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May 30, 2006
At home on my dome
As a muralist, I sometimes feel that I have been born 500 years too late. The great cathedrals are all finished, the Pope has run out of ceilings to paint and the Medici are dust in the tomb. So my turpentine started to froth over when I had a sniff of a dome to paint!
The house is a spectacular 12,000sq' mansion in the Livermore hills and the dome was 35' scaffold climb each day.
The client wanted the full Monty, with chariots and battles, all with deep personal symbolism to represent key moments in their lives. This is in the true sprit of mannerism, and one can even think of the giants of Silicon Valley as the "new Medici", swapping trade in spice and silk for chips and hard-drives.
There are some real problems in dome painting: The paint wants to obey gravity and end up on the floor, not the ceiling. Working overhead took a real toll on my aging body, and this is only obvious when you are done for the day and your attention wanders from the work to your back and neck. There are some huge problems of foreshortening of perspective as the dome surface approaches the edge and the angle turns towards the vertical.
Dispite all of the above, it was a huge joy. I sometimes can hardly believe I get paid for some of the fun I get to have.
Beats a real job any day!
Posted by Barbara at 06:58 PM | Comments (0)
May 29, 2006
The BIG hole.
I had been noticing a slight depression in street at the bottom of the driveway over the weekend, and came home from work on Monday to find a 3'X 4'X 4" sinkhole in the street. "Holy shit!!"
I quickly figure it to be my broken lateral clay sewer line, and call the city. They show up and tell me "you have a sink hole in your street"... no kidding.
What they meant is it was my hole. They also told me it would cost $6,500 to make the hole go away and have my tiolet flush again.
.... Next stop, Home Depot!
$120 bucks later I had the pipe fixed and got to keep my new pickaxe:)
The city inspector is moaning about about the cold patch I used for the black top, but my tiolet is flushing again, so they can kiss my freshly wiped ass.
Posted by Barbara at 09:23 AM | Comments (0)
Carnival Day at the Child Development Center.
It was the annual carnival day at Ursula's school the other day.
Just as with every other school, we had 3 bouncy castles, face painting, a story teller, coast guard launch tours, fire truck, dog display team and two helicopters.... ok, these are exceptionally lucky kids.
I was asked to donate a portrait of one of the kids for the silent auction, and needed to show one as an example. It was about time I sketched Ursula. My offer made the high bid for the auction of $150, and the carnival made a total of $4000 for the school.
Posted by Barbara at 08:50 AM | Comments (0)
from tundra to eden... almost.
We were recently given a root bound Redwood tree by Barbs sister Jan, and it spurred us into starting to untangle the garden.
The Redwood was soon joined by a London Plane, a Silver Birch and a Japanese Maple. I redressed the nondescript slope into a terrace, and used my cave building skills to fabricate some huge rocks.
Throw in a couple of hundred bucks of bedding plants from Home Depot and a few quarts of sweat and ... Boom!
A garden.
Posted by Barbara at 06:49 AM | Comments (0)