Obi Kaufmann | |
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 Kaufmann in 2010 | |
| Born | 1973 (age 50–51) Hollywood, California, U.S. [1] |
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| Education | University of California, Santa Barbara (BA) |
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| coyoteandthunder | |
Obi Kaufmann (born 1973) is an American naturalist, writer, and illustrator. He is the author of The California Field Atlas , a guide to the state's ecology and geography. The book features hundreds of his watercolor paintings of maps, wildlife, and other aspects of nature.
Kaufmann was born in Hollywood, California in 1973. [2] [3] His father, William J. Kaufmann III, was an astrophysicist who served as director of the Griffith Observatory from 1970 to 1974, and also a writer of several books about physics. [4] His mother is a clinical psychologist. [5]
In 1978, his family moved from Southern California to Danville, California, a town in the East Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area. [6] While living there, Kaufmann spent an extensive amount of time exploring Mount Diablo State Park. [7]
Kaufmann studied at the University of California, Santa Barbara (UCSB). He entered as a biology major but switched to visual arts after finding inspiration in wildlife painting and the rock art of the Chumash people. [5] While at UCSB, he took art classes under the painter Ciel Bergman. [8]
After college, Kaufmann lived in the Pacific Northwest before moving to Oakland, California in the early 2000s, where he has resided since. [9] Shortly after his return to the Bay Area, he switched from oil painting to watercolor. [6] He has contributed wildlife artwork to a variety of publications. [5] He was an arts writer for the East Bay Express , an alt weekly serving the East Bay. [10] Beginning in 2009, the brand Juniper Ridge employed Kaufmann as its "chief storyteller"; he eventually quit after he "got sick of selling shit." [6] He later collaborated with the Swedish denim brand Indigofera on a line of natural-fabric clothing. [11] He has worked as a tattoo artist for several years, dating back to his time living in the Pacific Northwest. [6] While he was preparing The California Field Atlas, he only took breaks to go on hikes or to work at a tattoo parlor in Oakland. [12]
Kaufmann is a conservationist and has given talks across California on ecology and preservation of nature. [13]
In 2017, the Berkeley nonprofit Heyday Books published Kaufmann's first book, The California Field Atlas . The book was a surprise commercial success: it sold out of its first two printings, generating pent-up demand, and became a regional bestseller. [14] It was a recipient of numerous California book awards. [15]
His next book, The State of Water: Understanding California's Most Precious Resource, was released in June 2019. [16] It will be followed by The California Lands trilogy, consisting of The Forests of California (Fall 2019), The Coasts of California (Spring 2020), and The Deserts of California (Fall 2020). [17]
Obi-Wan Kenobi is a fictional character in the Star Wars franchise. Within the original trilogy, Obi-Wan is a Jedi Master as a supporting character and is portrayed by English actor Alec Guinness. In the later-released prequel trilogy, a younger version of the character serves as one of the two main protagonists, alongside Anakin Skywalker, and is portrayed by Scottish actor Ewan McGregor. In the original trilogy he is introduced as Ben Kenobi, an alias he uses while in hiding from the Empire. He is a mentor to Luke Skywalker, to whom he introduces the ways of the Jedi. After sacrificing himself in a duel against Darth Vader, Obi-Wan guides Luke through the Force in his fight against the Galactic Empire. In the prequel trilogy, set two decades earlier, he is initially a Padawan (apprentice) to Jedi Master Qui-Gon Jinn, and later mentor and friend of Luke's father Anakin, who falls to the dark side of the Force and becomes Vader. The character briefly appears in the sequel trilogy as a disembodied voice, speaking to protagonist Rey, and serving as the namesake of Ben Solo. He is frequently featured as a main character in various other Star Wars media, including the streaming television miniseries Obi-Wan Kenobi, in which McGregor reprised the role.
Sonoma County is located in the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 United States Census, its population was 488,863. Its seat of government and largest city is Santa Rosa.
Santa Rosa is a city in and the county seat of Sonoma County, in the North Bay region of the Bay Area in California. Its population as of the 2020 census was 178,127. It is the largest city in California's Wine Country and Redwood Coast. It is the fifth most populous city in the Bay Area after San Jose, San Francisco, Oakland, and Fremont; and the 25th-most populous city in California.
Sonoma is a city in Sonoma County, California, United States, located in the North Bay region of the San Francisco Bay Area. Sonoma is one of the principal cities of California's Wine Country and the center of the Sonoma Valley AVA. Sonoma's population was 10,739 as of the 2020 census, while the Sonoma urban area had a population of 32,679. Sonoma is a popular tourist destination, owing to its Californian wineries, noted events like the Sonoma International Film Festival, and its historic center.
Northern California is a geographic and cultural region that generally comprises the northern portion of the U.S. state of California. Spanning the state's northernmost 48 counties, its main population centers include the San Francisco Bay Area, the Greater Sacramento area, the Redding, California, area south of the Cascade Range, and the Metropolitan Fresno area. Northern California also contains redwood forests, along with most of the Sierra Nevada, including Yosemite Valley and part of Lake Tahoe, Mount Shasta, and most of the Central Valley, one of the world's most productive agricultural regions.
The Bear Flag is the official flag of the U.S. state of California. The precursor of the flag was first flown during the 1846 Bear Flag Revolt and was also known as the Bear Flag. A predecessor, called the Lone Star Flag, was used in an 1836 independence movement; the red star element from that flag appears in the Bear Flag of today.
Wine Country is the region of California, in the northern San Francisco Bay Area, known worldwide as a premier wine-growing region. The region is famed for its wineries, its cuisine, Michelin star restaurants, boutique hotels, luxury resorts, historic architecture, and culture. Viticulture and wine-making have been practiced in the region since the Spanish missionaries from Mission San Francisco Solano established the first vineyards in 1812.
The Salinas Valley is one of the major valleys and most productive agricultural regions in California. It is located west of the San Joaquin Valley and south of San Francisco Bay and the Santa Clara Valley.
The Salinan are a Native American tribe whose ancestral territory is in the southern Salinas Valley and the Santa Lucia Range in the Central Coast of California. Today, the Salinan governments are now working toward federal tribal recognition from the Bureau of Indian Affairs.
Junipero Serra Peak is the highest mountain in the Santa Lucia range of central California with a height of 1,785 metres. It is also the highest peak in Monterey County, and is located within the boundaries of Los Padres National Forest. It is named after Saint Junípero Serra, the Spanish Franciscan priest who founded the California Missions in the 18th century. There is a fire lookout, with a tower and building, near the peak that was constructed around 1935. An unauthorized skiing operation on the summit was reported sometime before 1970. Good astronomical observing conditions were an early attraction to the peak. Astronomers scratched a trail to the summit in January 1880 to observe a total eclipse of the sun. Observations from the peak were also made on the transit of Venus in 1882.
Sonoma–Marin Area Rail Transit (SMART) is a rail line and bicycle-pedestrian pathway project in Sonoma and Marin counties of the U.S. state of California. When completed, the entire system will serve a 70-mile (110 km) corridor between Cloverdale in northern Sonoma County and Larkspur Landing in Marin County. In 2022, the system had a ridership of 474,500, or about 2,700 per weekday as of the third quarter of 2023.
New Camaldoli Hermitage is a rural Camaldolese Benedictine hermitage in the Santa Lucia Mountains of Big Sur, California, in the United States. The Camaldolese branch of the Benedictine family was founded by St. Romuald in the late 10th century. The hermitage was consecrated under the Immaculate Heart of Mary and was known by that name for its first decades, but its official name is New Camaldoli.
Andrew Fraknoi is a retired professor of astronomy recognized for his lifetime of work using everyday language to make astronomy more accessible and popular for both students and the general public. In 2017 Fraknoi retired from his position as Chair of the Department of Astronomy at Foothill College. In retirement he continues to teach through the Fromm Institute for Lifelong Learning and the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute at San Francisco State University, to give public lectures, and to add to his body of written work. He is the recipient of numerous awards and honors in his field.
The San Francisco Bay Area, commonly known as the Bay Area, is a region of California centered around the San Francisco, San Pablo, and Suisun estuaries in Northern California. The Association of Bay Area Governments defines the Bay Area as including the nine counties that border the aforementioned estuaries: Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, Napa, San Mateo, Santa Clara, Solano, Sonoma, and San Francisco. Other definitions may be either smaller or larger, and may include neighboring counties that do not border the aforementioned estuaries, such as the Central Coast counties of Santa Cruz, San Benito, and Monterey, or the Central Valley counties of San Joaquin, Merced, and Stanislaus.
The San Francisco Examiner is a newspaper distributed in and around San Francisco, California, and published since 1863.
Plaskett is a thinly populated oceanside hamlet in Pacific Valley, a thin bench of land alongside the Big Sur Coast Highway in the southern Big Sur region of Monterey County, California. It lies at an elevation of 203 feet. It consists of a USFS campground and station, two small resorts, a small school, and a few dozen families spread over the general region.
The Tubbs Fire was a wildfire in Northern California during October 2017. At the time, the Tubbs Fire was the most destructive wildfire in California history, burning parts of Napa, Sonoma, and Lake counties, inflicting its greatest losses in the city of Santa Rosa. Its destructiveness was surpassed only a year later by the Camp Fire of 2018. The Tubbs Fire was one of more than a dozen large fires that broke out in early October 2017, which were simultaneously burning in eight Northern California counties, in what was called the "Northern California firestorm". By the time of its containment on October 31, the fire was estimated to have burned 36,810 acres (149 km2); at least 22 people were believed to have been killed in Sonoma County by the fire.
The Atlas Fire was a 2017 wildfire burning in Napa County, California north of the city of Napa, near Napa Soda Springs. It was one of fourteen large fires simultaneously burning in eight Northern California counties, in what was called the "Northern California firestorm". Governor Jerry Brown declared a state of emergency.
The California Field Atlas is a 2017 book written and illustrated by Obi Kaufmann. It was published by Heyday Books, a Berkeley-based nonprofit small press. Through passages of nature writing and hundreds of watercolor paintings, the book details California's ecology and geography. Kaufmann, an artist and outdoorsman, was born in California and currently resides in Oakland. He prepared the book over the course of a year, drawing from a lifetime of experience hiking thousands of miles of California wilderness. With the California Field Atlas, he intended to foster geological literacy and conservation of the state's natural environment.
Lucia is a hamlet located 22 miles (35 km) south of Big Sur Village and 38 miles (61 km) north of Hearst Castle. The area is sparsely settled
I was born in 1973, the same year as the passing of the Endangered Species Act...
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