On t-4 days before the shelter in place order came down, I went to the library and checked out a bunch of books for my son just in case the libraries closed (the libraries closed the next day). Two of them are on tsunamis, which my son is obsessed with. We were reading them this morning, and they put Bali on my mind. This voice kept singing, "jungle, jungle, more jungle!" while I was drawing this.
We took the Tuesday after Memorial Day off and rode bikes into GG Park. We found a mostly empty patch of green to picnic and play across from the Conservatory of Flowers. Our social distancing signs are blue with four white arrows pushing four people apart. Every time I look at them, I think, what if people think the length of those arrows is actually 6 feet? What do yours look like?
Finally started back on a regular sketch schedule. Once a week on Thursdays, and I really look forward to it. I tried to tone down the orange marker with brown ink, but no luck. It really was a bright and sunny fence, though.
Playgrounds were opened in October then closed again the first weekend of December, and then re-opened yesterday! So grateful. This is one of the renovations by SF Rec and Park while they were closed: Alice Chalmers Playground. It's a pretty crazy climb inside (my five year old needed me to help him down the slide). The Q-bert type iceberg things are super cool, too.
Kangaroos, wallabies, and emus at the zoo with my Sharon Art Studio friend. So nice to create together again! This was from November, when the SF Zoo was still open. I'm really grateful we were able to go several times before it closed again.
This oil painting was , for me, an explosion of a new freedom I found after finally getting a home nearly 40 years ago, a room with a sink and a bed and a window. I hadn't painted for years, and never without extreme self-consciousness. But years of homelessness changed me and my appreciation of "art". That freedom eludes me these days, that 'ignorant' notion that I can do whatever comes to me. I'd love to get it back. Surely it's in us all. It may be better to paint to be satisfied than to paint to satisfy...
