SKETCHES FROM SPAIN PHOTOS

The SF Bay area is very spread out and the last few days found me driving all over the place. Today I sat again at the Gallery Concord. That is a 100 mile round trip drive for me. I really don't mind the distance as I listen to books on tape while I drive. Sitting for 5 hours at the Gallery can get pretty boring unless I take some work with me. It is a wonderful space and a terrific old building. Unfortunately, there is no incidental foot traffic in this neighborhood, so we don't get a lot of visitors.

Today I decided to take my computer and draw from the 1500 photos I took in Spain. I started a new sketchbook and I am going to devote the entire book to images from Spain. I don't know why I didn't think of this idea before. Most of the photos never get used. This is a way to get lots of drawing mileage and see which images can work their way into a painting or two. Here is today's efforts. They were all done with a mechanical pencil, probably 2B lead on white paper. I have no idea where the colors are coming from in the photos.

GAUDI'S ICONIC SAGRADA FAMILIA CATHEDRAL

One of the highlights of Barcelona is touring the amazing architectural wonders created by Antoni Gaudi. His incomplete masterpiece is the Cathedral Sagrada Familia (Sacred Family). I did this drawing on a second visit. We were taking a long walk to an historic hospital and I needed a rest, so I sat in the park across from the cathedral and drew for about an hour. You can see the park in the last photograph. It was taken from inside one of the towers. I normally avoid heights but couldn't resist taking the elevator inside the cathedral up into one of the towers and then walking down a very very very long spiral staircase. I have shared what the inside of the tower looks like, plus the top of the outside of two of the towers from close range. This is one of those places that you can't stop taking photos. The building is being completed with the funds collected by the tourists. There is scaffolding and workmen everywhere. Definitely job security on this project. The building has been in continuous construction since 1891!! If they complete it in my lifetime, I would love to go back.

I am excited to have the opportunity to teach in Ransom Canyon, Texas outside of Lubbock. August 24 through the 28th. They promise me air conditioning! I will add it to my website when my son gets a break from his college work. He is my webmaster. I don't have a clue how it functions. Fortunately, the blog is a template and you don't have to know computer programming to keep it going.

It's going to be a busy summer with 2 workshops in June in California. The Reseda Workshop is filled but there may be room in the Gualala one, if anyone is looking for a working vacation.

I get this little computer message every day from "The Universe"! I especially like the one from today. Hope you do, too.

"You get as many "do-overs" as you like. Of course, you never know you're living a "do-over" until it's over.

There are lots of reasons for wanting a "do-over." Most of all, people want another chance to do things they were afraid to do the first time, and to say things they were afraid to say. Oddly enough, it's not their mistakes they want to rework, but their "unused" minutes.

Yeah, pretty nifty, but you should know that it isn't any easier the next time, and because no two ever go exactly the same, the gifts, opportunities, and loves of one, never appear the same way again. Never.

So all in all, it's better to live as if there are no "do-overs," so that you won't need one. But I thought I'd share this with you anyway, to work in the bits about fear, mistakes, and how precious today's opportunities really and truly are."