Stories
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Thought I was a sculptor. There was a time when I first moved back to the city from Santa Rosa, that I was trying to decide, was I and should I be an artist. I
had something of a vision while living in Saint Helena, that brought upon me the desire to paint it. Shortly thereafter I moved to Santa Rosa where I was attending Junior College. I took up painting small pictures on Strathmore
heavy drawing paper with oils.
Coming back to San Francisco, I rented a flat on Powers Street, which was not far and just down the hill from Winfield, where there was still my pottery shop. Then I moved in some of my friends to help pay the rent. The pottery shop on Winfield was in the care of When, who took the place over for me, when I moved out before the birth of my son. The Powers Street apartment was a big place, lower floor, twelve foot ceilings, three bedrooms, living room, kitchen with a combination gas and wood burning stove.
In the back was a small utility room with lots of windows where I built a big easel of two-by-fours, constructed various sized one-by-two fir canvas stretchers, bought the best Belgian-Linen canvas, and so I became an oils painter. Of course I had to do it in a fashion that was vastly superior to my abilities, which means that for all the investment of time and money in materials and methods used by the masters, it was not worth my substandard talent. I ordered special lead paint from the state of Georgia, and used rabbit-skin glue and formaldehyde on the canvas. I never did learn technique, meaning the various methods of applying paint and texture to canvas. Having taken some art classes, I found that technique was not something that was taught.
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