobbi Pratte's landscape class this summer, I decided to paint from the above photo taken somewhere in northern California.  (You know how it is--after a while, you don't remember exactly where you took the pictures.)  The picture doesn't show much color in the sea caves because they are in the shadow; but I can see many different color changes in the water itself.  In the distance, it is cobalt blue.  As the waves approach the sandy beach, it changes from cerulean blue to a blue tinged with ocher.  The wet sand looks lavender.

I like the design too.  Three concentric waves all point to the sea caves, which I painted with warm, dark paints.  Sometimes I don't have to do anything other than just paint as Nature took care of the design for me!

"Golden Light" (oil on linen; 12" x 16") sold

sold

Reference photo

I took the photo above three years ago at Glass Beach in northern California and have been wanting to paint from it for some time.  I liked the sunset sky and its golden colors reflected in the ocean water.  But I was put off by the dark lumps of the rocks.  That is what a camera does when it takes a brilliant backlit view.

When I showed the picture to Bobbi Pratte in her class on Monday, she advised me that I paint the water first, then add the rocks as dark shapes, and finally sculpt them with lighter colors to make them three-dimensional and rimlit.  Brilliant!  She also told me not to get fussy with the waves and ripples.  There is no way that I can copy these hundreds of ripples; just make them believable and DON'T go back after I put down brushstrokes that go in the same directions as ripples.

I did exactly as she suggested.  The painting went fast.  As it was almost done, I finished it later at night at home to take advantage of wet paints.  I simply love the golden light that seems to glow from within.  Thanks, Bobbi!

"Walk in the Redwoods" (oil on stretched canvas, 18" x 14") sold

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I struggled with this painting, largely because the photo I worked with was so washed out by the blinding light.  My teacher, Diane Tester, suggested that I should restore the darks with Photoshop.  Today I brought to her class the original photo that shows the glowing ground where the figure--my then-seven-year-old daughter--is standing, along with the adjusted photo.

My intention was to darken the background trees with dark greens.  No, Diane said, you already have enough greens.  She recommended that I glaze them with purples, which I did promptly.  Wow!  Suddenly there was a differentiated background, middle ground, and foreground.  I redrew the figure (the head was too big!), tidied up things here and there, and you are now looking at the result.  I was so close to the finish but didn't know it.