The Deschutes River mural is by husband and wife artists, Paul Bennett and Carolyn Platt. The artists created this mural in 2012. This piece, along with their Dogs mural, is on display at the Strictly Organic coffee shop. These works are in the Old Mill District of Bend, Oregon.
In this shot taken from a distance, you can see the smokestacks of the old mill building that now houses a REI store.
Today I’m sharing a sockeye salmon 2-sided rock painting I created. On one side you see what this fish looks like when it’s spawning, and on the other side you see what it looks like at other times in its life cycle. They look SO different!
Sockeye salmon travel from the ocean to freshwater to spawn. Kokanee are a landlocked version of sockeye. If you’re lucky enough to catch one, they are especially delicious smoked.
Here’s a video of sockeye spawning in the Adams River in British Columbia, Canada. The 3-minute video, by Luke Gibson of Life of Luke, shows aerial and underwater shots of the fish. I loved his creative solution to filming underwater shots on a limited budget! A true artist will always find a way to work around obstacles.
Do you have artwork you would like to share? Include a First Friday Art tag on your post.
Rainbow Splendor is a large statue of trout jumping in downtown Troutdale, Oregon. This work is by local residents and world-renown artists, Rip & Alison Caswell. A smaller version is for sale on their website.
Today I’m sharing a simple drawing I did of a western snowy plover on scratchboard. This drawing shows stippled sand, waving beachgrass, and an alert snowy plover ready for action. This tiny shorebird is classified as a federally threatened subspecies. In Oregon, certain areas along the coast restrict activities from mid-March to mid-September, when plovers nest. Snowy plovers also breed on alkaline flats in eastern Oregon.
If you want to see how an amazing group of animators interpreted shorebirds, watch Piper from Disney. The star of this Oscar-winning short is a sanderling, but snowy plovers show similar behaviors. The artists who made this film spent a lot of time studying shorebirds and it shows. Enjoy this clip!
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This photo of the sun-dappled Mayors Square Mural reflects past times in Troutdale, Oregon. Muralists Dwayne Harty and Tammy Callens created a depiction of what the town looked like in the early 1900s. Completed in the fall of 2016, this work shows every type of ground transportation available in the beginning of the 20th century. The mural includes a train, horse & buggy, automobiles, bicycle, freight truck, and freight wagon.
I like using digital magic to bring out the best in my photographs before I post them. I use Corel PaintShop Pro, a less expensive alternative to Photoshop.
Clean up an image
This is a slide I kept in my tent during fieldwork and tiny spots of mold had grown on it. They couldn’t be removed physically so I used a digital scratch remover and cloning tool to erase them.
Steens Mountain, Oregon (Unedited)
Steens Mountain, Oregon
Crop an image
I took this picture of a pair of burrowing owls at the High Desert Museum. There was a lot of glare on the window of their enclosure. I cropped the photo, and in the edited version, they look like they’re in a natural setting.
Burrowing owls, High Desert Museum, Bend, Oregon (Unedited)
This morning I woke up with memories of a bison. This is Wooly Bully by local Central Oregon artist, Greg Congleton. This sculpture used to be in the Old Mill district of Bend but was moved several years ago.
The artist includes collected bits and pieces of everyday and historical artifacts. For example, the guts are made from four cylinders and a crankshaft. The eyes are -7/8 inch hitch balls. The lungs are made from a Model A Ford horn. He has the vision and talent to incorporate the unexpected into his unique works of art.
Maybe I was having memories of a bison because I was thinking of Yellowstone National Park. I hope to visit again soon and view the animals that inspired this outdoor sculpture.
To see a couple more of Greg Congleton’s pieces, and those of other artists, see Outdoor Horse Sculptures.
For me, it was a rocky start to photography. As I mentioned on my About page, I dropped out of Photography class in High School. I was failing the class. My focus was still unclear during those rebellious years.
College and beyond
Maidenhair fern printed in my darkroom
In college, everything changed when I roomed with two Photography majors. In one of the places I lived we converted a bathroom into a makeshift darkroom. I spent a lot of time in that room, unrolling spools of film in semi-darkness and immersing prints in sharp-scented fixatives.
I also served as a part-time muse since the college required Photography program students to take one roll of pictures a day. The infrared picture of me below, dressed as a lion, was taken by my roommate Jill.
Me dressed as a lion with wine in infrared
During one winter break, we left our rented house to spend time with our families. I arrived back at the house days ahead of everyone else. A catastrophe greeted me. Unbeknownst to me, my out-of-state roommates neglected to pay the electric bill—they assumed our rent included electricity. The electric company turned off our power when no one was in town, and the house was ice cold. The pipes had broken in the ceiling, releasing a steady stream of dripping water. My first thought was, “Her photos!” I scrambled to salvage my roomie’s pictures from her drenched room. String zigzagged from wall to wall and I hung up the saturated prints.
Here’s a black-necked stilt drawing I created with pen-and-ink. The rushes surrounding these birds echo their tall slim form.
Here’s a stilt I saw in the spring in Harney County, Oregon. Black-necked stilts have an almost regal quality to them. They move as if in a procession, slowly and deliberately.
Do you have artwork you would like to share? Include a First Friday Art tag on your post.
My dog, Tesla, loves to sing along to music. She especially likes harmonica music. Here’s her version of Jingle Bells.
You may not be able to hear it very well in the background, but here’s who Tesla was singing along with. This talented musician plays 10 Christmas carols in 5 minutes.
May music find its way into your holiday celebrations.
Many of us won’t be celebrating the holidays with close relatives, but we’ve grown closer to bird “families” in our yards. Interest in birding is soaring and people are flocking to this activity during the pandemic. I’m sharing the joy of birds in these photos of ornaments I’ve collected over the years.
Bluebirds capture the essence of the sky in their plumage. I’m hoping we have more bluebird days to look forward to soon.
Mountain bluebird
Flocks of whooping crane birds fill the landscape with their unique “unison” call. Maybe people can heed the call towards unison in the upcoming year.
The sun was rising and it was snowing lightly when I walked by this Canada goose sculpture in Bend, Oregon.
Sunrise over Canada goose sculpture
Here’s what it looks like with a bit more snow.
“River Geese” by Peter Helzer
This life-size bronze sculpture is by artist Peter Helzer. “River Geese” is part of the Art in Public Places initiative in Bend.
Canada geese pair & gosling
There are plenty of real life Canada geese in this neighborhood to keep the artwork company. The Deschutes River, and the Bend Whitewater Park, is directly behind this sculpture.
This Mother Bear sculpture is in a roundabout located in Madras, Oregon. Christopher Buffalo Folsom created this work of art. Can you spot all three of the mother bear’s cubs?
California scrub jays are usually a loud and active kind of bird. I shared this painting I did of a calm jay exactly four years ago today after a hectic political season. I wanted to show that a sense of calmness can return even after a time of chaos.
The jay pictured above, and the one below, appear calm on the surface. But underneath those calm exteriors, there is a flurry of activity. Their minds are running through a lot of “what ifs” and their bodies are ready to spring into action.
Today we are facing many challenges and “what ifs.” It may be difficult, but I hope you’re able to capture moments of calm, no matter how brief, before you flutter to your next destination.
This is a sculpture of Fungie, a bottlenose dolphin who has lived in and around Dingle Bay in County Kerry, Ireland for 37 years. He has brought much joy to visitors and residents over the years. Unfortunately, he has not been seen for over a week. A large scale search is underway.
Fungie holds a place with Guinness World Records for being the longest-lived solitary dolphin in the world. He is thought to be in his forties.
I am sending good thoughts his way…
May you live as long as you want, And never want as long as you live.
I showed you how I created this mural but I didn’t show you the inside of my High Desert hideaway hut. This 8 foot by 16 foot hut used to be a garden shed. We repurposed it into a guesthouse for visiting relatives and a studio space for me.
This $50 thrift shop door we installed is interesting on the inside and outside. What a great find!
This month, for First Friday Art, I’m sharing an American kestrel study I drew in pencil. When I took an ornithology class in college we learned about anatomy by studying specimens in a museum.
These sketches helped me learn more about birds, but they also turned out to be great tools for future works of art. I have referred back to them when working on pen-and-inks and paintings.
Here’s a photo of an American kestrel I saw in Malheur National Forest last year. They have beautiful coloring.
I’m sharing grizzly drawings for First Friday Art this month. I found this pencil drawing tucked away in a forgotten file drawer. This bear, in a typical bear pose, is feasting on a salmon.
When I flipped the pencil drawing over, I found this on the back. I forgot it was there! The fur is not drawn realistically, but this stylized pen-and-ink is interesting. The bear looks so content.
Maybe I’ll let these grizzly drawings out of their lonely drawer and do something with them. There must be an empty wall somewhere…
I have been busy filling up space and time by creating a High Desert mural. I recently posted more details on creating my Outdoor Pronghorn Painting. This weekend I added three additional paintings to the mural.
Did you know you can order customized fabrics from JOANN Fabric & Craft stores and other sources? Neither did I. This week I made face masks with customized fabric that I ordered online.
Here’s an outdoor pronghorn painting I did in our backyard. It’s the first Friday of the month so it’s time to share your First Friday Art. If you have artwork you would like to share, use the First Friday Art tag.
We have an 8 x 16 foot shed in the backyard and it had a boring blank west-facing wall. It needed something to make it more interesting. I thought of painting a pronghorn, one of my favorite critters.
This draft horse standing within three large circles of steel is by Devin Laurence Field. Horses played an integral role in Bend’s logging industry. Devin painstakingly constructs each steel piece in a process that includes cutting, forging, pressing, welding, grounding and polishing. This sculpture is in a roundabout in the northeast part of Bend.
Last February I was happy to see the Central Oregon Light Art exhibition lighting up winter nights in Bend. Oregon WinterFest has food, beer, and music like other events, but it’s also a showcase for artists. I have photographed the Fire Pit Competition (one of my favorite events!) and the Ice Sculpture Competition in the past. Central Oregon Light Art was added in 2019. I was surprised and impressed with what I saw this year.
This one looked nice in the daylight but look at how it changes at night.
When I walk my dog in the Old Mill district, I always smile when I see the art at the amphitheater. The Les Schwab Amphitheater is the main venue for large events in Bend, Oregon. Minneapolis artist, Erin Sayer, painted the crow on one side of the stage and the owl on the other.
Fellow Minneapolis artist, Yuya Negishi, assisted her. Yuya painted a dragon mural on the side of a building across the river and another mural on a staircase.
It’s already First Friday again! Today I’m sharing a prairie falcon pen-and-ink drawing I created. This drawing shows their dark “armpit” marking. That’s one of the ways to distinguish them from peregrine falcons.
Here are a couple glimpses of a prairie falcon flying high above the 9,734 foot peak of Steens Mountain in Oregon.
Share artwork you or someone else created with the First Friday Art tag.
Isn’t this dragon door spectacular? It’s a beautiful work of art with an interesting story behind it.
Do you recognize the tree-lined road in the photos below? This road, in County Antrim, Northern Ireland, is featured in the Game of Thrones television series.
Do you see the big stump on the left? Four of the 245-year old beech trees fell in windstorms over the last few years. The reclaimed wood was used to create several doors. The dragon door is one of ten doors installed in pubs and hotels in Northern Ireland. Each door represents a scene from season six of Game of Thrones. You can download a Journey of the Doors passport and collect stamps as you visit the location of each door.
Here is a crow feather on scratchboard I created long ago in a scientific illustration course.
On the first Friday of every month, the city of Bend usually hosts an art walk through the galleries in town. The galleries serve snacks and drinks and highlight local artists. Since the First Friday event is not happening this month, I thought I would share a piece of my own art.
Do you have artwork you would like to share? You can include a First Friday Art tag on your post.
In 1847, the worst year of Ireland’s Great Famine, people of the Choctaw Nation of the southeastern United States sent a gift of $170 to Ireland. The money, worth thousands in today’s dollars, was collected to help the starving people of Ireland. Over a million Irish people died from starvation and disease in the period from 1845 to 1849.
Honoring a small act of kindness
Cork-based sculptor, Alex Pentek, created the Kindred Spirits sculpture to help honor that simple act of kindness. The Making of Kindred Spirits shows the artist discussing its creation. The 20-foot tall sculpture, in Midleton, County Cork, was unveiled to the public in 2017. It stands in Ballie Park beside a popular walking trail.
But why would the Choctaw have sent such a gift when many of their people were struggling to survive?
I was looking for things to do around the house and decided to paint this dinosaur rock. This 8″ x 12″ Tyrannosaurus rex is the bigger version of this rock that I painted several years ago. Maybe this one will find a place in my garden.
In these chaotic times, I was looking for something to bring a sense of calm. Who knew I could find my calm by painting a dinosaur rock.
Art, in itself, is an attempt to bring order out of chaos.
Stephen Sondheim
This morning I found this article – Soothe Your Soul With An Arts Break. It features a wide variety of artwork from diverse artists. The site features six short videos. I hope some of the art in these videos will soothe your soul… at least for a little while.