Drawn the Road Again

Tag: Central Valley

  • Birdland

    Birdland

    I’ve written about California’s Central Valley before, and I have a feeling it’ll come up again. But there are just so many things to love about the place. Perhaps the best part of all is the birdwatching. The Central Valley is a main thoroughfare along the Pacific Flyway, and hosts thousands upon thousands of both…

  • Jumbo java

    Jumbo java

    Need a Scandinavian beverage to wash down all that krumkake and hvetebrod? A cuppa of Swedish coffee might do the job nicely.

  • In season

    In season

    One thing I always look forward to about driving to California is watching the seasons change as I go. It never ceases to amaze me that you can go from winter… …to spring, sometimes in the course of a single hour. These two sketches were done on the same day, just over 60 miles apart.…

  • Field geometry

    Field geometry

    Wednesday’s post reminded me that like lighthouses, I seem to have a whole collection of farm field drawings—like this sketch I did last year. I always thought the inherent lesson in one-point perspective (sketching nerds unite!) is what made these fun to draw. But now I think it’s the geometry. There’s just something so satisfying…

  • New day, new year

    New day, new year

    I made this sketch at the start of the last lunar year—on a crisp morning, surrounded by orange trees, in the still-breathing heart of a Gold-Rush-era Chinatown. So here we are, with another Chinese new year upon us—wishing you a happy and prosperous Year of the Horse!

  • Sunkissed sketching

    Sunkissed sketching

    In my studio I have a massive collection of vintage fruit crate labels from the 1930s and 40s (they’re still fairly easily obtained here on the West Coast). So it’s probably no surprise that when I found myself standing in an orange grove this winter, all I could do was imagine my sketchbook plastered on…