This week Nancy and I were in Point Reyes National Seashore near San Francisco prepping for a new mural. Here’s the concept sketch. It’s been years since I’d been here and it was great to see this beautiful place again. I’ve seen this park from car, foot, horseback and twice sailing by it in my own boat, but this time park staff showed us around and it was fun to see it through their eyes. It’s one thing to be a tourist or traveler; entirely another to see a big park with people who have great insight and knowledge of a place. As long-time Chief of Interpretation, John Dell’Osso said: “I have a huge passion for this amazing park – let me show it to you.” You bet!
The problem, of course, was to figure out a way to show all five separate and different Point Reyes habitats into one painting – ocean with whales and elephant seals, estero (like Drakes Estero in the distance in the photo), uplands with scrub, forests with cypress, fir and redwood, and of course Tomales Bay estuary and wetlands on the other side of the mountains. Impossible, of course, so after two days of trying, I finally admitted defeat and fell back to something called reality.
So, the painting will be all about this habitat: coastal scrub with an amazing collection of critters and plants. I’ll be painting tule elk, black-tailed deer, scrub-jays, hummingbirds and quail. Oh boy! Just to be on the ground here was so much better than trying to paint a place without seeing it first-hand. Hear that you guys that don’t send us for a field trip?? This one will be GOOD!
Here are the flat-hat pros that know their stuff like few others: John Dell’Osso on the right and John Golda left. The artist with his sketchbook in the middle just wishes he could stay here forever.
Thanks for reading this week.
Larry Eifert
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