Happy New Year with the best 7 paintings of 2016

December 31, 2016 / Terrill Welch / Leave a comment

In 2016, there are 24 oil paintings and 32 acrylic painting sketches for a total of 56 completed works by the Canadian artist Terrill Welch. Many of these oil paintings are larger canvases and cover specific geographical areas of both the west and east coast of Canada. Most of the painting sketches were completed during a spring seven-week art trip to Prince Edward Island and remain unavailable in the artist’s private studio collection. In total, 30 paintings or painting sketches were released in 2016 and overall 15 works from the available pieces left Terrill’s studio into private collection.

The selection for the best paintings of 2016 is limited to an arbitrary number of seven works because choosing 16 for 2016 out of a total of 56 works just didn’t seem to create enough of a meaningful selection process. So here it goes, in no particular, order, the artist’s choice of…

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How a rainy day by the sea painting saved a west coast Christmas morning

December 18, 2016December 15, 2017 / Terrill Welch / 5 Comments

This is a true modern-day story about how a “Rainy Day by the Sea” painting saved a west coast Christmas morning…

The shopping mall was stuffed with shiny objects, seasonal jingles and the grimaces of determined shoppers during the last weekend before the holidays. A woman stood stoically in the middle of the good cheer with her children draped casually against her side. There was one present left to get for her person, the love of her life, and the father of her children. Disappointed, she concluded that nothing in these many shops of splendour really seemed worthy of this occasion. What was she going to do?

Meanwhile, on a small southern Gulf Island, there was an artist noticing the evening settling in around her. The quiet valley was expecting another rare snowfall overnight. Despite the weather warning, she was cosy and content in their strawbale timberframe home. There were still a few presents to wrap but, the parcels that needed to be mailed had been sent. The new range had arrived that morning in time to make the seasonal shortbread. Life was peaceful and good.

The island artist has a studio home with oil paintings and acrylic painting sketches that lean two and sometimes three deep against banisters, walls and even windows. She has a great online gallery and social media presence but limited and sporadic bricks and mortar storefront exposure. Hence, holiday seasons are usually quiet for the artist. Besides, original oil paintings are often too personal and too expensive to be purchased as Christmas gifts. This is usually her reflective time, family and friends time and planning for the next year time.

However, upstairs in the studio loft was a petite oil painting, a small gem that measured a wee size of 5 x 7 inches. It was a tiny study for a larger painting from a few years earlier and had lost its place on the studio walls to later works. Now the small painting sat rather forlorn in the loft window seat. Even the resent dramatic southern west coast snow seemed to conspire against the quiet colours of a “Rainy Day by the Sea.” What was the tiny work going to do?

Just then, with all the brilliant zazzle, shouting gizmos and screaming gadgets swirling around her, the woman in the mall became calm and centred. She had an idea. Pulling out her phone, right there in the bulging shelves of opportunity, she sent a private Facebook message to an artist she knew and whose work she admired on Mayne Island.

“Hi Terrill! Hope you are well on this crisp day. I just had a last-minute brain wave of buying X a painting of yours for Christmas. However, my budget is small… $xxx. I realize this might not be possible, but thought I’d ask anyway. I think your daughter mentioned you are coming here for Christmas, so perhaps transport could happen that way. Anyway, I have other ideas if it isn’t possible, but wanted to see what you thought. I am standing here in a mall feeling depressed at my surrounding options! Let me know your thoughts and I hope I haven’t insulted you with my budget!”

The artist assured the woman that she wasn’t insulted by the budget size at all. She thought for a moment and was sure she could help. She prepared her response and gathered the specific links to a couple of tiny paintings listed in her online gallery and sent them off.

The return message from the woman with her children in the shopping mall was prompt.

“Okay! The kids and I agreed on Rainy Day By The Sea!!! Thank you so much!!!!!!!!”

“Shall I pay with an e-transfer? Or what do you prefer?”

The artist confirmed that an e-transfer was great and that gift wrapping and delivery on Christmas Eve day were also included in the price. She then went up to the studio loft window seat, where the small painting now sat in the winter darkness. Carefully, the painter lifted the painting up, selected an appropriated box, and carried both downstairs to the table with the wrapping paper. She thought she could see the little painting smile. It was wearing a badge of local, original, handmade significance. It was the “Rainy Day by the Sea” painting that would save a west coast Christmas morning for a true love, a best friend and a cherished father. The petite painting’s last wish was that the artist would choose the brightest wrapping paper so that the small box wouldn’t be missed on Christmas morning. The artist was sure this final wish could be granted.

And this is a true modern-day story about how a “Rainy Day by the Sea” painting saved a west coast Christmas morning.

SOLD! Rainy Day by the Sea, 5 X 7 inch oil on canvas.

View other paintings and painting sketches currently available at: https://www.artworkarchive.com/artwork/terrill-welch

Do you have a modern-day Christmas story to share?

Liberal usage granted with written permission. See “About” for details.

Creative Potager – Visit with painter and photographer Terrill Welch

From Mayne Island, British Columbia, Canada

For gallery and purchase information about Terrill’s photographs and paintings go to http://terrillwelchartist.com

The Process of Painting Centuries of Seasons

November 11, 2016November 11, 2016 / Terrill Welch / 5 Comments

What follows is the process of painting “Centuries of Seasons” inspired by the Currie heritage road on Prince Edward Island.

On this day, November 11, 2016, the painting “Centuries of Seasons Heritage Road PEI” 24 x 30 inch walnut oil on wood comes to rest, overturning most of the grey disillusionment of the past few days with the curious unexpected results of the United States election and the more anticipated death of Leonard Cohen at the age of 82 years. It is also a day of remembrance for all of those who have fought for our freedom. And finally, it is my grandson’s fourth birthday. This hodgepodge of events, experiences and emotions are most fitting to brushes, paints and a painting surface.

Today, I am drawn to the words of Canadian painter Ozias Leduc (October 8, 1864 – June 16, 1955) who lived to be 90 and was born and living much of his life in Saint-Hilaire Quebec. During his career he decorated more than 30 churches and chapels in Québec, Nova Scotia and the eastern US. The last major project he accepted at the age of 76 was a request to providing the mural paintings for the Notre-Dame-de-la-Présentation, Shawinigan-Sud. The work was completed between 1943-55. Besides his religious commissions for churches, he rendered many easel paintings including portraiture, still life, and landscape paintings. The latter paintings were mainly from his intense study of the landscape that were then painted from memory and imagination in his studio home.

“Art teaches, informs. It uncovers the soul. No doubt it also has the power to sort the chaos of the unconscious into an orderly cosmos. It leads from disorder, suffering and unbalance to stability, harmony and joy.”

(Ozias Leduc, in a letter to Paul-Émile Borduas, 1943)

“The sole mission of the artist is to express beauty. Beauty without servitude. Beauty as unconstrained as space and time.”

“If the earth were strictly utilitarian it would not be so dear to us. Our eyes seize all of its dazzling sights.”

(Ozias Leduc, sometime in the late 1920s, from the “Ozias Leduc Documentary Canadian Painter” directed by Michel Brault, 1996)

Leduc was not influenced by contemporary Canadian artistic currents and trends, and he held only one important exposition, which was at the St-Sulpice Library in 1916. By helping to promote the career of Paul-Émile BORDUAS, he became quite popular late in his career. He also left many texts, poems and short reflections on art. His feelings about modern painting are expressed in the mystical thought that man lives searching for the paradise he hopes to regain through a knowledge of nature and the beauty of art.

(Canadian Encyclopedia.ca)

“I do not have a style of my own and do not choose to have one. Every time I paint I am seeking something.”

(“Ozias Leduc Documentary Canadian Painter” directed by Michel Brault, 1996)

This painting has been completed during these events and with these guiding words from a Canadian painter from before I was born. It might be said to have begun on a drive down the Currie Heritage Road on Prince Edward Island this past May.

It might be said that I only trust my brushes today and not my own words and convictions. This is true though not uncommon I would think to seek the experience of wise counsel when processing ones own experiences.

It might be said to have begun with the first trees I ever painted. This likely equally true because to know a tree well enough to paint is to spend years in its company.

It might be said that the centuries of seasons in this painting have no beginning and no ending. This too is true as we can observe that the road has worn away from years of passage over its red dirt surface.

But the work has come to rest and this is a record of the process of its completion.

Centuries of Seasons Heritage Road PEI 24 x 30 inch on wood “resting” by Terrill Welch

The painting will be released once it is truly considered completed, has dried and a final photograph taken.

Now my brushes shall be cleaned and the painting shall rest. Good day to you!

What wise counsel is guiding your day today?

Liberal usage granted with written permission. See “About” for details.

Creative Potager – Visit with painter and photographer Terrill Welch

From Mayne Island, British Columbia, Canada

For gallery and purchase information about Terrill’s photographs and paintings go to http://terrillwelchartist.com

Three Large Plump Peaches in the Studio Today

August 26, 2016August 26, 2016 / Terrill Welch / 6 Comments

There are just three large plump peaches, fresh from the fields, sitting in a bowl on the table.

I paint the still life sketch promptly because there is a great risk of there only being two.

The result is slightly larger than life contemporary impressionist style painting sketch.

Because this is all there will be, no larger painting anticipated, the 11 x 14 inch original acrylic still life painting sketch on gessobord has been released immediately HERE.

I have also released this work as a print and products in my Redbubble storefront HERE.

The studio study was completed simply for the pleasure of summer, peaches and paint.

What simple pleasures of summer are you enjoying?

Happy Friday to you!

Liberal usage granted with written permission. See “About” for details.

Creative Potager – Visit with painter and photographer Terrill Welch

From Mayne Island, British Columbia, Canada

For gallery and purchase information about Terrill’s photographs and paintings go to http://terrillwelchartist.com

Art Studio Gossip

August 13, 2016August 13, 2016 / Terrill Welch / 6 Comments

Gossip overheard in the artist’s studio this afternoon…

Standing on end and shouldering themselves into a rough order along the curved hallway, these landscape paintings whisper loudly to each other.

“What are we doing here? I don’t even have my edges painted yet!”

“Me either but I hear that is happening tomorrow. Apparently, we have a big gig coming up for September and October.”

“Yeah, I heard eight of us large ones will be showing in Victoria, BC ” says Seaside Mayne Island, as he heaves himself to a slightly better angle to be heard, without actually shouting, from the great room.

Then Evening And The Arbutus Tree leans over the railing from the loft.

“She told me that she wants to call the show ‘Above The Stacks’ because we are going to be in a new library and most of us will be way up high above the books. I said she had to add ‘Land and Sea’ to the title or no one will know that it is going to be us.”

Long Beach Vancouver Island sighs as the tide recedes farther up her midriff.

“You know” she comments patiently while stretching out one long sandy leg, and then the other “it is way too soon to be getting excited. There are still a couple of weeks to wait. No use wearing out all our shine in the studio.”

Then she winks and the light sparkles off of her sea “I do believe Emily Carr is somehow involved again.”

All the paintings in the studio start whispering at once. In fact one little fellow gets so excited that he falls over flat on his face in the magazine article he had been trying to read upside down.

Sea and Sun Cox Bay Tofino BC grumbles “You had to go and wake the little ones didn’t you!? You know they are too small to go in this show.”

“There will be other shows” Long Beach Vancouver Island replies. “After all, there are not many place that can handle the eight of us.”

The late summer afternoon warmth starts to make all the paintings drowsy – large ones, middle-sized ones and small ones. Sssshhhh!

The studio is quiet.

What are you whispering about today?

Liberal usage granted with written permission. See “About” for details.

Creative Potager – Visit with painter and photographer Terrill Welch

From Mayne Island, British Columbia, Canada

For gallery and purchase information about Terrill’s photographs and paintings go to http://terrillwelchartist.com

Large Painting of Blooming Point PEI a meditation on World Peace

August 11, 2016 / Terrill Welch / 5 Comments

Terrill Welch

A painter can sometimes keep it simple and say that the painting painted itself. On occasion, this may even be the case. But not for this 40 x 60 inch canvas. It came with intentions that were sparked by a conversation with David Sandum, a Swedish painter and print maker living in Norway. He is also the author of the award-winning memoir I’ll Run Till the Sun Goes Down. We have been colleagues and friends for more than half a dozen years, or at least as much as one can be when living an ocean apart. The context for this painting was a dialogue following the latest in a series of terrorist attacks, this time it was Nice, France. The anger, bewilderment and confusion was felt bone deep. When one is a painter, there often seems to be only one thing that can be done in a situation like…

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In the Words of Strangers

July 29, 2016July 29, 2016 / Terrill Welch / 10 Comments

By now you may have guessed, as a Canadian artist, I often have conversations strangers about my work when I am traveling. It comes with geographic proximity to my landscape subjects and other human beings. These engagements are frequently brief and fleeting in nature but this does not diminish their impact as a kind of concrete gentle-kindness to fortify my solitude as I put brush to canvas over and over again.

This same kind of engagement also happens through the vast and complex inter-connectedness of the world-wide-web.

Oh, I suppose could tell you about new works painted, several art shows and painting sales in the month since I have been home (my website has this information if it is desired). But, it has also been an unprecedented time of quiet recognition of my work. Complete strangers often contacted me to make requests about sharing my work elsewhere online. In the process, they frequently articulated why they wish to do so. Sometimes their words leave me rather stunned and deeply humbled with gratitude. Here are a couple of brief snippets as examples…

Received in my inbox today:

“I discovered your paintings from a Google image search of paintings of the Canadian coast. I grew up in ….. BC and spent much time sailing through Desolation Sound and the Gulf Islands. You’re paintings truly capture much of the beauty inherent in the
region. I was wondering if I could share one….”

Fog Inside Passage 12 x 24 inch oil on canvas

Details and purchase information available HERE.

What do you think my answer was to this request!?

And here is part of a public comment this week on my TerrillWelchArtist.com website contact page:

“I have to tell you –though I hesitated to write this because I did not want to provoke anything which might disturb whatever wonderful thing it is that enables you to produce these works–I have spent numerous hours at the Musée du Quai d’Orsay fixed on one or another impressionist painting–usually one by Van Gogh. Your paintings have a similar effect. Your artistic sensibilities, while uniquely yours, seem to have a resonance with what I see communicated through Van Gogh’s pieces. Please don’t take offense at a comparison. Your work is truly original and beautiful–as is his. No mere imitator of Van Gogh, however talented, could ever hope to match this peculiar sensibility. I’m convinced that it must be something innately shared and, for me, your work expresses it in a way that’s of course your own. But these works could easily hang beside anything in the Orsay’s permanent collection.

It is no wonder to me that collectors snap up your paintings as soon as you finish them. If I had a fortune or was a curator at a major museum, I’d be collecting your paintings with the same interest that I’d have for any work by Van Gogh or Matisse or Raoul Dufy.”

Signed “P.”

One of the paintings of particular interest to this individual is Spring Tea, 16 x 20 inch oil on canvas, one of three paintings showing this weekend on Mayne Island at “La Vida Rústica” — multi-disciplinary reflections on the rustic life.

Well, I must say, I really don’t know what to say when faced with such frank remarks…. except thank you, thank you – Thank You!

What is particularly powerful and meaningful to me is the clarity with which the paintings moved these commenters – it is as if the brushstrokes were felt even more than they were seen. There is no higher compliment or recognition as a painter I could ever wish for my work. This is a clean and perfect match to my intention and the driving force that brings me back to the studio again and again.

May the painting continue, without interference, and yet gently supported by the words of strangers!

On that note, I think we shall conclude with one of the latest paintings and the first large works from Prince Edward Island the East Coast of Canada.

Can you share a time when you were moved by the insight and kindness of a stranger?

Liberal usage granted with written permission. See “About” for details.

Creative Potager – Visit with painter and photographer Terrill Welch

From Mayne Island, British Columbia, Canada

For gallery and purchase information about Terrill’s photographs and paintings go to http://terrillwelchartist.com

Until later Prince Edward Island as I leave with more painting sketches

June 15, 2016June 15, 2016 / Terrill Welch / 6 Comments

Has the past three weeks really gone so fast that I have not intrigued you with my gallivanting from shore to hill to shore again? Well it seems so though I did share ten sketches on the website update, there has been more – so much more! But one must choose what to share I think, otherwise boredom will have you on the next global surf for website spectacular viewing. We must get on with it!

Let’s see…. oh yes, we shall start with just a few of the latest painting sketches and then a handful of photographs of subjects I find particularly fascinating.

I can never seem to get enough of the red dirt and sandstone of Prince Edward Island!

South Shores PEI study 8 x 10 inch acrylic sketch on gessobord

Cape Bear on edge study 12 x 9 inch acrylic sketch on gessobord

Wind Swept Murray Head PEI study 11 x 14 inch acrylic sketch on gessobord

Hilltop View Above DeSable River PEI study 8 x 10 inch acrylic sketch

But in truth, it is the relationship between land, sea and sky that keeps my attention no matter if it is red or white sand and stone.

Fogged In At Basin Head PEI Study 8 x 10 inch acrylic sketch on gessobord

But there are also the lighthouses…

West Point Lighthouse 1875 PEI

Colourful fishing huts…

Georgetown Harbour PEI

And the churches…

This one comes with a story about its photographic capture even:

I almost didn’t get this photograph of the Roman Catholic Church of the Immaculate Conception, built 1848, in Brae, PEI. You see, there is at least one or sometimes two churches, of some sort it seems, within walking distance of pretty much every farm and fishing village on Prince Edward Island. There are large churches, small churches, plain churches, beautiful churches and unusual churches. Many, like this one, only open the doors for special occasions and eventually may be lost to more central houses of worship that can be reached easily with a vehicle. But, in a day’s adventure on this gorgeous island, we see a lot of churches!

Traveling with a landscape photographer, who is also the driver, can get more than just a little bit tedious. There is a lot of stop and go. There can be lot of turning around and going back even. So, by the time I spotted the Brae church through the trees and a ways over the fields and trees, my sweet husband was just about ready to crumble into a two-year old’s meltdown of angry despair. He is an extremely patient man but there are limits. Turning on the signal and thinking as fast as I can, I shout – LAST PHOTO OF THE DAY! while simultaneously and silently praying to the gods of fading light that I might be able to keep my word without regret. I didn’t dare look sideways at him, not even out of the corner of my eye. I just kept driving and searching for a photograph of the church from various angles as we approached. I knew I was only going to get to stop the car once without the floodgates of frustration overflowing the banks of spousal goodwill… and I was going to have to be quick about it. We were approaching the end of a long day, both of us hungry and tired.

At first I couldn’t find the shot. There were power lines everywhere and very little to use for context. Then I saw a small bridge and zipped across. Turning into the Brae Harbour Rd, I spin a slow u-turn and park. I leap out of the car and jog across the road. I had it! Last photo of the day – with nothing more than a heavy sigh and a grinning shaking of his head as he asks – did you get it!?

Phewffff! Love wins another round!

Roman Catholic Church of the Immaculate Conception 1848 Brae PEI

And then there are red dirt back roads….

Eliot River Rd PEI

Fresh leaves gracing Currie Rd PEI

Farrar Rd PEI

No matter where we went, from North Cape to Cavendish to Summerside to St. Peters Bay, to East Point to Georgetown, to Murray Head to Rocky Point or just on the streets of Charlottetown, we were welcomed with exemplar Canadian kindness! Prince Edward Island has managed to cultivate the best of rural and urban living in its small province and it is a place that warms the heart and lifts the spirit. We will be back. We have made a promise to ourselves to have me come and work in the fall to early winter, maybe in 2017, to capture the landscape again in painting sketches and photographs during the autumn season. For now, I must go home and start working up the Prince Edward Island landscape onto larger canvases using the reference material I have gathered over the past seven weeks. I owe a huge thanks to all the islanders who have welcomed me and shared their favourite places and advice. There are too many to name but you know who you are! Thank you!!! Until we meet again!

I usually end with a question but I actually have not one to ask today so…

What question might you like to ask today?

P.S. Save the date for Mayne Island, B.C. – West to East Coast Art Show featuring new landscape painting sketches and recent large oil paintings by Terrill Welch on Sat. July 9th 1-4 pm and Sun. July 10th from 11 am – 4 pm at the Mayne Island Community Centre, 493 Felix Jack Road.

Terrill will be displaying over 18 of her new east coast painting sketches (prints of these works can be ordered) from her trip to Prince Edward Island this spring along with recent west coast landscape paintings that will be available to purchase.

During this pop up show, Terrill will be painting live and demonstrating how her work goes from a collection of sketches and photography reference materials to the final large oil paintings.

Come experience the magic of these landscape renderings of Canada’s west and east coasts as they are captured and translated by Terrill Welch with her brushes and paints onto medium and large canvases.

Liberal usage granted with written permission. See “About” for details.

Creative Potager – Visit with painter and photographer Terrill Welch

From Mayne Island, British Columbia, Canada

For gallery and purchase information about Terrill’s photographs and paintings go to http://terrillwelchartist.com

A Painter’s Sketch of Prince Edward Island and Interview with CBC Host Karen Mair

June 2, 2016 / Terrill Welch / 6 Comments

For your reading, viewing and listening pleasure this morning. Enjoy!

Terrill Welch

Sun, rain, snow, wind, frost, thunderstorms and summer-time warmth, along with the opening of lobster season and the arrival of the season’s first cruise ship, have all been part of painting sketches the east coast during the past five weeks on the Prince Edward Island in Canada. Fourteen painting sketches have been completed so far. Ten of these works have been selected to share today, along with a link to a radio interview with CBC Mainstreet PEI host Karen Mair which aired earlier this week.

These quick sketches are part of reference research for larger oil paintings and are not for sale at this time. However, prints can be made available and a link to purchase these will be provided upon request. Now, from Charlottetown to far-flung beaches on Prince Edward Island between April 27th and May 2nd 2016 …

Harbour Charlottetown PEI 8 x 10 inch acrylic plein air…

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A few painting and image snippets of Prince Edward Island

May 15, 2016May 17, 2016 / Terrill Welch / 9 Comments

During the last two weeks, I have taken my camera and brushes to Cavendish, North Rustico, Dalvay Beach, Savage Harbour, Blooming Point and St. Peters Bay on Prince Edward Island, Canada’s smallest province. Though it is May, the weather is mostly wool-sweater cool, with the occasional breezy sunny day. The potatoes are being planted and the daffodils and magnolias are blooming. However, it can still get down below freezing at night. But the light! It is a photographer’s and painter’s jewel-of-a-life-time in the early mornings and anytime before ten o’clock on this fine island during the month of May. Working our way along the north shore towards the east, let’s have a look and see what we have for you in the albums.

Cavendish is the setting for the fictional Anne of Green Gables stories and these stories are the most commonly referenced attribute when I mention Prince Edward Island. I found that it was impossible to resist a wee ramble up to the Cavendish cliffs with its rather tame wild rabbits (there are signs NOT to feed them but, from the behviour of the rabbits, I don’t think this is heeded).

Sitting with the view at Cavendish PEI is for my mother who deeply enjoyed “the Anne books.” I, on the other hand, humbly admit, to never turning a page in even one of these books.

When I whispered this to someone in a tweet, she replied “I am pretty sure you can get your Canadian citizenship revoked if this gets widely known… or get voted off the island.”

Okay, I will think about reading them… maybe this fall or winter when I am working in the studio on larger oil paintings of this area. After all, I really don’t want to get dangled off the cliffs of Cavendish.

Something to think about while I am waiting for the ground paint to dry for a quick plein air painting sketch.

As you can see, in the few minutes between photographs, the clouds are moving so fast that the sea cannot settle on a colour. I love this about the sky and the sea and how they talk and sometimes even shout at each other.

Pulling on my heavy wool sweater, sleeves rolled up, I work as quickly as I can. The waves coming ashore provide a diversion from my stiffening fingers.

I end my reference work with “Shores of Cavendish in May PEI” 8 x 10 inch acrylic sketch on gessobord.

I could stop here and it would be a complete blog post. However, this is not wise. I do not have much time for blogging. Even though the post will be long by the time I am finished, we had best continue. This is a good time for you to get a beverage of choice and snuggle right into the adventure……

Earlier on this same morning, long before it was warm enough to want to stand still and paint, I meandered around North Rustico which is just a little further to the east of Cavendish. Pleased with my reference images, I am not sure yet if I will make it back for a painting session. It was about 7:00 am or so when I took these.

North Rustico bathed in early morning sun PEI

There is nary a fishing boat in sight at the Warf because lobster season opened on the 1st of May.

Seagulls Nest Rustico Harour PEI

North Rustico Lighthouse PEI where red sand drifts up from the shore and onto the dirt road.

Continuing east, over hill and dale along the coast, a person will eventually arrive at Dalvay Beach. On this particular day I am joined by CBC Host/Producer of Mainstreet PEI, Karen Mair, who does an interview with me for a 5-6 minute guest appearance sometime next week on her show.

I am a happy painter – more red sand and warm hues to work with.

Dalvay Beach PEI 9 x 12 inch acrylic sketch on gessobord

I am sure that one can’t truly claim to have been to Prince Edward Island unless they have ground red sand between their teeth after being blasted by a cloud of grit on the beach or stomped the red mud from their shoes before going in doors. This was my plein air adventure on Mother’s Day.

A friend who moved to Charlottetown three years ago took me to her favourite beach at Blooming Point. It is a warm day with fog drifting in off the water. The filtered light is perfect!

My friend walked with her dog and read while I painted.

Blooming Point Beach PEI 8 x 10 inch acrylic sketch on gessobord

There is a large painting to come from these reference materials of Blooming Point. I can feel it in my bones!

Then there is this one day where the wind howled and I had to hang onto the car door to keep it from coming off its hinges when I stepped out to take photographs. In fact, 92 % if the island’s power was generated by wind on this day. Despite the wind, the afternoon light was stunning.

The relationships between land, sky and sea has never been stronger.

Shores to sea, Savage Harbour PEI

St Peters Roman Catholic Church built in 1927 next to a ploughed field PEI

The red field brings up the third aspect of Prince Edward Island notoriety – potatoes!

Fields of red St Peters Bay PEI.

Well, there you have it! A few snippets from the past couple of weeks. There is more of course but it shall wait for another time. I feel as if I have collected what I came to gather. Now? I am on bonus time – with still another month left to explore! I am beaming widely and relaxing into our adventure here on the east coast of Canada. So, I leave you with this novella-length post and I am off!

What creative adventure are you relaxing into today?

Liberal usage granted with written permission. See “About” for details.

Creative Potager – Visit with painter and photographer Terrill Welch

From Mayne Island, British Columbia, Canada

For gallery and purchase information about Terrill’s photographs and paintings go to http://terrillwelchartist.com