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San Diego 100 (#93) - Christmas, California Landscape Painting

11/30/2009 11:46:05 PM

It is not likely we will have a white Christmas in San Diego, but I can't really say it is not going to happen. It may happen -- only if you go to the mountains and the weather cooperates, that is. Then, Julian would be a perfect place to be. In my San Diego 100 series, I included several scenes of this charming mountain village. In fact, I have painted Julian more frequently than the other locations. In the spirit of the holidays, I did another to add to the series. May your holidays be merry and bright! A snowy day [...]

San Diego 100 (#92) - Hillcrest, California Landscape Painting

11/30/2009 1:24:24 AM

We all belong to a community -- a community of people who share common interests, locality or identity. One has no right to attack another just because they are not in the same community. I, for one, belong to a community of artists. Yesterday, out of the blue, someone emailed me to tell me "there are too many of you artists in the world, and the world does not want to pay for what you make." This kind of senseless and self-centered remark shows clearly this person has a lot to learn about diversity and grow up. Hillcrest is an [...]

San Diego 100 (#91) - Lake Hodges, California Landscape Painting

11/28/2009 11:53:22 PM

It was a chilly, rainy day today in San Diego. After almost five months of no significant rainfall, it was a big surprise for many who realized now we are in the rainy season. Rain will bring many changes to the landscapes of San Diego, including Lake Hodges, a huge reservoir located between city of San Diego and city of Escondido. Only natural flows and storm runoffs entering this lake, its water level goes up and down, depending on the amount of rain we get. During dry months, there is almost no water in some parts which become mud flats [...]

San Diego 100 (#90) - Mission Valley, California Landscape Painting

11/28/2009 12:51:20 AM

Mission Valley (SD100-90) This valley was named after Mission San Diego de Alcala, the first California mission built in 1769. Today Mission Valley is where many locals go for shopping, commute to work, and watch football games at Qualcomm Stadium. Vacationers play golf and stay in many hotels that line along the busy freeway that connects beach communities to the west and inland cities to the east. New condominiums, more shopping malls and office complexes have been built in recent years. This painting is a view from one of the hills on the south side of Mission Valley. It is [...]

San Diego 100 (#89) - Pacific Beach, California Landscape Painting

11/27/2009 1:32:51 AM

Pacific Beach (SD100-89) They say "you never know how many friends you have until you rent a house on the beach." There must be many PB (as Pacific Beach is called here) residents who know how true it is. For that reason and others, this beach community is busy and crowded. It seems wildly popular, mainly with young adults, who love bars, boutiques and boardwalk. And, of course, the sun, sand and surf, too. At the end of the street is Crystal Pier (Click here to see Crystal Pier painting). San Diego 100 (#89) - Pacific Beach [...]

San Diego 100 (#88) - Crystal Pier, Pacific Beach, California Landscape Painting

11/26/2009 12:50:38 AM

Many people think the sound of rain is relaxing. Songs of birds or even whales are soothing. But I think people will agree that the rhythmic sound of ocean waves, among others, is probably the most calming and comforting. Crystal Pier at Pacific Beach is where it is possible to fall asleep, feeling and listening to the waves gently crashing all night. These quaint-looking cottages on the pier are actual hotel rooms that are popular with vacationers. San Diego 100 (#88) - Crystal Pier, Pacific Beach Click here for an enlarged view of this painting. Media: Original watercolor on [...]

San Diego 100 (#49) - Mission Bay, California Landscape Painting

11/25/2009 1:14:23 AM

Mission Bay (SD100-49) Sunset time is the best time to be in the Mission Bay Park -- at least for me. When most of the boats have come back to be moored for the night, the quietness returns to this marina. I was painting here a few hours before and I heard boats coming and going, children running in the park, seagulls chattering, and even occasional cries of a sea lion. Now everything is gone. The stillness of water tells me it is time for me to go home, too. Marina Village, Mission Bay Park San Diego [...]

Balboa Park December Nights III, California Landscape Painting

11/24/2009 1:40:30 AM

It is a magical moment when a day under the cloudless California sky slowly gives way to night. Seeing it is a surreal experience, but painting it is even more gratifying. I feel thankful for beautiful nature around us and for being able to paint it every day. Moving a little bit closer to the California Tower, I painted the same scene at Balboa Park as yesterday (see yesterday's post). Just as the sun sets behind the scene, people start gathering for one big holiday celebration called December Nights on the first weekend in December, a tradition for many people [...]

San Diego 100 (#87) - December Nights (Balboa Park), California Landscape Painting

11/23/2009 12:21:53 AM

"December Nights" has been a holiday tradition in San Diego for many years. On the first weekend in December, the largest community festival takes place in the historic Balboa Park. Seen from the other end of the Promenade, the California Tower and other exquisite Spanish-Renaissance-style buildings, together with lush tropical plants and trees, all look silhouetted against the setting sun. That's when the lights start glowing in warm colors and the big party begins. Like tens of thousands of people in San Diego, I look forward to this event to join in the communal holiday celebration. San [...]

Paris Café XXX, French Landscape Painting

11/22/2009 1:26:29 AM

Paris Café XXX Le Colibri, the hummingbird. I have no idea where the name of this café came from. They named it because the hummingbird is one of the most beautiful birds? Or, is it because everybody loves this jewel-like bird? Under a very eye-catching red-yellow awning, this café was bustling. Ernest Chausson (1855-1899), by the way, composed a romantic piece Le Colibri to a poem by Leconte de Lisle, praising the bird's amazing power and love. I can't help but think whoever chose the name for this café must have been a romantic, too. [...]

Paris Café XXXII, French Landscape Painting

11/21/2009 1:07:00 AM

As 2009 has only 40 days left, I have been thinking a lot lately about what painting project to do in 2010. This year my main project has been San Diego 100, which is winding up within a few weeks. I've also kept working on my Paris Café series. Since I've been having so much fun with Paris Café, I will continue this series. But I need something else for a change... I will have to put on my thinking cap. Speaking of a change, one of the biggest changes that occurred in the history of Parisian cafés was a [...]

San Diego 100 (#86) - San Marcos, California Landscape Painting

11/20/2009 1:39:36 AM

San Marcos (SD100-86) The weather in San Diego is pleasant almost all year round, so any day is a good biking day. Although life in Southern California is still highly car-dependent, the extensive bike route system in San Diego helps many who want to go to work by bike or who want to ride for pure enjoyment and a little adventure. I see biking gaining popularity year after year as there seem to be more and more bikers riding, especially on weekend mornings. One Saturday, I spotted a group of bike enthusiasts in colorful jerseys in the San Elijo Hills neighborhood [...]

San Diego 100 (#82) - Valley Center, California Landscape Painting

11/19/2009 1:09:40 AM

Valley Center (SD100-82) About an hour north of downtown San Diego, Valley Center is a rural community situated in the middle of a heavily agricultural area. During the month of October, lots of people from all over San Diego take the time to drive there to spend a day at a farm - at a huge pumpkin patch in particular. With hayrides, a maze, a llama ride, a farm animal zoo, a candy store, music, BBQ... there's plenty to enjoy at this farm especially for families with young children. Halloween pumpkins are sold nowadays at any grocery store or in a makeshift [...]

San Diego 100 (#85) - Rancho Santa Fe, California Landscape Painting

11/18/2009 1:22:27 AM

Rancho Santa Fe (SD100-85) The downtown area of Rancho Santa Fe is so carefully and elegantly designed it almost looks like a movie set. Restaurants, shops, offices are housed in Spanish hacienda-style buildings. Many have red tile roofs. Several businesses have an ornate wrought-iron sign hanging outside. All of these in the meticulously landscaped surroundings have a cozy village appeal - from somewhere in Spain or south of the border. Because the entire area around here used to be a eucalyptus tree farm (read yesterday's post), many landscaping trees are, of course, tall eucalyptus, which makes soft shadows on any sunny [...]

Rancho Santa Fe, California Landscape Painting

11/17/2009 2:18:37 AM

Rancho Santa Fe (SD100-23) Rancho Santa Fe is a small, picturesque community in the suburbs of San Diego. If you come here for the first time, driving through this community will be an experience that'll be hard to forget. One reason may be that the landscape doesn't look like typical Southern California. Winding roads run up and down the rolling hills, by the coastal wetlands, beside golf courses, orchards, a farm (as in this painting)... What makes the landscape particularly unique here is thousands and thousands of eucalyptus trees seen all over. Like in this photo, we literally drive under the eucalyptus [...]

Venice Reflections VIII, Italian Landscape Painting

11/16/2009 2:07:37 AM

Venice Reflections VIII I don't even remember what else was there because I was so mesmerized by the light at sunset time in Venice. Its soft and magical quality was amazing. And the reflection on the water was spectacular. That's all I remember about this particular spot. Using my photo and quick sketch, I did my first painting Venice Canal III-5. I think I was able to capture the atmosphere and the flavor of this magical moment. Based on this first painting, I made a few more pieces, including today's painting. For today's painting, I used a vertical format to give [...]

Piazza San Marco, Venice, Italy I, Italian Landscape Painting

11/15/2009 2:22:32 AM

Piazza San Marco, Venice, Italy I Because "only a lazy guidebook about Italy doesn't quote a sentence said once by Napoleon," chances are many visitors are already familiar with his quote: San Marco is Europe's most elegant drawing room (venice travel website). In general, I am not really interested in painting famous landmarks. Instead, I find myself attracted to more mundane scenes: smaller squares, backstreets, local markets, etc. where ordinary people live. Standing in the middle of the San Marco Square among many other tourists and pigeons, and admiring the sights all around me, I indulged myself as a tourist. Because [...]

Trattoria, Venice, Italy III, Italian Landscape Painting

11/14/2009 2:00:40 AM

Trattoria, Venice III There's nothing like eating a good meal in a friendly, family-run trattoria that local people also love to frequent. But today I read shocking news: Venetians may soon be extinct and Venice will be a ghost town by 2030. They say tourism has driven up prices too high for local residents to live there comfortably. Does this mean, in just 20 years, I won't be able to sit in a trattoria like this any more? (Please go to my previous post to read about this trattoria). The number of permanent residents in Venice went from 145,000 in 1960 to [...]

Trattoria, Venice, Italy II, Italian Landscape Painting

11/13/2009 1:56:58 AM

Trattoria, Venice II Travel experience could be ruined with just one disappointing meal in a wrong restaurant. Yet it is not easy to find a good place, especially in a foreign land, that we will remember fondly even years after the visit. In a huge tourist destination like Venice, there are dozens of eateries that get recommended by travel gurus and popular guidebooks. But, then, there's always somebody who will refute the recommendation, based on his or her experience. So what can we really rely on when looking for a great place to taste the local food? I'd say [...]

San Diego 100 (#84) - Del Mar, California Landscape Painting

11/12/2009 1:49:05 AM

Del Mar (SD100-84) One of the commissions I'm working on right now brought me to this neighborhood in Del Mar a couple of days ago (This painting is not the commission). I enjoy coming to this beach community for its quaint village-like feel. Behind its busy main street is a quiet, upscale residential neighborhood with tree-lined streets, as in this painting. These towering landscape trees make the place feel almost like a forest. And they are the main characters in today's painting. If I am correct, some of them must be the Torrey pine tree, the rarest pine species in the U.S. A [...]

Toledo, Spain V, Spanish Landscape Painting

11/11/2009 12:38:19 AM

You can't be visiting Toledo without feeling the presence of El Greco. While working on a painting I posted yesterday (Toledo IV), I remembered Annunciation, the very first El Greco I saw when I was a child in Japan. Today's painting has something to do with another famous piece by the artist, The Burial of Count Orgaz. The church of Santo Tome in this painting is where this masterpiece can be seen. Many visitors walk on this street with great anticipation of seeing El Greco's remarkable painting up close and personal. Toledo, Spain V Click here for an enlarged [...]

Toledo, Spain IV, Spanish Landscape Painting

11/10/2009 1:08:55 AM

El Greco lived in Toledo in the late 16th century during his best years as a painter and died there. As I was enjoying this vista of Toledo, I remembered how I came to know this expressive painter, even before Van Gogh or Picasso. When I was growing up in Japan, my family lived for several years near the city of Kurashiki in Okayama Prefecture. The Ohara Museum of Art in Kurashiki was, and still is, well-known for El Greco's Annunciation in its collection. But that was of little importance to me as a 7 or 8-year-old. When I first heard the [...]

Marisqueira, Portugal I, Portuguese Landscape Painting

11/9/2009 12:37:31 AM

You might remember this painting from my previous post. I was glad that this piece was also reviewed by John A. Parks in the summer issue (2009) of American Artist/Watercolor Magazine (you can read an online version of the article here). John, an established artist himself (see his website), often writes for American Artist and its sister publications. His writings are commended highly and I always enjoy his articles which are insightful, accurate and thought-provoking. So you can imagine how truly honored I was that he would do an article about my work. He wrote, "Her travels have (also) [...]

San Diego 100 (#83) - Fallbrook, California Landscape Painting

11/7/2009 1:16:05 AM

Fallbrook (SD100-83) On our way to an inland community of Fallbrook, we often see avocado vendors by the roadside. No wonder, the town proudly holds the title of avocado capital of the world. It's in a rural area north of San Diego, away from freeways, nestled among rolling hills, forests, and, of course, avocado groves. An isolated, sleepy village you think? If you've never been there, you'd be surprised to find a thriving art community. On the main street are several art galleries, an art school and an impressive art center. They attract many art lovers to town who visit for exhibitions, festivals, [...]

Autumn Leaves, Kyoto, Japan IV, Japanese Landscape Painting

11/6/2009 12:56:50 AM

Lots of light, a gentle breeze, flickering shadows, autumn colors on magnificent trees, sparkles on the river, hazy mountains in the background and two people walking through a temple gate... It was a beautiful sight, almost picture-perfect. I liked it when I saw it and I wanted to paint it. Soon I realized, however, finding an inspirational subject was an easy part. Next came a tough question: how am I going to paint it the way it inspired me? As I stopped and observed the scene, I began to see more things beyond natural beauty that really attracted me in [...]

Barcelona, Spain VIII, Spanish Landscape Painting

11/5/2009 1:09:21 AM

The moment I stepped in this narrow street, I was stopped in my tracks. I was not just blinded by the bright midday sunlight; I was hit by something more organic. It took me a few seconds before my eyes were adjusted to discover a spectacular aerial garden. Residents living on this narrow street in the medieval section of Barcelona put out flowers, vines and ferns on their balconies. Some of the plants had grown so long, nourished by the warm Mediterranean sun, that they hung to look like waterfalls. Some even crawled on the wire to the buildings on the other [...]

Barcelona, Spain VII, Spanish Landscape Painting

11/4/2009 12:22:13 AM

There stood a red brick building. With spires and heavily decorated windows, it was towering above plane trees at the corner of city streets. It would be a surprise if a castle-like building suddenly appeared in the middle of a city, but this is Barcelona, the city of Art Nouveau-style architecture. This one is actually an apartment building, called "Casa de les Punxes" by Modernism architect Puig i Cadafalch. In a district called Eixample, just outside Barcelona's Old Town, this and many other buildings of Art Nouveau-style can be seen. Why so many? I kept wondering... To find an answer, [...]

Barcelona, Spain VI, Spanish Lanscape Painting

11/3/2009 12:59:37 AM

Here's another painting of Las Ramblas, the same street as the one I painted yesterday (click to view). The name originates from the Arabic ramla, meaning the sandy bed of a seasonal river. This tree-lined avenue in Barcelona has always attracted many visitors. Some may come here just to shop at an outdoor market. Ever so popular, like any major sights in a big city, Las Ramblas is not immune from criticism from those who don't like it. They say it's too crowded, too touristy, and not safe. They say there's too much hype. Not too long ago, an article [...]

Barcelona, Spain V, Spanish Landscape Painting

11/2/2009 12:35:58 AM

Whether you agree this is the top must-see sight in Barcelona or feel it's a bit too overrated and touristy, Las Ramblas is a captivating street. Once you experience it, you can't get the image off your mind. At least that's how it is with me. Even years after my visit there, I still remember the lively atmosphere of this street as if it was yesterday. I feel I can still hear people talking... And in no time I am walking under the cool shadows of plane trees with other shoppers and watching street performers entertaining passers-by. Barcelona, Spain [...]

Vigilucci's Bar III, Interior Painting

11/1/2009 1:15:58 AM

Vigilucci's Bar III I was invited to see the interiors of a newly opened Italian restaurant in the resort town of Coronado (San Diego, California), Vigilucci's. The owner, who hails from Milan, Italy, recently added several original works of mine to his art collection. I am honored that some of them are now on the walls inside his restaurant. This painting shows a bar area of Vigilucci's. I was there before the restaurant was open for the day, but I could easily imagine the coziness of the place from exquisite lighting fixtures imported from Italy, draperies and furniture coverings in soft, [...]

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