Orcas!
I was out painting yesterday at Pacific Grove, and from what I can tell, a pod of Orcas were having fun off shore. Enjoy this short video….
travel
Wilder Hogs
aka Hollister/Carmel Run
Enjoy this short video of a ride on April 13, 2022. Be sure to turn the volume up!
Route was Hollister Hwy 25 South; Hwy 198 West; Hwy 101 North;Greenfield to Arroyo Seco; to Carmel Valley; Laurels Grade; Hwy 68 East.
An Entirely new Art Form Breakthrough
Marina, CA, April 1, 2022.. World renowned, award winning artist Donald Neff has just invented an entirely new genre of art. We think it will take the art world by storm. Art and painting constantly evolve and transition to ideas and areas we may not have imagined just a few years before. Think Picasso, who as a teen could paint like Raphael, and with no where to go was a forerunner of modern art. Pollock stumbled upon drip painting. Hunter Biden blew the art world away with his doodling.
After spending two years virtually locked up due to covid restrictions, Neff was yearning to be free. “I just wanted to be free to paint, so I strapped an easel on my Harley, took off and started painting”, Neff says. Neff frequently rides his Harley, including painting trips, but has never painted while actually riding. “I have always wondered what a painting would look like if I did it while cruising down the road, so rigged an easel on my gas tank to paint while on the road.” Neff continues “it was so great, because as soon as I got to my first actual painting location, I already had one completed.”
“Freedom!” is Neff’s first ‘zoom painting’. According to Neff, it was a little difficult concentrating on the painting while staying on the bike, but he did it without any scrapes or accidents. For such a big invention, Neff also chose a big canvas, 24×36, and it was a little hard keeping it steady in the constant headwind. Like a sail, Neff had to keep correcting course to stay in his lane. Neff says, “I also had to circle around a lot to keep painting the same scene, but didn’t get too dizzy.”
You can read more about Neff’s other painting trips on the Harley here.
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FireFall!
What a spectacular display of mother nature! One of the most amazing natural occurrences is coming up this February in Yosemite National Park. I have been fortunate to have seen it twice. There are thousands of pictures of the firefall on the internet, but I have never seen a painting of it. So, fresh off the easel at the Neff Studio...I painted one…
Fire is difficult to paint, and half the reason I painted this is to try my hand at it. Although it isn’t actual fire, it looks like fiery lava pouring over the side of a cliff. Here’s a little backstory—
During my adolescent years growing up in Pasadena, CA, we used to make trips to Yosemite National Park, camping in both the valley and the high country. I remember well, while camping in the valley we would shuffle out in the valley to the middle of a meadow to watch the Firefall. It used to be called the parks most famous spectacle where each evening during the summer months, a huge bonfire was built high above the valley at the edge of Glacier Point. At 9pm the glowing coals were pushed over the edge creating a luminous glittering waterfall of fire tumbling some 3200 feet. Here is a picture I gleaned off the internet —
In 1968 due to a variety of reasons, the Firefall was discontinued.
However, today, there is an even more wondrous and totally natural Firefall. Each year for a week or two in February the setting sun beams up the valley and illuminates Horsetail Falls, and when conditions are perfect, it glows orange and red for a brief time. It’s hit and miss because the sky must be relatively clear, and there has to be enough flowing water in the falls. I have been fortunate to see it twice while attending the Yosemite Renassaince opening art reception where my paintings have been shown in the Yosemite Museum.
Of course, I have seen many pictures of it over the years, and always thought the photos had to be enhanced or touched up. Not so. The falls glow a bright yellow/red/orange for about 10 minutes. It was like someone hung a giant glow stick over the edge of the cliff.
The last year I saw it in 2019, many have said was one of the best. Due to the heavy snow in Yosemite Valley, we had to work for it a bit more by having to walk over a mile to the best vantage point…but well worth it. The recent snows added another dimension, and when the wind blew the icy crystals off the shoulder of El Capitan, the entire cliff lit up as if fire in the bowels of the earth emerged. This is the event I based the painting on. As usual, I might touch the painting up a bit.
Here is a video I produced of the 2019 event…
Shinkoji Nakaniwa
From April 2020, for a year, I posted on Facebook a painting each day as a brief diversion from the lockdowns and other bad news this year. Neglecting my weblog, I’ll post in the coming days some of my better posts. Some of these paintings are still available.
From the “stiwdio ger y bae”, this Buddhist Temple Courtyard overlooks the Japanese town of Maniwa and is just a few minutes walk from where my son used to live. Those who have traveled Japan know Buddhist Temples are found everywhere, and many are situated near Japan’s most beautiful locations.
On the left is the temple gate, and in the middle is the temple bell. On the right are some outbuildings and a pagoda like sculpture. A number of red banners (I think they are called Nobori) were hung around the courtyard, but I don’t know their significance.
A Thanksgiving in Japan with a Wise Teacher
Note: this post was originally published in 2016 and updated here.
It was in November 2015 that I spent a few weeks in Japan and Thanksgiving with my son, Justin, who had lived there over three years teaching English to school kids. He works and lives in the mountainous town of Maniwa. I have visited him several times, and cannot get enough of the Japanese countryside. Yes, of course the cities are where most visitors go and great fun, but after awhile, to me, the big cities start to blend into the same.
Well, this blog entry is not about Thanksgiving day, but about one day at a school where Justin teaches…a day I will never forget. Justin rotates around a half dozen schools teaching English from Kindergarten through grade school.
The Kusakabe Elementary School principal was interested in meeting me, so I went with Justin in his car to the school for his teaching day. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to stay the entire day sitting around a Japanese school, and it was a little too far to walk home, so figured I was there for the day. After the first hour I didn’t want to leave!
It was a drizzly cloudy day.
As soon as we arrived, the principal was expecting me, and he and some teachers royally greeted me. In Japanese schools, upon entering, you take your outside shoes off, and put your inside shoes on. They have slippers for visitors, so I ‘slipped’ into those, and followed the principal to his office. We sat down in some sofas in front of his desk, and chatted a bit, somewhat in English with Justin doing a little interpreting.
A few teachers came to greet me, and before you know it, I had rice paper, ink, and a Japanese brush in front of me and everyone expecting a ‘masterpiece’. Whoa! Japanese art such as this simplifies everything into just a few strokes. I am so unfamiliar with this, I just brushed out what I had seen the day before, Kamba Falls…and it didn’t turn out well.
The first class of the day Justin taught was pre-school. I have never seen such a lively bunch of precious little kids eager to learn. Justin taught a few words for the day…banana, ice cream cone (can’t remember all exactly)…he put them in a song, talked, continually interacted with the children, and invited me to to come up and draw pictures of the words he was teaching on the board.
I was so impressed by one student confined to a walker, seemingly the happiest of all. I didn’t know his condition, maybe palsy, but all the other kids just constantly came over and embraced and loved him.
Watching those kids with all their enthusiasm was one of the sweetest and lovely things I have seen in my life, and it made me realize why Justin loved to live and teach there.
After that, I went to a number of other grade school classes with Justin, but after an introduction, and a little talk, I would exit the class.
I wanted to go paint the Asahi River close to the school, so walked a few blocks with my acrylic travel kit, found a bench by the river, and started to paint.
Like I said, it was an inclimate day, and it soon started to drizzle and found it impossible to continue.
Heading back to the school, I asked them for a couple chairs to sit and finish the painting outside under the eves. Almost the entire time, I was surrounded by school kids asking me all kinds of questions in a few English words, using gestures, but mostly unable to communicate.
I finished the painting under the eves of the school, and at the end of the day, presented it to the principal as a gift to the school.
School was soon over, and all the school kids lined up to be dismissed to go home. The principal wanted me to stand with Justin as he spoke to the student body eager to go home. I had no idea what he said for about 10 minutes as he held that little 8×10 acrylic painting up over his head for all to see. Occasionally there were oohs, and aaahs from the kids, with everyone looking at me, and I just grinned and nodded not knowing at all what was being said.
Justin later told me what the principal said, in summary and paraphrasing —
Art is a universal language which we all can see and appreciate, and even though Mr. Neff can’t speak our language, and we can’t speak much of his, Mr. Neff brought an expression which we all can relate, enjoy, share, and bring us together.
I kinda like that principal!
EPILOGUE
The school framed the painting, and it now hangs in the entrance by the shoe racks.
A Thanksgiving in Japan with a Wise Teacher Read More »
Leaving Milford
From April 2020, for a year, I posted on Facebook a painting each day as a brief diversion from the lockdowns and other bad news this year. Neglecting my weblog, I’ll post in the coming days some of my better posts. Some of these paintings are still available.
Breathtaking, the fiord’s cliffs rise vertically from the dark waters, mountain peaks scrape the sky and waterfalls cascade downwards from as high as 3000 feet as clouds swirl and dance playing peek-a-boo with the magnificent peaks. The remarkable glacial carved natural environment features spectacular tumbling waterfalls, glistening stunning fiords, ice-carved valleys with rivers, ancient rainforests, shimmering lakes, soaring walls of granite, and snow-capped peaks.
Milford Sound, a fiord in Southwest New Zealand, has been called by some the eighth wonder of the World. I visited Milford Sound on a cruise ship in February 2013. For those who have visited Yosemite Valley, it was akin to sailing a cruise ship right into the valley.
One of my favorite spots on a cruise ship is on the promenade deck right at the stern above the wake of the ship. Here you can hear the churning of the propellers in the water as it splashes and bubbles producing wonderful colors of aqua, greens, grays, and blues. I tried to capture a bit of this in the painting in Milford Sound.
For something totally different from the “nowe wi?zienie studyjne”, is another ‘vertical water’ painting. You can read more about it, including development of this painting here–
http://www.donaldneff.com/blog/leaving-milford-sound/
WINDY, FROTHY, BLUSTERY, SUNNY, and GLORIOUS!!
I haven’t seen Garrapata coastline this frothy in a long time. I went out with the Monterey Bay Plein Air Painters Wednesday to the coastline. It was such a beautiful day with the unusual pounding surf. Only a few artists showed up this time, and some quit because of the wind.
Generally the paintings I do on these paintout events are just for fun, and not to keep. However this one I might keep and touch up in the studio. About two hours of work.
Enjoy this short video of the pounding surf by Soberanes Point along the beautiful California coastline.
WINDY, FROTHY, BLUSTERY, SUNNY, and GLORIOUS!! Read More »
Endicott Arm
From April 2020, for a year, I posted on Facebook a painting each day as a brief diversion from the lockdowns and other bad news this year. Neglecting my weblog, I’ll post in the coming days some of my better posts. Some of these paintings are still available.
The towering cliffs surrounded us effused with waterfalls tumbling down to the glacial carved inlet. Advances and declines of the massive Ice Age glaciers had scoured this area dozens of times. Waterfalls plunged from astonishing heights down steep fjord walls and into the azure water. The fresh air, enhanced by the fizzing and popping of the glacial ice in the salty sea as it slowly melts, was all around. Harbor seals eyed us as our cruise ship made it’s way up Endicott Arm.
We visited Endicott Arm on our 4th cruise to Alaska in 2017, hopping the boat in San Francisco for a 10 day round trip.
Today’s offering from the “Coraintín Stiúideo” is one of my “Vertical Water” series of the azure sea in Endicott Arm.
May Lake II
From April 2020, for a year, I posted on Facebook a painting each day as a brief diversion from the lockdowns and other bad news this year. Neglecting my weblog, I’ll post in the coming days some of my better posts. Some of these paintings are still available.
Yesterday [sic] I posted a painting done at May Lake, in the Yosemite high country. If you missed that story, you can read it here — http://www.donaldneff.com/blog/yosemite-high-country/
Like I said, I originally wasn’t very pleased with these works, but they grew on me over the years, and especially now are reminiscent of my many visits to the area. From the “Studio Kwarantanna”, here is another rock study completed that same day.