Today San Diego is celebrating Día de los Muertos!
By mid-afternoon, people were streaming into Old Town. Many will participate in this evening’s candlelight procession down San Diego Avenue from the Immaculate Conception Church to El Campo Santo cemetery.
In preparation, some were having their faces traditionally painted as sugar skulls. Face painting artists had tables set up at several points along the sidewalk.
As I passed through Old Town San Diego State Historic Park, then down San Diego Avenue, this is what my camera encountered!
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It’s widely known that Coronado’s North Island is the birthplace of naval aviation. But did you know that shortly before World War I, Coronado was also home to a training school for submariners?
Camp Richardson, which was located on a block of First Street just north of the Ferry Landing, served as the homeport of the United States’ very first Pacific Submarine Fleet. This is one of many interesting facts you’ll learn should you enjoy A View from the Periscope, which is the current exhibit at the Coronado Historical Association‘s museum.
A View from the Periscope focuses primarily on twenty-eight works of art. The Coronado Historical Association’s website explains how these pieces of artwork from the Naval History & Heritage Command’s Navy Art Collection are on loan for the exhibition. Throughout the museum gallery visitors can view paintings of submarines in different settings and their working crews. The website further explains that many of the artists featured are affiliated with the Navy’s Combat Art Program, which places artists on board navy ships on duty and in combat.
But there’s much more to discover in this exhibition! When I walked through it a few days ago, what interested me most were displays that concern local history.
Not only did I learn about short-lived Camp Richardson, but I was surprised to read how the submariners in training, as they practiced diving and firing torpedoes, would put on pre-announced shows in San Diego Bay for tourists staying at Coronado’s Tent City!
I was also surprised to learn that a Coronado artist, a member of the San Diego Fine Arts Guild, was instrumental in successfully camouflaging naval vessels during World War II.
His name was Dayton Brown. His novel approach to camouflage involved mimicking the natural environment, eventually utilizing only two color shades like Haze Grey or Ocean Gray.
Until I visited this exhibition, I had no idea!
A View from the Periscope continues through January 2023.
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Thank you for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!
I post new blogs pretty often, so you might want to bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and check back from time to time.
You can explore Cool San Diego Sights by using the search box on this website’s sidebar. Or click a tag! There’s a lot of stuff to share and enjoy!
I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!
A group of plein air painters were at work today in and near Balboa Park’s rose garden.
As I wandered through the Inez Grant Parker Memorial Rose Garden, I peered over a couple of shoulders to see how different eyes might interpret the nearby beauty, including Balboa Park’s Desert Garden and Florida Canyon. A couple of the artists kindly let me take photos close up.
I learned these are students enjoying the Plein Air Painting: A Working Method workshop offered by the UC San Diego Division of Extended Studies. Perhaps one day I’ll sign up.
Plein air artists have endless material in beautiful Balboa Park. Set up your easel anywhere!
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Thank you for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!
I post new blogs pretty often, so you might want to bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and check back from time to time.
You can explore Cool San Diego Sights by using the search box on this website’s sidebar. Or click a tag! There’s a lot of stuff to share and enjoy!
I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!
The Chula Vista Art Guild Exhibition highlights the work of talented local artists, who’ve contributed many pieces in a variety of styles. Much of the artwork depicts the culture and life of San Diego’s South Bay. If you’re anywhere near Bonita between now and October 28, 2022, I recommend a visit! It’s free!
I learned today that the Bonita Museum’s upcoming Blooming Art event, hosted by the Bonita Valley Garden Club on October 21 and 22, will feature colorful flower arrangements inspired by the artwork now on display.
Everyone is welcome to create a floral arrangement for Blooming Art! All you have to do is head down to the museum, select a particular art piece that you’d like to complement with flowers, and let the folks at the museum know! But you have to do it by this Saturday!
Did you know that the Chula Vista Art Guild had a rather auspicious beginning back in 1945?
Alfred R. Mitchell, President of the San Diego Art Guild, co-founder of the San Diego Museum of Art, co-founder of the Fine Arts Society of San Diego, co-founder and president of the La Jolla Art Association, widely known as the “Dean of San Diego County artists,” was also founder of the Chula Vista Art Guild!
Here are just a few of the many great canvases now on display at the Bonita Museum & Cultural Center…
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Thank you for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!
I post new blogs pretty often, so you might want to bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and check back from time to time.
You can explore Cool San Diego Sights by using the search box on this website’s sidebar. Or click a tag! There’s a lot of stuff to share and enjoy!
I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!
Have you read those classic nautical stories where sailors are tasked with tarring ropes in a ship’s rigging?
Well, if you visited the Maritime Museum of San Diego today, you might have seen this age-old activity in practice. A museum volunteer was tarring the shrouds of Californian, official tall ship of California!
As I walked about the museum’s historic ships, I noticed the forward hatch of the 1904 steam yacht Medea had been recently varnished. And another volunteer was busy applying the second of three coats of paint to the railing of the San Diego harbor’s 1914 Pilot boat!
Even in calm San Diego Bay, the daily weather, salt and sun slowly ravage ships. The sun’s ultraviolet rays eventually break down everything, even tar. To maintain the beautiful vessels of a world-famous maritime museum requires elbow grease!
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Thank you for visiting Cool San Diego Sights!
I post new blogs pretty often, so you might want to bookmark coolsandiegosights.com and check back from time to time.
You can explore Cool San Diego Sights by using the search box on this website’s sidebar. Or click a tag! There’s a lot of stuff to share and enjoy!
I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!
A mural full of whimsy decorates a fence at the north end of San Ysidro’s Cultural Corridor. Painted by local artist Gerardo Meza (@mezarte), the colorful street art encourages residents to become vaccinated against COVID-19!
I walked up the Cultural Corridor today and noticed a variety of new murals that were painted since my last visit. I’ll be sharing the rest of them in my next blog post, but this particular mural is so creative and visually fun I thought I’d post it first, to get things started.
Last time I passed this section of the fence–about a year and half ago–it featured Día de los Muertos artwork, also created by Meza. You can see a portion of it in the final two photos here.
As you can see, the San Diego Trolley passes very close by–just southeast of the Beyer Avenue station. The Cultural Corridor, with its many murals, runs south down Cypress Drive.
Casa Familiar, a nonprofit service and community development organization, reminds those passing by that Las Vacunas Salvan Vidas–Vaccination Saves Lives.Composite creatures, seemingly emerged from mythology, capture the eye.
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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!
If these photos appear strangely dark, that’s because I’ve increased contrast to bring out the details of a badly faded mural.
This large old mural was painted on the south side of the Hazard Center shopping center in 1996 by an artist whose signature is Duff. The artwork faces the San Diego River and is exposed all day long to the sun.
That building you see in the mural is the Junípero Serra Museum. It stands across the river several miles to the west. The museum’s tower (which is often mistakenly thought to be the San Diego Presidio) can be seen rising above trees from various spots in Mission Valley.
Do any of you know who the artist Duff is? I can find nothing by searching the internet. I documented another Duff mural in Mission Valley, which was painted beneath Friars Road, here.
Please leave a comment if you know anything more!
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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!
You can easily explore Cool San Diego Sights by using the search box on my blog’s sidebar. Or click a tag! There are thousands upon thousands of photos for you to enjoy!
Quick renderings of scenes provide a sense of how very talented artists might glimpse this beautiful and complex world during a walk through life. Many of the images are of familiar San Diego locations.
Some of the works in different media appear like very brief sketches, while others works seem a bit more detailed.
Your eyes will move from piece to piece as if you are viewing ephemeral dreams– each canvas providing a unique moment of wonder.
Like a fast sketch this exhibition also ends soon–it runs through October 9th, 2022. So you better go check it out before, like a dream, Explorations in Urban Sketching vanishes.
Explorations in Urban Sketching is in memory of Dominique Eichi, an artist who shared a studio in Balboa Park’s Spanish Village.
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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!
I ventured up to the Central Library’s rooftop 9th floor yesterday and gazed briefly up at the building’s nearby dome and across San Diego’s South Bay. Then I stepped through the door of the Marilyn & Gene Marx Special Collections Center and was introduced by a friendly librarian to a few of the exhibits inside.
Above shelves in one corner hung half a dozen gorgeous paintings, including several by Alfred Mitchell, whose pieces I’ve also admired in fine art museums.
In the museum-like Rare Book room, display after display celebrated the history and work of diverse artists, printers and writers.
When I saw an absolutely incredible rosewood sculpture by Donal Hord, my mouth dropped open.
On another wall were several famous engravings by William Hogarth!
Westwind, Donal Hord, 1953. Rosewood.Morning (from the series, The Four Times of the Day), William Hogarth, ca. 1822. Engraving and etching in black ink on buff paper.Noon (from the series, The Four Times of the Day), William Hogarth, ca. 1822. Engraving and etching in black ink on buff paper.Spring Fields, Alfred Mitchell, ca. 1929. Oil on board.Autumn Sunshine, Alfred Mitchell, ca. 1924. Oil on canvas.
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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!
Driving north on Interstate 5 near Old Town, have you glimpsed the top of a huge head poking over the freeway wall? Just past the Courtyard by Marriott?
It’s the curly-haired head of Michelangelo’s famous sculpture David!
The Head of David mural was painted on the side of an apartment building back in 1984 by San Diego Mesa College physics student Jeff Sale. The entire mural used to be visible from the freeway, until a wall was built by Caltrans that conceals much of it. You can read an old article concerning the artist and his creation here.
Yesterday I walked through Old Town to see if it’s possible to get photographs of the two story high Head of David from a spot away from the freeway. By standing in the cul-de-sac just north of the Marriott, I took these pics.
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I live in downtown San Diego and love to walk around with my camera! You can follow Cool San Diego Sights via Facebook or Twitter!
You can easily explore Cool San Diego Sights by using the search box on my blog’s sidebar. Or click a tag! There are thousands upon thousands of photos for you to enjoy!
Cool San Diego Sights! 
