Catalina Island Retreat Weekend, April 8-10, 2022
by Anne Kupillas and Charles Leon.
The EPL Catalina group poses against Casino Way’s arch.
Last weekend, Catalina Island hosted our small-group art retreat. For two days (April 8-10 2022), the island played host to 8 retreat participants and three leaders, for our second Eat Paint Live Art Retreat. The Catalina weekend did not disappoint, filled as it was with creating plein air art and photography, friendship, excursions and delicious meals.
For the leaders, this was another dream-come-true experience: spending an entire weekend in a truly magical location with other amazing creatives, helping them to learn and grow their skills quickly in a short period of time, especially with regards to the joys of plein air sketching and painting. This retreat, we were glad to have several repeat attendees, as well as a few new participants, some of whom were photographers and non-plein air artists. It was a varied group and brought a new element of learning and sharing to the retreat! Eat Paint Live welcomes artists and non-artists alike, as the retreat is more rounded and not purely focused on just painting (as the name implies, we plan our retreats to encompass experiences as well as painting). All eight of our participants were talented creatives in their own focus areas, and brought the full force of their creativity, generous spirits and fun to the group!
Our Location
Santa Catalina Island is one of California’s Channel Islands off the coast of Southern California, From Long Beach, Avalon is about 42 miles offshore. We took the Catalina Express which is an easy boat ride from Long Beach, lasting an hour and costing about $70 round trip. Boats also embark from Dana Point and San Pedro. Private planes and helicopters can transport visitors to the Airport in the Sky and helipad, respectively. And of course, private boaters are welcome in the harbor. How lucky we are to reside so close to paradise!
All aboard! We took the morning ferry into Avalon.
And this is what greeted us!
Avalon is clean and pretty, with a stunningly picturesque U-shaped harbor, palm and eucalyptus trees, and is a welcome respite and laid-back landing spot for sailors and day trippers alike. It also is a mecca for artists and art lovers. The town and surrounding island offer plenty of things to explore, eat, drink, and relax – and inspire our creative juices! You can imagine how spoiled we were with subjects to sketch, paint, and photograph.
Welcome to Avalon!
The charming Hermosa Hotel and Cottages was our home base for the retreat. We all stayed together in this historic economy hotel (established 1868!), conveniently located on Metropole Ave next door to the Museum and a stone’s throw from Crescent Ave, the “main drag.” Imagine white cottages framed by bright bougainvilla vines, and a very spacious lobby with lounge seating and bar which made for a central gathering point each morning.
We kicked off the weekend with a welcome drinks and dinner at the Bluewater Grill.Sustainable seafood, a buffalo milk cocktail and some fun drawing activities accompanied our “getting to know each other” orientation. For we had some new faces, as well as several familiar faces, and it was really nice to see the artists reconnecting in person since our last retreat in September in Ojai.
Retreat leaders Charlie and Anne orient the group to the weekend’s activities in store for them.
The crab dip delights !
Enjoying the Buffalo Milk cocktails, dinner and welcome activities, including personalizing our place settings with artwork.
Each participant had a welcome gift: An Eat Paint Live print in the style of Catalina tiles.
Joelle Renzi was our local food expert for the retreat, and she kept us full and happy with delicious local meals and drinks, and healthy snack boxes. Joelle also shared information about sustainable seafood, what is really in the “Buffalo Milk” cocktail (it’s mostly vodka and ice cream) and where to find beignets in town.
The Itinerary - what our days and nights were like.
Day One “Land”
Our first activity on the agenda Saturday morning was a private backcountry Hummer tour into the interior. The Catalina Island Company’s biofuel vehicles are safe and eco-friendly - repurposing vegetable oil from the restaurants and cafes around town to fuel the large Hummers. How cool! We all met for coffee in the lobby and walked over to the Tour Plaza, where Joelle met us with breakfast and we gathered for the tour. Some of us did a little sketching sitting in the plaza, others just chatted about how to eat beignets without inhaling the powdered sugar.
Charlie and Anne prepped the group by discussing how to capture a moment in motion, and how to sketch the bison, should we be lucky enough to see any on our tour. We weren’t - it was likely they were hiding in the shade after two intense days of heat. But our guide Cindy was so entertaining, and the views of the wild interior were so lush and spectacular, we didn’t mind. Check out some of the views!
Anne did a quick line sketch from the Hummer; color added later.
After a brief stop for lunch at the Airport in the Sky (not on the regular public tour, this was a special stop for our group and we pre-ordered lunch through the cafe), we headed back down to Avalon and on to our next activity.
from Left: Lori, Sarah, Carole, Kathy, Charlie, Anne, Elana, Shelley, Bonnie and Cara. Our Team EPL Catalina Island!
Nopales, or Prickly Pear Cacti, are prevalent on the island. The fruit and the green parts are both edible.
A few of the group opted to visit the Catalina Island Museum while the rest of us took the Garibaldi bus to the Wrigley Memorial and Botanical Garden. The group split up, with Charlie taking on the monument for our more architectural sketchers, and Anne setting up an easel for botanical sketching. It was a really tranquil few hours spent amongst the monument and the cacti and succulents, finding spots of shade and capturing the subjects in plein air that interested us the most.
The short walk up to the memorial (seen in the distance). Good shoes and sun hats are recommended, though.
We always leave a little R&R time in the schedule, and after a warm, sunny day, everyone was happy to explore on their own or return to the hotel by bus and relax before dinner. And what a dinner! Joelle prepared a fresh Meditteranean-inspired barbecue up in the Ocean View Suite, a private deck atop the hotel’s bungalows with amazing views of the harbor and hills. Most participants took some time to capture these views, in photos, paintings or sketches, while socializing and grazing. One of our participants was celebrating a birthday, so we had an excuse to have cake. The sun set over our group and then we descended to enjoy the nightlife in Avalon.
Live music, karaoke and late-night shopping are all part of the nightlife in Avalon. It’s also very prettily lit up.
Day Two - “Sea”
Sunday morning took us to the Green Pier for an undersea excursion, but not before we started the day with a breakfast buffet in the lobby and - since we missed seeing any bison the day before, Anne broadcast a video from her last bison sighting trip onto the TV in the bar and we all sketched bison very fast.
Practice and tips for sketching wildlife in motion was no accident, as our next activity was a Submarine Sketching Tour. The Undersea Adventure took the group on a semi-submersible submarine ride for 45 minutes around Lover’s Cove, a marine sanctuary filled with kelp and many species of native fish. It was just breathtaking! The artists photographed and sketched the marine life from the sub, and then took in some sun on the top of the boat, on the way back to the Green Pier.
Back on dry land, the group got its land legs back and colorized or completed their sketches. The Undersea Adventure was “officially” a hit!
Our new friend, Noelle, was an awesome videographer and put together this movie of some of our Day 2 adventures.
Next stop: Casino Way & sketching the tiles and the Avalon Casino. The group split into two again to tackle the tiles and architecture of two of the most exceptional sights on the island. There’s a great shady spot on the near side of the casino to sit at picnic tables and leisurely draw and paint - and that’s what we did.
Interested in learning and seeing more about the tiles and murals on Catalina? Check out our December ‘21 blog: Art on Catalina.
Our last plein air activity was capturing the harbor and Green Pleasure Pier, from the beach and Crescent Avenue. Charlie and Anne gave 1:1 instruction on painting water and tips to capture a bustling scene. It was a gorgeous day and there was no shortage of stories to tell in our sketchbooks.
Sadly, our weekend on Catalina was coming to an end. After some shopping in the local boutiques, we gathered at Luau Larry’s for nachos, drinks and farewells, before catching our ferries home. We spent our last hour together trading takeaways, sharing supply and technique tips and viewing each other’s sketchbooks, filled with wonderful memories of a creative weekend with friends and fun. The memories we made here together will last a lifetime — from the friends old and new, kindness, talent and generosity of our participants, the food, weather and island vibes, and of course, the opportunity to create art amongst like-minded creatives. We hope that you feel the same, in following our journey, and it inspires you to create and experiment, and do what makes you feel joy!
Until next time….
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