Original Art Stories - Xueling Zou

I was a little bit behind the schedule this morning, rushed out of the door, drove up the winding road to the location. It was quite windy and cold, my first time painting there, only hiked nearby once years ago.  I set up my stuff and painted behind the trees and shrubs, thought they could help me to block the  wind.  Not! I had to hold my easel with one hand while painting.  There were many small branches and leaves that dropped onto my painting.  How could I not check the weather?  I didn't stop when my painting looked good enough, but kept adding more dark colors.  It was just practicing I told myself.  Then, I couldn't find the parking lot, because I was focused on my painting, I totally forgot how to get back.  Lucky there was another artist who stopped her sketching and walked me half way.  We had a nice conversation chatting about Chinese New Year.  I kept walking, suddenly saw her sketching again... I realized that I forgo...

Many painters get inspired by this location, but I always find that it is difficult to paint. Nice afternoon to meet several artist friend there. Looked that they were half way done when I arrived. Lucky I found this tree, otherwise I couldn't see anything vertical standing out to paint. Near sunset, it was gorgeous! (January 28 2022)

Palo Alto Baylands Nature preserve is one of those places that has been inspiring most California Plein Air painters for years. I went to paint several times, hadn't found a better way to express it then through watercolor media yet. It was a little cooler today, grey with dramatic clouds in the sky at the location. Felt a little lost with my new color palette, could not follow my usual watercolor's flow to loosen up. And Alizarin Crimson made a small mess, not sure why it was so liquid?  Anyway, I painted a scene  moving objects around a bit, and I wish I would be inspired by this place to return and paint again someday soon.  Good day for practicing.

April 20 2021, the first egg was discover in the nest :). Time flies so fast, we moved in August 2008 and have been living in the same house for over twelve years now. After we moved in, I picked up a DVD from the local library about a hummingbird's story and learned that the hummingbird mother is always a single mother from the onset of pregnancy. Then I started planting some plants to attract hummingbirds. In spring of the 4th year we happily discovered a hummingbird mother had built a nest and raised her babies on a tree branch outside our window. I took so much footage, even caught one of the first flights of her babies. For the next couple of years I watched the hummingbird mothers successfully raising babies from spring to early summer, including the final training before the babies became independent. April 22 2021, the second egg was laid in the nest. For the next several years they weren't able to finish their motherhood experience unfortunately; one year the win...

A gray day painting out on location. Thought I was over dressed when the sun came out. Later I felt so cold, only a few steps from my car, but I didn't want to stop. Still learning how to manage time while painting outdoors, especially doing watercolor. Miracles only come from practicing daily for an artist. (Nov.11 2020)  

Changed back time from Daylight Savings. Only one hour different, I felt like jet lag. I was excited on the way to paint at the location, could see some other artists I haven't seen for a long time. After I got there, realized that the park wasn't opened to the public. There was no bathroom open either. It was still quite a warm day, feeling hot in the sun. Locked my bottle of water inside the car, no need to drink any water in this case. Challenging, no one could have predicted what can be happen in advance. Some artists can paint the Marshlands beautifully. I was just focusing on painting loosely, and using a limited color palette. Quickly I found there was not much more could do, which meant it time to stop. Usually I would try to force myself to continue, not today, I was done. A couple of other artists said some complements. I know they try to encourage me, and I was very thankful! Bay National Wildlife Refuge Fremont CA. Changed back time from Daylight Savings...

Cleaned up my studio, found some old outdoor oil paintings I didn't like. Feels like my beginning Plein Air oil paintings look like antique works after I have sanded them down and e-framed them. Shall I keep them or paint them over again?

Bugs like my watercolors in spring... lol. I didn't know about this park till today. Still under 60 degrees out, not a warm day. Felt like somewhere in China all of a sudden. Lucky me not only have so many friends all over the world supporting my art every day, and also my family members helped and delivered a couple of new 140b big and small watercolor blocks which were made in Holland, and a new watercolor palette with 17 wells from China. I used a couple of new watercolor paints I ordered online. Hadn't gotten to used them yet. Anyway, keep practicing... I don't usually paint for using all the tricks, today's painting I used some sea salt on the tree area, wanted to express the spring blossom feeling, but the sea salt I used not absorbed properly

Gorgeous and warm day. Painted at Saratoga Heritage Orchard next to the library. Finally spring came, though there was frost on roof this morning. Beautiful apricot and cherry trees just start blooming. I have allergies and have to cover myself well outdoors. Some nice people came by to talk to me while I was painting. Thought I could paint more than one, but the allergies had made me tired... Please view this video I made that there was a coyote there before I started painting in the morning.

From gray to sun shine, it was a typical California morning. My first time being here, did two paintings at the location. After one done, I turned ninety degrees, then did the second one at the same spot. There were many geese visiting the lake, they seemed very happy. All of a sudden, there was a remote controlled looking like a toy boat making a loud noises sailing in the water, broke the peaceful morning and scared all the geese away. I didn't think it was a nice thing to do. Later on, a lady passing by told me that the geese were eating the fish growing inside lake, so they used the the little motor to scare the geese away on purpose. (Updating from for August 30, 2018)

It was quite windy. The one I've posted here was the first one I painted at dusk. I tried to loosen up and paint another one, it was the sunset time, I wasn't able to finish. I have been thinking to paint here for so long, finally Robyn and I we made it. Always happy to paint with another artist. (Updating from August 29, 2018)

Being an outdoor painter, checking the weather forecast is very important. It was a beautiful day yesterday, I didn't bother to check and was excited to find a great new nature preserve. There were many kinds of birds, the dramatic sky, distant mountains... What a perfect place to paint a landscape in watercolors. Marilyn saw me painting and took a p hoto of me, she mentioned that it was going to rain. It did start raining only a few minutes after she left. I was crazily in rush packing my staff, while a nice gentleman was passing by and offered if he could help. I should say thanks instead of "No!", and wished he were an umbrella... It is so easy to miss an opportunity to show one's appreciation. I hope to meet this person again to say a big Thanks! So far I have been quite spoiled with our lovely California weather. I really am grateful in life, no matter little thing or big, they all inspire me to paint. More original artwork @  http://xueling-zou.pixels....

They are ocellated turkeys. I first saw them when I traveled in Guatemala, but could not realize that  they were in wild.  I was not surprised that some people mistake this type of turkeys for peacocks.  Both of them are birds with similar and beautiful teal colors and patterned feathers covering their bodies, especially when a male opens his fan in order to attract a female's attention.  After day by day study, maybe the autumn feeling urged me to paint a pair of ocellated turkeys in front of a farm, because I haven't seen them in North America.  The more I got into the painting, the more I felt the love between this pair of birds.  I really didn't want to think about Thanksgiving.  I would love to create an environment where they are happy as long as they should live, no matter whether they lived in wild or on a farm. After the painting was done, I was happy for the result.  I posted a thread at http://fineartamerica.com/showmessages...

(Please click the image to enlarge) The magpie, xi que, a bird symbolizing great joy, can appear in these forms: plum blossom is said to be a sign of good luck, friendship and happiness. Two magpies, shuang xi 双喜(囍), symbolized the wish that you find each other in joy. Chinese use both words and a pair of magpies symbols for wedding, anniversary and business success. The rebus of a magpie depicted at the top of a branch has the meaning of happiness before your face," or xi shang mei shao 喜上眉梢. If you would like to know more about magpies, please visit: http://originalartstories.blogspot.com/2013/02/happy-lunar-new-year-painting-with.html

Some people believe that there is no winter in California. Even if it is not as cold as it is on the East Coast, we have less activities during our winter time. There are a couple months of cold raining days, a couple of frosty days, and the temperature can drop down to about 30 F degrees. I was quite lucky to have this opportunity to watch and learn more about how a hummingbird mom raised her little family during May in previous years. After coming back at the end of April last year, I had no idea what happened but only saw an empty hummingbird nest. Was the mom successful raising her babies? Hummingbird mom is the most independent mother I think. She searches for a safe area, builds a nest, hatches her eggs (usually two), feeds, raises and trains her babies all by herself after pregnancy. Finally she has to push the grown-up babies out of the home area at the end of raising them. It didn't rain enough last winter. Not all the autumn leaves fell off the trees and we cou...

Chinese New Year is one of the most important traditional holidays and is celebrated on the first day of the year of the Chinese calendar (lunisolar). In China, it is also known as the Spring Festival, or "Lunar New Year". 2014 is the Year of Green Wood Horse in the Chinese zodiac related to the Chinese calendar, starts on January 31. Like many other cultures, horse is one of Chinese favorite animals, horse is not only a symbol of traveling, but also a sign of speedy success. The horse is an intelligent animal. Horses need to be trained to become useful to humans. Interestingly, Chinese wouldn't let horses do farm work. Instead, all the farmland jobs go to the ox. This is because Chinese believe that horses can help human to win battles. Sitting on a horses back implies that the person is from a noble or higher ranking family. So people born in the Horse year usually care about their dressing, outlook and speech. So place a horse or many horse symbols around to en...

First, I check my last year's photos, of course there was no way that I could tell if it was the same hummingbird mother.  But I realized that it was exactly the same date- May 20th that I took first a couple photos of the baby birds last year.  What an interesting coincidence! So, I watched them more carefully, found out many differences between those two mother birds. This year's would rest on the potato tree, and spend a lot of time cleaning her feathers.  I didn't think that she fed her babies as frequent as the last one did.  Even the babies behaviors were quite different too.  Like mother, like children! They started to clean their feathers in such a crowed nest, one already flipped its wings, and would stand on the edge of the nest more often.  The most funny thing I saw that the baby birds pushed their poos out of the nest, squirting into the air.  Last year, the baby birds only sat in the nest, sleeping or waiting for being fed, the mother'...