Plein Air @ Branscomb Farms Half Moon Bay CA 加州風景寫生


(May 12 2021)

Summer time really has arrived in the South Bay Area. Drove to Half Moon Bay this morning, definitely felt like traversing from summer to winter in about one hour. It was pretty cold, only 52 degrees at the location. And I didn't have any trouble to find the farm this time.  Painted watercolors on a grey day, so I decided to do a vertical one, only the easel were not designed for a 15" tall painting size, that was the reason I don't usually work in verticals.  It was a little challenging, besides the wind, I couldn't barely put any tiny bit weight on the painting for fear of it falling over.  Over all, I like my vertical layout today. 

The hostess, KC Branscomb has been very kind in allowing us to paint at her farm, but we have to follow her very strict rules for parking, not to close to the horses, because these are breeding horses at the farm, and young horses in training, etc.. Anyway, we only were allowed to paint in certain area.  In the end, she came to see our paintings during her busiest season spring schedule, gave us a quick training on how to respect horses for a few minutes.  Very knowledgeable lady, I wondered why her farm looks very well organized.

Also I met Daniel one of the managers on the farm.  He rode a very handsome horse passing by where I was painting.  He allowed me to pat this special Jumper.  



San Francisco Bay Area CA Half Moon Bay, CA, USA
Storytelling artist Xueling Zou who works in ♦️ watercolor & ♦️ oil mediums on ♦️ original art Plein Air paintings. Ship worldwide since 2010 @ https://about.me/xuelingzou@ about.me/xuelingzou or http://xueling-zou.pixels.com

Original Art Story

Alameda Plein Air Paint Out -16th Annual Event 2021

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Lady from Bangladesh

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There are many beautiful portraits that have visually showed us the subject's personality, history and culture.  I think facial expression is another very interesting subject in art.  That is why I love to study it.  I do it differently than some artists who just copying a photo.  I'd rather to know a little bit more about my subject before I start painting.  Here are some some portraits I painted and the stories behind them.  Please visit my online gallery at:  http://xueling-zou.artistwebsites.com/galleries.html to see more. Lady from Bangladesh was the portrait I painted in March 2011. We used to be neighbors for a short while. Her name is Tahmina. She was the mother of three very nice and well-educated boys, with such a sweet character. One early morning, I saw her dressed this lovely traditional pink/magenta sari in the garden, the morning light went through her veil, shining on her face... I went back and grabbed my camera imme...
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Work in Progress, live models studies - long and short pose

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Quick studies before the Annual Alameda Plein Air Evert

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Redwood City Port seems like a perfect location for practicing painting on a windy day. A year ago I painted at the location a couple of times. It was windy in the afternoon. I found a short tree to paint under to block a little wind. Took me almost an hour to finish the drawing. I tried to paint the kayak, but it was removed from the people working there. Lucky I had my reference photo. Not sure why I love painting fishing boats Later the owner of the boat next to it came to me, he took a photo and wanted me to paint his boat someday... Rushed to the drawing class...(July 26 2022) I have to get ready for the Annual Alameda Plein Air event, so I drove to the Campbell Community Center to practice, but I didn't know what to paint. Walked around and saw the Campbell Pool, then I knew it would be a good subject to practice. Found a corner and set up my stuff. For the composition purposes, I had to "move" and "reset" several little details. It wasn't a...
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Original Art Story - The Colors of La Boca Argentina

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Colorful La Boca grew to become an Italian (mostly from Genoa) district of Buenos Aires, Argentina in a very short time in mid-19th-century. It used to be the area where Italian immigrants arrived, and settled in the poorest of conditions. Their houses were built by the leftover corrugated iron and other waste found in the nearby harbour and industry on the Riachuelo river. In order to make the neighbourhood more interesting, they decided to paint their houses in bright colors by using the leftover paint from boats - hence the many different colours that can be seen. Where first a small river flowed, the area that now is Caminito had tracks installed, and when those were not used anymore, this developed into an ugly, abandoned part of La Boca. There were several museums with paintings portraying its hard-working inhabitants in the shipyards and on the docks. Local artist Quinquela Martín painted the walls of the street, which now we know as Caminito (which means little path in Spanish)...
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Capitola Plein Air 8th Annual Art Festival 2023

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Laurie Hill, the organizer of Capitola Plein Air Evert, gave me a personal orientation before I started.  Weather was perfect, I was in a rush and felt excited to start working, but forgot my parking permit.  No worries, I saw a flower stand on the corner of Monterey St and Park Ave.  A Mexican Lady carried a baby, and two others looked like teenage girl helpers. Surprisingly, their business was very good.  Every several minutes someone stopped by and bought flowers. Not mention it was Tuesday.  I thought people usually buy flowers before the weekend. After my work was done, the younger teenager asked me if it was OK to take a photo, the lady with the baby she talked to me in Spanish, which I didn't understand. They took photo, then we had photo together. Next day, I met a newly wed couple from Texas while I was painting outside Zelda's on the Beach.  They seemed very interested in my work.  I gave them the Sunday exhibition info, hopefully they would ...
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The Old Man and The Sea - Original Watercolor

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This original watercolor painting was inspired by Ernest Hemingway's The Old Man and The Sea.  It is one of my favorite watercolors, and a great gift for Father's Day. (Please click the image to enlarge) I read this book in Chinese a long time ago, then I read it again in English when I was studying in Australia. Back to my overseas studying time, I had to take the ferries from the place I lived to school each day for a while. Not mention the terrible home sick I had, the ending of relationship with my first boy-friend, when I struggled with every single little detail in life. But nothing could stop my love of the ocean and I enjoyed taking ferries on beautiful and stormy days. Watching the sun-rising or sun-setting, sailing by the magnificent city landscape and the awesome boats out on the sea, I promised myself that I knew I would overcome the difficulties... Years later, I started painting watercolors after moving to Bay Area in California, and the first one in m...
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Paintings with Auspicious Symbols V - Peacocks 孔雀東南飛

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I was inspired by the Chinese traditional folk art style to create a couple of peacocks with eight peony-flowers oil painting on canvas recently, which I named "Peacocks Flying Southeast 孔雀東南飛". "Peacocks Flying Southeast" is well-known to Chinese and is a phenomenal poem in Chinese literary history. It is one of the collections of the Music Academy (YueFu) formed by the Han Dynasty (196—219 AD) courts to gather literary works created largely for the common people. It was about a tragic love story between a young couple, who promised to love each other forever. Perhaps the morbid mother-in-law could not stand the daughter-in-law coming between her and her son. Eventually she broke up the marriage when her son was working out of the town. The young couple’s dream and promise of living together was shattered. Both their families forced them to marry someone else. So this young couple took their own lives, fulfilling their commitment of love in a different world....
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Plein Air @ Alviso Marina County Park San Jose CA

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It was not a warm morning at the location. I got to one of my favorite painting spots and decided to paint again at this location. Couldn't remember how many times I've painted there before. Still, I started with a thumbnail, almost the same layout from my memory as before. I tried to use less water as it was hard to dry given the weather. One lady walked by me to complement my work, but she she surprised me and immediately apologized and told me that she was just walking by. Later some male voice was even louder behind me saying that it was a beautiful painting. That really scarred me a lot. Turned around and I saw two policemen driving by, they were kind and smiled, apologized as well. Then asked me when I started my work. I didn't really pay much attention, told them around nine o'clock. After they left, I realized that it might not have told them the correct time, they might misunderstand me and think I was not honest enough, oh, no.... Saw several other artis...
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