CONTINUING MY SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA TRAIL

Coastal Live Oak, Santa Rosa Plateau

There are basically two broad categories of oak species, deciduous and live. These include the large trees as well as the 'scrub oak' varieties.  I must admit I started out being biased somewhat against live oaks as they seemed to all look the same to me.  Their branch formations aren't as sculptural as the deciduous oaks (Black Oaks, Valley oaks, Blue Oaks, Engleman Oaks - see photo in the last post), and they don't have the beautiful Fall and Spring colors.  But as I traveled I saw as many live oaks as deciduous oaks on this trip and often only live oaks (Coast Live Oak, canyon Live Oak, and Interior Live Oak), and decided they too have their own beauty, very sculptural under the dense canopy, and a special feel of their own.

In early Spring, many of the deciduous oaks are at various stages of 'leaf out'.  At Yosemite, no leaf out yet, and many of the Southern climes are in the flowering (pink & orange) stage with the first bright leaves beginning to pop out.  the live oaks are blooming now too, but it's more subtle, they are basically green.  Many of the Coast Live Oaks are very large.  Their branches grow out and can support a huge canopy.  Some of the most interesting things about the live oaks was being underneath and experiencing the light and shadow as it filters through the canopy.  It will be interesting to try to translate that view of live oaks in a painting.  Lastly, finding the Elfin Forest near Moro Bay, was a real teat.  The Coast Live Oaks there are dwarfed due to weather conditions, creating trees with tops 12 feet in height, instead of the normal 40 - 50 feet high, but with a similar umbrella like canopy, with twisting  wide spreading branches close to the ground to support their tops.

Elfin Live Oak, Moro Bay

I'm still digesting my recent trip as I review over 700 photos.  As a painter it was a different experience.  I normally pick a scene I want to paint,  set up, and start putting paint on canvas. It's a physical forward movement toward a goal while I remain in one spot.  Photographing, walking, looking and touching, digesting the whole environment of the oaks requires a slightly different mindset.  At first I felt like I should be "doing something".  But since I really knew very little about oaks except that I thought they were beautiful, I came to accept the fact that because I wanted to focus on them in my art over the next several years, I realized that my knowledge and experince of them is an important part of my process.  My educational phase as it were.