4th Street, Facing East

oil on board 18"x24"

You may notice this one is painted in the middle of the road. These views always catch my eye when crossing the street but it is not a viable place to set up and paint.

I was all excited the opportunity to work from this spot - they had the whole block closed to traffic for Lotus festival. I am such a dork I called one of my plein air pals Troy and was like "Troy!! Lotus Festival means we get to set up in middle of the friggin street! Get your butt down here!" Troy wasn't as excited as I was .. he mainly does more rural scenes.

I painted on this for around four hours on Friday and came back as early as I could get there on Saturday. I thought Lotus Festival lasted through Sunday and I had plenty of time but a bunch of workmen and a semi truck started packing up behind me while I was painting. They were super nice, encouraging, and kept coming by to check out my painting. But their job was to pack up this block and open it up to vehicle traffic again .. the very last thing they loaded was the roadblock I was set up in front of. I thanked them for letting me stay and paint as long as they could. This is what I was left with.