You're David Lobenberg!

Last week, internationally known watercolor artist Nick Simmons came to talk about his working method and to do a workshop at the California Watercolor Asc. in the Concord area of my fair state. As he was heading towards his laptop station, he looks over to me and says "You're David Lobenberg!" Well hell yes I am!! He gave a bodacious talk and computer display. If you have an h2o group, book this dude! Anyway, after the talk, we chatted a wee bit and had our photo taken.As you can plainly see, he is a rather sinister person. I just became a member of CWA, and by golly if they didn't put me in their November newsletter "artist spot light" section. Click here to get on the home page of CWA, then click on "current and back issues: right at the top of the page and high lighted in blue. I am on page 5 of the Nov. issue. (POOH!!!...I JUST WENT TO THE CWA SITE AND CLICKED ON THE ONLINE NEWSLETTER SECTION, AND THEY HAVEN'T GOT THE NOVEMBER ISSUE UP YET. GO BACK TO THEIR SITE IN A FEW DAYS IF YOU ARE INTERESTED IN SEEING THE ARTICLE. SORRY ABOUT THAT)

Can you spell T-E-D-I-O-U-S

I am currently painting 7"X7" and 8"X10" watercolors of fruits and vegetables in preparation for a large art and craft fair at the end of November. Here is my painting sequence of some artichokes (yum!!!...good with melted butter, mayonnaise, or garlic infused olive oil). First goes on the yellow greens, wet-on-wet and allowed to flow on a slight tilt of the watercolor paper. Here comes the tedium... painting each individual leaf, going from dark, where the leaf joins the body, to light on the top, prickly point. This is wet on dry. I'm working from a photo reference and really, really need to concentrate on what damn leaf I'm working on! I work on more leaves before I am even close to finishing the first artichoke. I always like to move around my painting and not become myopic on one part. This process rests the eyes and helps to keep things harmonious. Gotta keep concentrating on what damn leaf I'm working on! Painting those two lower chokes help to define the center one, and gives me an idea if the whole painting is going to work out OK in terms of my darks and lights. At last the fun of taking off the border masking tape and seeing my effort "framed". I will later cut a deckled edge where the painting joins the white border and float the piece in a simple frame. I do hope sales are brisk, because this is not the only tedious painting in my collection. Please wish me dood luck and wave me good bye!

GOT MILK?

Yesterday I set up an old milk can on the floor in the middle of my drawing classroom at Sacramento City College and had my students spend several hours rendering the can in fabulous vine charcoal. I did this demo to give them the idea that charcoal is both an additive and SUBTRACTIVE medium. After drawing the contours of the milk can very lightly in charcoal, I then proceeded to cover the entire contour drawing in mid range grey charcoal. I then PULLED OFF charcoal with a kneaded eraser and pencil eraser (for small highlight areas) to render the lighter areas on the can (both reflective light and local lighter values of the can). Charcoal was then ADDED to render the darker areas of the can (shadow and local values). ADD + SUBTRACT+ ADD. Whenever you succeed in rendering a successful charcoal drawing, celebrate with a nice cold glass of milk! Milk can help keep your muscles and bones healthy and therefore aid in your drawing ability. Cheers!

Handsome Young African Muslim Gentleman

I sometimes roam the net to find interesting photos to use as painting references. I found one of a very good looking, young African Muslim. From that photo ref., I did a contour drawing using an ink sketch pen with a brush tip. The paper I worked on is TYVEK, a paper I learned about from seeing some absolutely terrific portraits by my friend Myrna Wacknov. TYVEK is used in the building and mailing shipping industries. After the inking, I water colored over it. As the paint dries, patterns of this synthetic paper is revealed. I have only just begun to play with TYVEK, and I doubt if it will become an an important aspect of my art, but it is fun! My Chinese stamp reads "peace". The female study is one of my watercolor students from a year ago.

And then there were two wine labels

Back late August, I posted some grape watercolors that I had just completed. I also posted them onto my website. Well, a business entrepreneur saw them and contacted me to see if he could pay me a usage right to use two of the painted images for wine labels. The bottles of wine (red and white) will be used for promotional purposes. We agreed on a price and here are said labels. These are their design firm's design comps to be approved by the client. Kinda fun, uh? I told Mr. entrepreneur that an artist gets thirsty whilst working hard in his studio. Once they get the filled bottles of wine off the production line, he told me that he will send me a few bottles to prevent my getting dehydrated...nice man!

PBS Television Interview

About a month before my stint on our local PBS station, I had the terrific pleasure of being interviewed by Huell Howser of "California's Gold" fame( a popular weekly program where Mr. Howser highlights interesting locations in the golden state and interviews the people who live or work there). The interview was used to help advertise the Channel 6 annual art auction. Enjoy! Click here

Mr. Lobenberg with Mr. Potter

I have just become a member of the California Watercolor Association (the largest watercolor organization in California) and the Gallery Concord, a very limited membership co-op watercolor gallery made up of CWA artists and voted into membership. We just put together our Fall show and had a reception this last Friday. On the following day, I took my first turn with the president of Gallery Concord to gallery sit. The gallery is open to the public on Thursday through Sunday. While the prez was showing me the ropes, in comes one helluva master water color artist to pick up one of his paintings. His name is Ken Potter, and he is a Master Signature member of CWA. I've known him and has admired his work for many years. Quite frankly, he is waaaay under rated! Check him out on californiawatercolor.com. Here is a photo of me and Mr. Potter as well as a photo of one of my portraits in the Gallery Concord Fall show.