Plein Air @ Joseph D. Grant Park, Mt. Hamilton CA


Drove through a narrow winding road to the location, I could see this beatiful Santa Clara Valley scene from the hill this fine morning.

My first time painting at this location, though I had been there several times before, hiking or just passing by.  


I didn't see the old barn that I wanted to paint; it was supporse to be nearby. Found a spot at the shore of the Grand Lake and painted next to an other local artist who was working with oil media.

Old oak trees in the distance, California poppies were blooming on the hills, birds singing and catching each other, frogs in the lake...


Such a gorgeous spring time, but I knew it was not my typical scene to paint.  Finished the work, walked around chatted with the other artists.

Actually,  I found the old barn really was not far from where we were painting, have to come back again.
(April 29 2024)
San Francisco Bay Area CA San Francisco, 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

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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Alameda Plein Air Paint Out -16th Annual Event 2021

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Alameda Plein Air Paint Out 2021 - my 3rd time here Joined the 16th Annual - Alameda Plein Air Paint Out Event from August 2 to 7. It was my third time joining the Plein Air event since 2018. Didn't apply in 2020 as Coivid-19 changed the world. August 1 in the evening, I moved into my host lady Ros' house on Bay farm island. I was so welcome by her, her dog Sparky and three of her bunnies. Not a good first night's sleep, might be the airplanes over head or the new place. Met many artist friends while we checked into the event the next morning. Ross' friendly dog Sparky Always started my first painting at Grand Marina, actually I painted at Fortman Marina at the Alameda Yacht Club. It was a gorgeous morning, met the Club manager Mark. He showed me the watercolor  paintings his grandmother and his mother did in his office and told me that he was an artist too. People were passing by and gave me some compliments. I remembered to give them the flyers inviting them t...
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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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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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Work in Progress, live models studies - long and short pose

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Arrived 30 minutes earlier at the studio, because the model is one of my favorites. Our model she is African and Irish mixed. Today she wore a long white silk gown which contrasted her skin, very beautiful. But I didn't get the spot where I wanted to paint. She looked exactly straight to me, and her hands and feet were all together in the middle. Depends on my years of Plein Air experience, I know I must make decision quickly. Almost the same moment she moved her hand to touch her face, I captured the moment, so I could had a reference photo to paint while her two hands were positioned one horizontal, and one vertical. I already had done two portraits of her before, both were 12"x16". Today I worked on a new colored panel 16"x20". During the work, I noticed that her gown was quite challenging to paint, because of the white silky and reflective material. So I just focused on her whole shape, and used my left over color palette. Three hours was too shor...
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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 MartĂ­n painted the walls of the street, which now we know as Caminito (which means little path in Spanish)...
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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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Plein Air @ Westwind Community Barn Los Altos Hills CA

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It has been over a week since I painted out. I always wanted to come back to this place and paint in spring, finally I made it before all the grasses turned yellow. Found a peaceful spot in the shade, watching all the girls cleaning the horses, then riding them on the trails while I was painting. There was a lady training a horse and made the area full of dust near me. That horse might be not cooperating. I heard the trainer using a whip in the air and talking to the horse, "what kind of horse are you" One young girl finished her riding and came to see my painting. She told me that she read books and found out she really loved horses since she was a child. Another lady Tania complimented my painting and we had chat. She told me something about horses I didn't know after she saw a horse in my painting. She wasn't Russian, but her name was given from her mother's Russian friend. What a lovely day and got to paint at this beautiful place! (April 15 2022)
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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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