Bob Dylan, Plein Air Painter

This website has the 2010 edition of Bob Dylan's Drawn Blank paintings, and it seems like they (at least the drawings) were done outdoors. Some of the earlier collections (2008-9) also included outdoor scenes. He's been drawing, sketching and painting since the 70s, as a practice to "relax and refocus a restless mind".

“The first exhibition I saw at the Metropolitan Museum of Art was of Gauguin paintings and I found I could stand in front of any one of them for as long as I'd sit at the movies, yet not get tired on my feet. I'd lose all sense of time. It was an intriguing thing.”

Re-view

As I was driving out to the county road a few days ago, I went over the cattle guard and drove past a shrub rose I had planted several years ago. It was in bloom, and I'd been enjoying seeing it there for more than a week. As I drove by, I was wondering if it would be worth a closer look or not. Maybe the blooms were starting to fade and fall off, maybe there wasn't much there to see.

Sometimes you think you know what your surroundings look like, so there's no point in looking again...

I decided to give a half-hearted glance and was stunned to see a bright Western Tanager. Wow! I'd never seen one before (except on the cover of my Western Birds book), so it completely took my breath away.

It reminded me of the time we'd been watching for the mountain lion. One night, the dog had been barking, but every time I checked on the lambs, they seemed unconcerned. Finally we went to bed. The dog barked again, and I thought, "Oh, well, might as well check on them one more time, I guess..." That's when we saw him attacking a lamb and were able to shoot him.

I guess you never really know unless you keep looking.

Eugene Boudin on NPR

What a fun story on NPR this morning about Eugene Boudin (1824-1898). He began life as a sailor and is famous for his beach and harbor scenes, full of light and scudding clouds. One of the earliest Impressionist painters, he taught Monet to paint outdoors.