New Series?

As I said in my last post, I've got a back log of a few recent paintings.  All of them were commissions and I'm stoked on how all of them came out.

This one is called Undertow (for now).  I started it as a painting for my friend Frances, and as soon as I was finished with my first session, I knew it was going to be a bit too dark (in feeling).  But, I was really enjoying how it was shaping up, so I just went for it and decided to paint Fran a new one.

 Here's the new one.  A bit lighter feeling and a lot more feminine.  I'm really happy with how it came out and I hope she likes it too!

This last one was done for one of my roommates as a Christmas present.  His friend's spirit animal is the bison and I jumped at the opportunity to paint one.  I'm currently spending Christmas with Casey and her family in Colorado, and looking at this painting now seems so much more relevant.

Happy Holidays!!!

The Holidays are Coming!

Since I've been truant with my posting, here is a catch up, starting from just before Thanksgiving.

My house is part of a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) group.  What that means is that a bunch of people in the city connect with a group of local farmers and directly work together through seasonal commitments.  That is a secured season for the farmers and a fresh basket of food every week for us.  Nice. 

 Everyone in each group takes turns sorting food for the rest.  In the week before thanksgiving, it was my turn to sort.  We each bring the baskets for our group and then divide up the boxes of fresh produce from the farmers.  This is what the start looks like.

This is what the end looks like.

 And this is what the happy consumers look like.  This is Jesse and Betsy, two friends who have been sharing a CSA basket for three years!

Moving on from the fresh stuff to the cooked stuff, it was Thanksgiving time.

 Here's Casey getting ready to carve into the turkey that I just pulled out of the oven.  It was my first big bird and turned out pretty good.  The breast meat was still a bit dry, but I'll fix that next year!

 We had a few friends over for our orphans Thanksgiving.  I wish I got some photos of the rest of the group, but after I took this photo, the only business to be had was eating it all.  We had a great time, with plenty of food, board games and digestion.

The next day, Casey and I rode our bikes to North Beach.  If you've ever been in that area of San Francisco, you know that it is right next to Chinatown and a strange experience to go from America to China to Italy in six blocks.

 I had to get some shots of Chinatown.

 The stores aren't shy at displaying EVERYTHING they have in stock.  It was pretty impressive.

 Except for the english "Bakery" on the side of the wall, I could picture this being in China.

 I wonder how you tell the storekeep which lantern you want.

 I'm not sure if they realize it, but Chinatown is very harmonious in color theory.  The complimentary pair of red and green are everywhere with this beautiful mustard yellow.

After leaving Chinatown, North Beach (aka little Italy) wasn't as ornate, and I didn't get many shots there.

But I did get one of this chubby pigeon.  It seems with all the bakeries and sandwich shops, these birds are well fed.  It was a somewhat chilly day, and this guy seemed to be keeping warm with his abundant plumage.

 It's buildings like this that make me love San Francisco.  Its on the famous beatnik corner where the culture is still kicking - more or less.

To continue with the holiday spirit, last night my house had a cookie decorating party.  A few of us had just gotten back from seeing one of our roommate's perform in a play to find another roommate wrapping up her cookie baking session, ready for us to decorate.

 Here's Casey putting the final touches on her batch.  We listened to Christmas music, drank hot toddies, each did some of our own work before the week started, and enjoyed the cookies.  It was a great Sunday night.

This last photo has nothing to do with the holidays.  I've been working on a painting where I used this orchid and I couldn't help getting a picture of it in my window at sunset.  I'll be posting the final painting, along with some others, soon.

Few Bucks

I just finished a painting for my friend Eugenio's album "Few Bucks."  I'm excited for him to finish it so I can give it a listen.  Here it is...

Chicago

This past week I went to Chicago to visit my Hawaiian hommie, Britt.

 University of Chicago is a picturesque campus.

 Trash squirrel.

Britt is currently working on an indescribable experiment aimed at proving that all of reality is a hologram, and here I am laughing in the stairwell at this poster.  There is no way they could have put this up without know the intended joke...right?

 Chicago was pretty cold and windy when I first got there.  Not the happiest camper, but it made for some cool shots.

Here's the lion in front of the Art Institute of Chicago, which has an unbelievable collection.  Here's a few key pieces that I've been dying to see and was surprise to stumble upon.

 Picasso's Old Guitarist.

 Edward Hopper's Nighthawks.

Seurat's A Sunday Afternoon on the Island of La Grande Jatte

 I loved this giant sculpture in the middle of the walkway.

 The bean!  This sculpture is amazing.  I wonder how often they need to polish it.

 Sundown in downtown.

After a few days in Chicago, Britt, a couple of her friends and I drove up to Indiana to the pumpkin patch.  It seems like a tradition over there, but something very foreign to us islanders.

 You just pick it out and weigh it later.

 It was a pretty well organized affair, with tractor rides to take you to the pumpkin patch and apple groves.

 I'm not even sure what this is suppose to mean, but it sure makes me a bit uncomfortable.

 Group Photo!

After the pumpkin patch, we took a long drive up to Michigan.  It was probably one of the best road trips!

 Fall is so beautiful.  I had to edit this photo a bit, and even after that, it's still not as pretty as the real thing.

While finding our way to the lake house, where we were meeting more friends, we stumbled upon this tank.  Vyom, the fellow on the left, is from India and needed to get a picture of this spectacle.

 This is a small section of Lake Michigan.  It was a sight!
 

 The house we stayed at was right on the beach at the lake, and this is what was behind the house.  There's nothing like early morning in the woods.

 I can't believe how big this lake is.  It seriously looks like an ocean.

JUMP!

F3 at the Cotton Mill

I recently found out that my work was accepted to an art exhibition in Oakland.   F3 at the Cotton Mill is a one evening art show including a fashion bazaar, food and beverage, a while building of open studios and presentations, vendor displays, music, and of course, the 4th Floor Main Gallery filled with the work of over 15 artists, designers, craftspeople, and makers of all kinds who reside at the Cotton Mill and guest artists (that's ME!) from around the bay area.


I will be showing a few older paintings and the newest one I just posted about.  They wrote a little blurb about me that you can read here.  If you're in the area, please come out and check it out.  Feel free to tell your friends too!  Here's a few details:


Friday, October 21, 6 - 10 PM
1091 Calcot Place, Suite 103
Oakland, CA
There is no parking around the warehouse.  If you go to the Fruitvale BART station, there will be shuttles to and from the venue.  

Art Nouveau

UPDATE: I titled it, "Hele Mai Hele Aku"

After returning from our trip, I've finally started working on some concepts and sorting out how to use all the inspiration I felt during my travels.  One art movement that I have always been a fan of and that I feel always shows itself in one way or another in my work is Art Nouveau.  Having its origins in France, I got to see its presence a lot while we were traveling.  I was also very taken with all the beauty of Hawaii.  

It's funny how you don't realize how good something is until you're not there anymore.  That's how growing up in Hawaii is for me.  Every time I go back I realize how beautiful the culture, land and life is.  I wanted to do a painting that represented, more or less, the convergence of all of it.  This painting is somewhat of a representation of now and a mix of France, Hawaii and San Francisco.  I don't have a name for it yet and will post it once I figure it out.  

Big Sur

Last weekend I went backpacking with some old friends.  Casey, Richmond and I drove down south while our college friend, Colin, drove up north with his girlfriend and friend to meet up in the middle at Big Sur.  Without a map and functioning phones, it took us some time to fine each other, but eventually we did and started off.

The start of the trail was interesting, with plants overgrown and WAY too much poison oak everywhere.  It was three miles in, and well worth it.  After passing a few, campable spots, we found our way to the most beautiful camp sight ever.

 Right next to a flowing creek with plenty of room to spread our legs, we quickly took our packs off and jumped in.  The first one in was Colin, who immediately lost one of his Crocks in the water.  So, we all hopped in to help find it.  Here's Colin triumphantly reunited with his lost footwear.

 After the steep climb in, we rested and took in the remnants of the day.

After rest time, it was food time.  We pumped and filtered some water from the creek and got to cooking.

Colin and Megan put together a delicious meal of indian curries, quinoa and naan.  With warm food in our bellies and fun camping games to play, we had an awesome night under the stars.  

We woke up the next morning to an even more beautiful camp sight.  There's nothing like drinking hot chocolate and tea and eating oatmeal with the morning sun shining through tall trees.  

After breakfast, we packed up our tents and decided to play some cards.  Being so close to the creek, why not play cards over it?  We had a large boulder to play the cards on, but not much seating.  So we moved this fallen log over to the rocks and made a bench.

Everyone looks comfy and ready to play "Oh HELL!" a game we learned from our friend Ryan and subsequently have been teaching to everyone we know. 

After the game, of course, we had to lounge around again.  We each grabbed a sunny spot and basked in the sun.  Here's a thing I learned: If you look up and this is what you see, life does not suck.  

As sunny as it was inland, the coast remained foggy.  That's Big Sur for you.