Firenados, dry lightning, extreme heatwaves, and downpours (rain more like what we expect in February than August) have pummeled Northern California in the past 24 hours. What else will 2020 bring?

It was too hot to be sketching in direct sunlight yesterday but I wanted to paint this angle of Pastori Winery in Geyserville, CA. I slathered on lots of sun screen and donned a hat but it wasn’t enough to beat the heat so I rushed through this one.

Geyserville, California is the new home of Lord Snort, a sculpture created by Bryan Tedrick for Burning Man 2016. The swine weighs aprox. 20,000 pounds and is over 20 feet tall and 30 feet long. Though I didn’t go to Burning Man this year, I was happy to see my favorite sculpture from the event displayed (at least temporarily) so close to home.

Sketched on location in graphite, colored pencil, brown and black ink, and watercolor. Aprox. 4 hours.

Geyserville is an unincorporated community just north of Healdsburg, CA. Its main drag, Geyserville Ave, is lined with shops, restaurants, and wine tasting rooms, making it an ideal place for sketch artists and wine tasters alike. After meeting for coffee at Geyserville Mud, followed by a couple of hours sketching, our group dropped into Diavola Restaurant. Here we enjoyed Neapolitan style pizza, a variety of seasonal salads, and cold drinks to round out a great day of sketching on a hot spring afternoon.