I like this better now. Not stripes, now there is a flow. Having a hard time getting the colors to scan true to life. The brightest green is not nearly as neon. And the tone in the bottom right corner is more sap and less avocado.

Not sure where I will take this next, but I do feel it needs a bit more work. Contemplating. Here is a reminder of where it started.

I have painted, a little each day, haven’t taken the time to edit and post. I conquered a major project. Well, half of it at least. I scanned all my family photos. Been meaning to do this for, well a decade at least.

The wildfires of 2007 made it more important. I have good friends who lost three homes in one family. Parents and two sisters. One family on the La Jolla reservation lost 20 homes. Sisters, cousins, parents. It was devastating.

I worked at the Rincon Harrah’s Casino, and could not get to work the day the fire started. A good friend was already working, and she was trapped, with many others, for three days at the resort. No safe way out.

I spent a week in my apartment. Ash was falling, the sky was tell-tale red. Dozens of huge Eucalyptus trees in the complex were destroyed by the high winds. The tree in front of my balcony was torn in half. My back was to it, and it scared the you-know-what out of me. Walkways were blocked, parking was blocked. If anyone needed to drive out of there, they were out of luck.

My place was miles away from the main fires. If you are interested, here are some links to more details.  After seeing my friend and her family lose precious family photos and heirlooms, I made it a goal to copy all of my photos, and digitize them for safekeeping.

I figured five days, it took seven. The second half of the task is to crop, name and file each one. Then back them up so I have the files in two locations at least. Later I will restore any that need it, but honestly, that could take years.

Big load off my shoulders though. Having the scanning done.

Back to art.

This tiny piece was just a few minutes of play before lights out. Meant to be a sunset, but it sort of reminds me of fire too. More late night play below. Both Caran d’Ache Neocolor II on gessoed Arches 140 lb. cold pressed paper.

 

After working on Fresh Start, I had paint left on the palette. More work on one of the first abstracts from the beginning of the month.

 

I started Laly’s class, and her building of layers was in my mind. So there is more to come with this I think. Here is the before.

 

Still paint on the palette, I  grabbed an ATM card, and a scrap of paper and started again.