We went to this event with FALC. Setting up at 8:30 am was not as bad as I anticipated, even though both me and Slava had very little sleep before that. Raja who organized it all for us was energetic and cheerful although he was e-mailing Slava at 3 a.m. last night. He said he felt ok because he was an astronomer, but even astronomers have to sleep sometimes and Raja was at the show the whole day!

By 10 a.m., when we were almost done with the setup, quickly visited our friends at Campbell Artists’ Guild and some others, it started to get hot. Slava and I went home until our shift in the booth at 4 p.m. and escaped the worst of the heat. When we returned, there still weren’t many visitors and the place resembled an oven even in the shade. There was some wind, and we were told that even a few drops of rain fell while we were away, but none of that brought any relief. It’s a miracle anyone at all preferred a trip to Triton to staying inside or soaking in a pool. A pretty good jazz band was playing, but they had no crowd to support them either. Poor guys.

Other than the heat, the show was great. It was nice to see Joe Decker, Jaya King, Cathy Zander again and to see artworks by many others whom we didn’t get to meet.

The most wonderful discovery for me was Deborah Matlack. Since she doesn’t have a Web site, I turned to Google for more information about her and found a lengthy article where she says she is impatient and doesn’t do many preliminary sketches because of that. Looking at her portraits, I would never guess that. “I work all over the painting,” she says. “I can start on a figure, a face, or the background. It really depends on my mood. The beginning of a painting is quite conscious. I know what I want to achieve, but not necessarily how I want to achieve it.” Clearly, her focus is on the character of the subject first and truthful rendering of details second, but I would imagine it still takes a good deal of patience to get them right. Deborah also gave me some valuable advice on working with pastels for which I was very grateful. So now I plan to stop further experiments with Strathmore paper and switch to Canson and will try Lascaux fixative too. I can’t quite stop pastel from falling off the paper with what I am using now, and Deborah’s artworks were in the perfect shape despite the wind that occasionally made them flap against the panels.

We did have some most wonderful visitors who appreciated the art and were great to talk to. The show was also a great opportunity for artists to get to know each other better and share their experience. We posed for a final photo, took everything down, and went home totally exhausted. Happy Summer Solstice to us.

We had just one more day to see the rest of open studios, so we started it by planning the route. That took some time because less sites were still open on the third weekend, and they were scattered all over the valley. We did make it to many more sites than yesterday, so I will be brief.

Margaret Prendergast Washington was the first artist we visited. Her watercolors are like fine China - light, elegant, and very pleasing to the eye.

A lot of interesting artists were showing in the Alameda Galleries - a labyrinth of studios behind the Recycle Book Store with a very unassuming entrance.

The artwork that caught my attention first was four pieces of burl with colorful pictures on them done with some dry media that I could not identify. It had no information next to it, but I was assured that the artist herself is about to arrive soon and I could ask her. We did not get to talk to the artist, but her husband was kind enough to explain that it was pastel on burl and that it’s a lot of work to complete such a large piece. I would imagine it was, but the result looked fabulous. The name of the artist was Patti Linder-Dodd, and her business card said she specializes a murals.

Nancy Walters shoots and paints wild animals. The portrait we saw go beyond capturing likeliness, they convey personality. Nancy must feel strong connection with her animals.

I am not sure how David Lippenberger’s art should be classified or if it even needs to be put into any specific category. He had many unusual pieces in his studio of which on with black wooden shapes for a city and rope-clad skies was the best. There was something about earthy tones of the rope playing against ominous black mass beneath that captivates the eye.

On the wall of the passage next to David’s studio were several abstract painting of Simone Raoux, a wonderful sequence of gorgeous pieces rich with texture and radiantly warm colors. In her studio, there was more wonders to see, all very different, each of them with its own emotion. Somehow they did not argue with each other; despite their differences, they formed an intricate harmony on the walls. I don’t remember myself being that immersed in abstract art since I first saw paintings by Karen Hale years ago.

There were more artists in the Alameda Galleries, but we wanted to see other sites too so had to leave.

Douglas Vincent’s Ilfochrome photos of nature seemed to glow from the inside and have almost a three-dimensional feel to them. He’s obviously a very talented photographer who does not need to rely on an unusual technique or materials, but they certainly add a special touch to his art.

We barely entered Amy Brown’s yard when I was stopped by beautiful ceramic fish on the fence. The whole yard was full of birds, fish, shark head vases and so much more that I was not sure where to look first. Amy had to invite us into the house more than once, and I finally followed with a small pelican in my hands. I am partial to ceramics, what can I say. She paints her tropical scenery, flowers, and frogs in acrylic, but the result looks like oil. There was a triptych of Red Eyed Tree Frogs above the fireplace that to me was the best thing in the whole room, although I am not a frog person.

Noreen Christopher and Jeanette Turkus were showing at the site that had a funny contrast between very good lighting and wooden floors generously spattered with paint of all colors imaginable. I liked Noreen’s abstract acrylics and Jeanette’s figurative art most of all, but the whole exhibit by those two artists was very strong.

Judging by the imagery outside, I expected to see a cat or two in Joe Decker’s house, but we saw none. His breathtaking photos were hanging, laying, and standing everywhere, and Joe could tell a story about each and every one of them down to the exact name of the place and a year when the shot was taken - what I would give to have that kind of memory!

Janet Trenchard works in many different media, and her display reflected that. She creates unusual mixed media assemblages, paints in acrylics, and does some sort of printmaking that I never saw before. Unfortunately, the name of the technique escaped my mind as soon as we left the site, but it had a delicately weathered look to it. Janet said that because it is not an easy technique, very few artists are engaged into it.

By that time studios started to close down, and we decided to call it a day. And it was a very good day, I might add.

Until this year, I was rather skeptical about the event. Slava and me were to a few open studios here and there before, and were not impressed. But this time it was different, we now knew some of the participating artists through the Campbell Artists’ Guild and the Fine Arts League of Cupertino, really liked their work, and wanted to see more of it. So of we went, without any planning. The goal was to visit our friends first and then see how much time we had left to explore the rest.

For some reason I was sure that it’s the second weekend, and at first the information in the SVOS directory seemed to agree. We stopped by Nina Uppaluru’s house to say “hi” to her and other members of the Fine Arts League of Cupertino who were also showing there: Belinda Lima, Raja Guha Thakurta, Iona Ezaki, Jane Ferguson, and William Galarneau. It was a pleasure to see so many artworks in different styles and mediums. I had no idea Iona was also making jewelry. She had some nice items, one pair of earrings was so beautiful that I could not help myself and bought it.

Our next stop was at the studio of Joy Kuo, also a member of Fine Arts League of Cupertino. Our arrival was marked by some shrill cries, and at first we couldn’t figure out who was making them. Then we saw a couple of peacocks - a male lying on the ground under the tree and a female on the branch above our heads. Joy said that in India people prefer peacocks over dogs to guard their houses, and we could see why. They would not let anyone pass by the house unnoticed. Yao-Pi Hsu and Lucy Marcoux were also showing there, both in the nice gallery upstairs and in the yard. There were not many other visitors which was a pity - they were mission on a great mix of photography, oriental and traditional paintings.

From there we went to to see Jill Johnson from the Campbell Artists’ Guild only to find no signs of an open studios anywhere. That’s when finally looked at the dates closely and found out we’re on the third weekend and not on the second one. Sadly, we missed Jill.

We also made some wonderful discoveries today.

Jake Snyder. He paints incredible landscapes and cosmoscapes (I just love this word!) being color blind, and he is also a talented sculptor. There were also a few drawings done with a very fine Rapidograph on a watercolor paper and a wood carving of the horse head with carnivorous teeth that I liked the most. Can’t remember what it was called - “When horses were predators” or something like that - it reminded me of Kelpie, Each Uisge, and the likes. I could not move away from him, he was such a character!

Suzan Siltaniemi. Wonderful portraits, scenery, and a wide range of other subjects. Her photos of historical San Jose neighborhood are especially charming.