Painting progression 1. . . ‘Cows’
April 11, 2015
THE DEWDROP VALLEY is a local site and part of a much larger area near Tranquille River and the Tranquille River Gorge. In essence, the Dewdrop is really rocky, hilly, grass-and-tree- covered pasture for cows and cattle during the Spring and Summer months. The Kamloops Thompson Nicola Shuswap Region is no-nonsense cowboy rancher country, complete with serious Rodeos and horse and rider cattle round-ups in the Autumn.
This is the first of recording daily progress towards completing a watercolour depicting a typical scene in The Dewdrop Valley . . . .
ON DISPLAY are a fine collection of tortured brushes. Some are from dollar stores or second hand bargain stores, and as soon as they get into the spare bedroom cum studio they’re cut up with scissors. None of them cost more than $2, and who knows what they’re made of–Moose? Sasquatch hair, perhaps. Each, however, is priceless.
Miniatures: Chipmunk
April 10, 2015
AS CHILDREN we always gravitated towards Chipmunks, squatting in total stillness with extended hands, hoping one would overcome its natural wariness and take the peanut being offered. The sprightly flicks of tail and peppy darts forward to snatch the gift–so quickly and deftly we didn’t see or feel it leave our palm–only added more charm to their compact, large-eyed, tiny bodied allure. On the other hand, the Grey Squirrel was just a nuisance. I guess size and colour made all the difference in our juvenile minds between one rodent’s mystique and another’s ho-hum plainness. We didn’t entice Squirrels. We threw sticks at them. Their raiding our bird feeders didn’t win them any points, either, I must say….
watercolour, 10cm x 10cm (4″ x 4″), art board
Local Mountains 2
April 9, 2015
THIS COMPLETED PAINTING of the mountains in our Kamloops area was in need of cropping in order to strengthen the composition . . .
THE PAINTING WAS REDUCED IN SIZE down to this as the completed painting .. .
THE CHOPPED OFF parts of cropped work can successfully be made into bookmarks, I’ve found, and then be sold for around $2 ea in our little co-op Gallery (www.kamloopscourthousegallery.ca). Waste not, want not, lol!
Local Mountains
April 8, 2015
A decision has to be made as to whether this painting ‘holds up’, composition-wise. It succeeds in conveying the misty atmospheric conditions of winter in the mountains. But the composition is troubling me.
The Federation of Canadian Artists’ National Show
April 7, 2015
THE FEDERATION OF CANADIAN ARTISTS had its beginnings in 1941, and had as its goal the unified representation of all Provinces through one organization. Canada’s premier artists, The Group of Seven, were instrumental in organizing The FCA, with A. Y. Jackson as the Ontario head, and Lawren Harris in charge of the West Coast region.
TODAY THE FCA has become largely a Western Canadian organization with most of its activity within the Province of British Columbia. The hub is Vancouver [www.artists.ca] with regional Chapters throughout B. C. and Southern Alberta. The Thompson Nicola Shuswap Chapter (which I am a member of) has been hosting two Annual Art Shows for many years, with the 2015 National Show being mounted this coming Wednesday, April 8th.
THE NATIONAL SHOW is open to any qualifying FCA member, but submissions for jurying are limited to 3. Digital images of a member’s work are submitted to Vancouver and juried by three Signature Artists who use a point system to arrive at which pieces will be accepted and which will be declined. Of the 130+ digital entries, only 85 pieces are selected for inclusion into this National Show.
MY OWN SUBMISSIONS (two) have been juried, one being accepted–
‘Approaching Storm, Sechelt’, 25cm x 35.5cm (10.5″ x 14″), Watercolour on board
It is considered an achievement simply to get into this Art Show, while Opening Night, Friday the 10th, will be the occasion when $2800.00 in Prizes are awarded by another set of Jurors for those paintings which stand out as the best of The Best. Only once has a piece of mine ever been awarded a prize.
SENIOR MEMBERS OF THE FEDERATION have these paintings being considered for The SFCA Prize, with only one receiving top honours.
NEARLY ALL THE WORK submitted by artists for these Shows is rendered in acrylics or oils, with some pastel, and a few watercolours, and fewer still graphite drawings. Watercolour, generally, is not the preferred medium of most painters. It is considered difficult and problematic because of its demands and limtations.
New bird miniatures
April 6, 2015
The image sizes here are approximately 5cm x 8cm (2″ x 3″). I use a pair of rather strong magnifying glasses when working this small–the kind you find on display at pharmacies (around here they’re referred to as ‘cheaters’). So when working on a tiny miniature they are an enormous help, until I turn to go check on something in the kitchen and walk into the wall, lol.
A FEW LAST COMMENTS about this painting…..there is a decided difference between nature and the art of depicting nature. Mother Nature is not only a hoarder, but not interested in housekeeping nor pruning, encapsulating, or boiling-down. She wants it all, all the time, and enjoys lavishing on us the plentitude of what happens when everything we look at, at any given moment, reproduces at will and overwhelms us with dozens–and even thousands–of itself.
FOR THE LANDSCAPE PAINTER the challenge, always, is to take Nature and make it into Art. It is the very human discipline of paring down, re-arranging, configuring and composing. What separates raw Nature from the art of painting is having a limited space, with only two dimensions, which is ultimately going to end up on a wall inside a human-made space. That restrictiveness requires moving trees and clouds and birds about in order to have a sense of balance or sense of wonder or sense of drama. It means the painter must dare to alter time itself, put limits on colour, and restrict amounts of what is naturally before the painter’s eyes.
MAKING ART is similar to the difference between looking at a field of wheat and sitting down to a loaf of freshly-baked bread. What happens between those two events is the act of altering something to create something else.
THIS PAINTING is not what the photograph of this scene looks like. For many years I struggled with whether I was ‘allowed’ as a painter to do anything other than depict Nature as it presented itself to me. Sitting out on some stoney ground, I would suddenly find myself slavishly working at painting the weeds between cracks of rock, then painting the seed heads on the weeds to look exactly like what my eyes saw, when really I knew the larger purpose of sitting there in the hot sun was not to pay attention to weeds, but to paint the distant mountains above and beyond them. By the time I’d gotten away from doing weeds justice, I was so hot I had to fold up my equipment and go back to the car. And I went home with a painting of weeds between rocks and a big expanse of white paper above them.
THAT DOESN’T HAPPEN ANYMORE. I have learned that I must take what is presented to me and do with it as I wish to do. That is the work of a painter.
A PHOTOGRAPHER has a whole different set of challenges because a lens is very different from a human eye (it can’t do half of what a living, ‘breathing’ eye can do) and from human imagination (once it has seen what is before the eye) . But I have noticed some irony happening between the worlds of photography and painting. In the past, painters often worked very diligently to make a painting ‘look like’ a photograph. These days, with technological photo-shopping manipulation, a photographer seems more or less obsessed with trying to make a photograph look like a painting. I am not convinced either enterprise is worth spending all that amount of time on.
IF A PAINTER WISHES TO BE A PHOTOGRAPHER, then don’t go trying to make a painting into a photograph. Do go and take courses and buy equipment and learn how to take photographs and do the work a photographer must work at in order to eventually become a photographer. And IF A PHOTOGRAPHER WISHES TO BE A PAINTER, then leave the photo-shopping manipulation apps alone and do take courses and buy equipment and learn how to paint paintings and do the work a painter must work at in order to eventually become a painter. They are two distinctly separate and inherently different artforms and–in my flawed way of viewing things–should stay that way.
AND YOU…what’s your view? Tell me how I’m missing things you’ve discovered!
Painting progression 3…. ‘Jamieson Creek Thaw’
April 4, 2015
BECAUSE WATERCOLOUR is such a watery, transparent, delicate medium–one which must always allow the paper it’s laid on top of to breathe through it–one which traditionally doesn’t use white pigment, but relies on the paper to be the white of the painting–BECAUSE of this (and more) the challenge of the watercolour student is to convey an illusion of texture, without the ability to actually build up a surface texture.
WERE WATERCOLOUR PIGMENT applied so thickly as to create an impasto-like texture on the paper beneath, it would lose its luminosity and look pasty, muddy, dull–worse, it would crack. Watercolour pigment only works when the paper beneath dazzles through it and brings life to the pigmentation. In other words, watercolour as a medium is more the business of staining paper than it is a business of building up layers and coats of daubs, stipples, slatherings.
THAT’S WHY CARE is required to not apply so many washes that the luminosity of the paper receeds and eventually provides no life at all. And that’s why the whites of the paper must be thoughtfully reserved and left untouched in key areas–the crests of waves; the moon; snow; clouds; a picket fence–and skill taken to paint AROUND these places to let the paper be the white.
SO….a student of watercolour (me) learns early-on that (s)he will be a student of the medium for life–that mastery is illusive–and failures, many. A good piece is approached very thoughtfully, noting where the paper will be left to serve the function of white (pigment) and painted around. Then the student will also have to gather enough courage to apply exceedingly dark washes in one ‘go’, while maintaining a sense of secure, carefree animation in order to present an immediacy and liveliness in the final piece.
THE DEATHKNELL of a failing, dying work of watercolour is finicky overworking of areas, and a refusal to accept what happened when water joined pigment joined brush joined paper. It is NOT a medium for those who love to micro-manage or be in control.
THE STUDENT OF WATERCOLOUR has to be more a Peter Pan than a child wanting to grow up–loving the thrill of what happens when ‘danger’ is courted, yet having the assurance that daring will win the day. However, that daring and search for adventure–on the surface of a good piece of paper–will only be pulled off if it is backed by enough experience to have a good hunch about what will happen when such-and-such is tried.
ATTEMPTING what remains beyond one’s ability isn’t courting danger–it is ignoring it. Trying to fly without thinking happy thoughts will give a person a broken bone. Within the bounds of representational art–(i.e. wishing to have a tree ‘look like’ a tree)–a painter cannot ‘pull off’ a landscape with lots of shadows if (s)he has yet to study them in some depth. Trying to do a scene which includes far far more than what one yet learned how to interpret is an invitation to frustration and wanting to give up watercolour for say, acrylics (oh, my).
AND SO FOR MYSELF, I know by this time that I must confine my attentions to learning about how corn grows, what it feels like, looks like, behaves like, before I can throw my abandonment into rendering a watercolour of winter corn in January. Not only that, but I must also have studied the qualities of snow–the qualities of what a winter sun does to shadows of corn stalk–the blues, the purples. And only then can a learned abandonment bring about a possible reward.
IT TAKES A LONG TIME to find the right paper, the right brushes, the right working pallet of colours, the right approach and the right subject matter. Knowing what can be done when paper is sopping wet–and what can’t–depends on who made the paper, how thick it is, how textured it is, how stretched it is, how quickly it will dry. Knowing when to wait until the paper is exactly wet or damp or dry enough to throw one’s energies at it, comes (usually) through ruining (many pieces of) good paper.
HERE IS THE LATEST DEVELOPMENT of the subject of Jamieson Creek in a February thaw…..
TOMORROW will (hopefully) provide a photo of the finished piece!
Painting progression 2…. ‘Jamieson Creek Thaw’
April 3, 2015
Painting progression 1…. ‘Jamieson Creek Thaw’
April 2, 2015
JAMIESON CREEK is about a 15 minute drive from our home, along a dirt logging road. The Kamloops, British Columbia, region is a geologist’s dream come true, featuring some of the oldest mountains in Canada. As a student of watercolour, I am fascinated by stone and rock, particularly because it is so challenging as a subject.
This is Jamieson Creek, taken four years ago around February, early March….
And here is my initial drawing of the subject…..
As you can already see, photography is not my gift (which is why I paint, lol)–so forgive the darkness. It was taken, pre-dawn in the spare room which serves as a studio.
Moral: don’t mess with Mother Nature (or the Ocean Man).
~~~~~
Aneleise (Ane) at her Grandparents’, age 8. . .
. . .’why the moon glows’ by Ane Jones (age 8)
March 31, 2015
……’why the moon glows’, by Ane Jones (age 8)
March 30, 2015
……’why the moon glows’, by Ane Jones (age 8)
March 29, 2015
……’why the moon glows’, by Ane Jones (age 8)
March 28, 2015
……’why the moon glows’, by Ane Jones (age 8)
March 27, 2015
……’why the moon glows’, by Ane Jones (age 8)
March 26, 2015
……’why the moon glows’, by Ane Jones (age 8)
March 25, 2015
……’why the moon glows’, by Ane Jones (age 8)
March 24, 2015
……’why the moon glows’, by Ane Jones (age 8)
March 23, 2015
‘Why The Moon Glows’ by Aneleise Jones
March 22, 2015
MY GREAT NIECE, Ane, age 8, was lying around with brother Levi making up another of their stories. Because their parents judiciously decided their home would be television-free, Aneleise, Levi and Caleb make up a lot of stories and sometimes act them out as well. That particular day, I told Ane that if she wrote out a story for me to take home, I would do the pictures for it.
She grabbed some lined notebook paper and a pen. Fifteen minutes later the pages were in my hands in time for Ane to join her brothers going crazy outside in the hammock. So this– Ane’s own grammar and spelling kept intact for future smiles–is her story (which–though made up between herself and her brother–she declared in front of him is OWNED by her)…..
Miniatures
March 20, 2015
THE DARK-EYED JUNCO ignores the feeders hanging in the red maple just beyond the front window, shunning the bossy finch rabble bumping one another off the perches. A Junco will head below, delighting in the shower of sunflower crumbs spit from Goldfinch beaks, already shelled, served on a bed of fresh snow.
STELLAR JAYS have the tact and grace of a sociopath. Self-absorbed to the point of being incognizant there even are other lifeforms, they bray and scatter seed as though perpetually going through puberty. Once chaos has been accomplished, they go over to our neighbour, Brenda, and do the same with her feeder.
BLACK-CAPPED CHICKADEES dart in to claim a single seed, flit to a branch, hammer the shell apart, then dart in again–chee-cheeing a mantra as though making merry to themselves alone.
2″ x 2″, and 1/2″x 3/4″ , watercolour on Arches 140 lb. Hot Press Paper
Same subject, different take…
March 17, 2015
THE OLD SCHOOLHOUSE is once again the subject……
THIS TIME around, a horse was to be included, which meant it could not be a nocturnal scene, as that would be an odd addition to a night painting. The choice was made to have only a single horse, even though horses are most often seen in pairs or groups, being a social animal…..
THE DECISION over depicting a single horse was selected as adding to the feeling of isolation: a lone horse beside an abandoned school in a lonely, forgotten field in the dead of winter……
“FROZEN IN TIME”
watercolour, 12″ x 15″, 140 lb. Arches Cold Press Paper, Kamloops Courthouse Gallery, Kamloops, British Columbia http://www.kamloopscourthousegallery.ca
Painting progression 5
March 16, 2015
THE FINISHED piece–“Abandoned Schoolhouse, Pritchard”. The rocks needed darkening and definition. Pines were added. Spattering of snow was used to unify the whole and add a feeling of movement.
Painting progression 4
March 15, 2015
MORE TREES needed adding. The suggestion of rocky outcrop is introduced. The aging building is blocked in. Shadowing completes this phase…..
weisserwatercolours 