Project Progress

This project took a few turns along the way. I originally started with the idea of mapping my fridge - watching how it changes from day to day. But after realizing how gross my fridge really is (and the seeming inability to throw things out in my house), I questioned that idea.

Then I started a map of my block (the space between 5th Street, 6th Street, Harrison Street and Folsom Street). We all have fear lingering in the backs of our minds that our landlord will decide to take advantage of the ridiculous real estate market and sell forcing us out. I thought about mapping the property values and the single residences that have been torn down to make room for multi story buildings.

A slow walk with my dog made me realize how much life is lived in the cracks of my neighborhood.

Life abounds in even the most derelict environments. My sidewalks and all the cracks between the buildings, curbs and fences are filled with life. It is life that many people dismiss as "weeds" but almost all plants have purpose. In some ways, I have started to see the plants as metaphor for the people as well  that dwell in the cracks - we all have purpose, even when it's not obvious.

I grabbed my camera and set out to take photos, but there is no good angle to photograph from. I normally don't hesitate to lay on the ground to capture a photo, but in a neighborhood coated with soot, grime, urine and feces, I wasn't quite ready to drop to the ground.

The first hurdle was how to identify the plants. There are a few plant identification apps but they involved uploading an image and waiting for someone somewhere to identify the plant and send you a message. Given the time constraints for this project, that wasn't going to work.

Next I tried using Google Image search... Yeah. That didn't work. It analyzed the whole image and found similar images but none of that helped identify the plants themselves.

Next I hit a list of "weeds" in San Francisco. Jackpot.
Cal-IPC
California Native Plants
CA Wildflowers - Wikipedia

There were a few other sites as well. I spent about 20 hours visually identifying the plants from the photos I had taken. I was able to identify 14, but there were quite a few more living in the cracks. In all likelihood, this project could be a full time job for months on end just trying to identify the numerous plants that populate a single block.

I had already created the map, but hadn't been sure how to visualize what I was recording. The photos weren't what I wanted. It felt slap dashed together and it was more of a visualization for a proposal than an actual project I was going to want to have printed and show.

Enter the paintings. I don't normally paint. But I love botanical illustrations more than anything and many of them are done in watercolor. I hate painting. I hate cleaning up. It's so messy. I often end up having a reaction to paint if it gets on my hands. It's just NOT fun for me.

But I have a Wacom Tablet. I have Corel Painter 11 (and now Corel Painter 2015) and it is the most amazing thing ever. Pressure sensitive brush control. A variety of media to choose from. I used to use it for rendering in some digital design classes and hadn't used it due to the lack of digital work done at SFSU and lack of time!