rocks and mussels

April 12, 2010April 23, 2010 / Terrill Welch / 20 Comments

"rocks and mussels" oil painting by Terrill Welch

11X14 by 1.5 inches water miscible oil painting.

View full resolution image here.

“rocks and mussels” is inspired by a piece of remote the beach at Point No Point on south western Vancouver Island. It is a rugged area close to the end of the Strait of Juan de Fuca and open sea. The rocks are of mixed texture and form. Some are large hard slate black stones rubbed smoothed from the surf and others are smaller, rounded and warm ochre and cream in colour. Seaweed seems to drape themselves over either. Though the when you look closely mussels appear to like the darker rocks. But since they are sometimes clustered together it is often hard to tell.

I have been coming to this area for over twenty years, sometimes for lunch and a stroll through the trails and other times to stay for a few days in one of the cabins. The last time I was there was in December 2009 for our honeymoon.

I had set a challenge when painting this piece to be able to paint the darker seaweed on top of the lighter rocks. However when I look closely, the light was the dark seaweed just at the crest of the rocks. Which made much more sense to me but the painting was still very challenging. I wanted us to feel like we were the sea about to wash over the mussels, the rocks and the seaweed. I also came to understand that the rocks are often washed away from the bottom quicker than the top as the sea pushes its way over the sand and withdraws back into itself. This leaves the stones with overhangs where there is no sand and the shadows seep in.

At some point this painting took on a life of its own and became separate from my reference images and slide down a path that was more about remembering how it felt, the smell of seaweed, the salt air, and the roar of the surf on distant rocks with the sun on my back lifting the mist off the trees on the bank above me.

Sprout Question: Have you ever discovered something different than what you thought you knew while creating?

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

Purchase photography at http://www.redbubble.com/people/terrillwelch

Creative Potager – where imagination rules. Be inspired.

From Mayne Island, British Columbia, Canada

San Francisco 1906

April 9, 2010April 9, 2010 / Terrill Welch / 19 Comments

Well it is Friday and I sometimes like to do something a little different – maybe a wee bit on the lighter side for the last day of the week. Today I have special surprise sent to me by a friend here on Mayne Island. I have a short film taken from a street car going down Market Street in 1906 just four days before an earth quake destroyed the area. There are cars, people, horse, teams of horses and this amazing interaction with the street car as it moves along.

The video is posted in a gazillion places on the web with this paragraph but I could not find a definitive source to credit.

This film, originally thought to be from 1905 until David Kiehn with the Niles Essanay Silent Film Museum figured out exactly when it was shot. From New York trade papers announcing the film showing to the wet streets from recent heavy rainfall & shadows indicating time of year & actual weather and conditions on historical record, even when the cars were registered (he even knows who owned them and when the plates were issued!). It was filmed only four days before the quake and shipped by train to NY for processing.

If anyone has a good source link, let me know and I will add it in.

Sprout Question: If you could time travel where would you want to go and in what year?

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

Purchase photography at http://www.redbubble.com/people/terrillwelch

Creative Potager – where imagination rules. Be inspired.

From Mayne Island, British Columbia, Canada

More Painting

April 8, 2010April 23, 2010 / Terrill Welch / 23 Comments

Power outage lends itself to another day painting

We had another power outage (due to winds knocking over a huge arbutus tree on Village Bay road at 1:40 am). I awake at 7:00 am. The power is still out. I decide to see if I can find a coffee before doing anything else. Ah yes! The bakery is serving coffee using generator power. Armed with to-go thermos cups filled with black gold, I return home and prepare our usual fruit, yogurt and grain cereal for breakfast. With few alternatives, I settle on my favourite activity of the moment – painting.

The wild underpainting had dried on my 18X24 by 2 inch canvas.

I go to work. At one o’clock this afternoon the power comes on again and I am ready to take a break and share the progress with you.

There is more to do but it is a good start.

Sprout Question: What is your creative activity of choice when the power goes out?

Note: My apologies for being late with today’s post but you will have to take it up with the wind and the arbutus tree… they have let me know they are taking full responsibility for the delay.

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

Purchase photography at http://www.redbubble.com/people/terrillwelch

Creative Potager – where imagination rules. Be inspired.

From Mayne Island, British Columbia, Canada

Evening Sea Oil Painting

April 7, 2010April 11, 2010 / Terrill Welch / 40 Comments

The sea hag swished her skirts then drapes them elegantly over dark rocks. Embracing the shore she pauses – then glides away, only to return again. Ah what a temptress. With the last light of a sunset sky caught in her folds, she lays the sea before us.

“Evening Sea” is painted on 100% natural cotton, 11X14 inches by one and a half inches.

View full resolution image here. (much more detail)

I do not have any process shots of “Evening Sea” beyond the initial underpainting that I shared earlier. It is one of those times that I settled in and painted until I was done and then fussed a bit around the edges the next day. This doesn’t happen often when painting but it did this time. I still look and see something that I might want to change but the roll of the sea is caught in the patterns of reflection and the movement is trapped in the paint showing through from underneath. So I don’t touch it. I leave it and watch the sea in its evening beauty.

Sprout Question: Can you tell us about a piece you created with ease?

Note: If anyone has any tips for photographing oil paintings, I am all ears (or eyes). They are much more difficult to get “true” then my watercolour paintings and I’m struggling a little with it – okay I’m struggling a lot (it took about 20 shots to get this the way I wanted it) but a person has to start someplace.

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

Purchase photography at http://www.redbubble.com/people/terrillwelch

Creative Potager – where imagination rules. Be inspired.

From Mayne Island, British Columbia, Canada

Sacred Rock

April 6, 2010 / Terrill Welch / 31 Comments

Did you have a nice holiday? Mine turned out very different from planned as a lengthy wind storm came up Thursday night and didn’t end until Friday evening. It took the power out for a day and a half which meant I didn’t go to Vancouver. Instead, I stayed on Mayne Island, cooked on the wood cook stove outside and kept a fire going in the outdoor fireplace for extra warmth.

Though I was terribly disappointed not to see my grandson other good things happened instead. My partner’s daughter came for overnight and we had an awesome visit and on Monday I worked on my paintings and went down to the beach to visit a sacred rock.

How do I know it is a sacred rock? Well I don’t really. It just captured my imagination and every so often I go and visit and see it if is still there. The rock is likely a little less than three feet wide and maybe two feet high. It doesn’t look like any other neighbouring rocks but is sandstone and possibly something else. So let’s have a closer look together shall we?

Isn’t it a beauty? So solid. So many interesting markings.

And the surface… what a design.

Close to the bottom the barnacles and little hats attach themselves.

Now I trust you can see why every so often I come down and have a visit sitting beside this sacred rock, admiring its beauty and looking out to sea. We have become good friends over the three years I have lived on Mayne Island.

I know that someday the sea will have battered drift wood against it long enough to wear it away. Or someone will have found an ingenious way of moving it to their country garden. But for now, it is a sacred rock on a beach in the southern gulf islands off the west coast of Canada.

Sprout Question: Has a place or thing ever inspired your imagination?

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

Purchase photography at http://www.redbubble.com/people/terrillwelch

Creative Potager – where imagination rules. Be inspired.

From Mayne Island, British Columbia, Canada

Early Easter

April 1, 2010April 1, 2010 / Terrill Welch / 27 Comments

Looking at that big sky I am reminded that today is the last Creative Potager post until the morning of Tuesday April 6, 2010. Early Happy Easter to you as we take one last quiet stroll before departing to family and friends.

Bull kelp rests where it was thrown during a high tide, its long tail reaching back into the sea. Bull kelp has been the inspiration for many a child who spies it on the shore. It is an annual and can grow 80 feet long in one season with leaves up to 10 feet long. They grow together creating an underwater forest.

Spring has arrived to the shoreline…

View and purchase full resolution image here.

Here is my personal favourite view looking down on the grape hyacinths, iris stocks and snapdragons growing next to the shore.

But mostly I want to share with you one of my favourite arbutus tree….

View and purchase full resolution image here.

If you look way across the Straight of Georgia that is where Vancouver, B.C. is, just below the cloud covered mountains. On Saturday afternoon, I will be waving back to you from there.

Sprout Question: How do holidays fit with your creativity?

All the best of the Easter holiday weekend to you.

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

Purchase photography at http://www.redbubble.com/people/terrillwelch

Creative Potager – where imagination rules. Be inspired.

From Mayne Island, British Columbia, Canada

Creative Community

March 31, 2010April 1, 2010 / Terrill Welch / 12 Comments

As I mentioned on Monday, I have been reading about Camille Pissarro and admiring his work and that of other impressionist painters that were part of his community. There was Monet, Manet, Renoir, and Cezanne to name a few. The influence of these fellow artists in Pissarro’s work is sometimes mentioned when author Linda Doeser discusses a particular painting.

Ah, to have been part of these passionate (and at the time unacceptable notions) about rendering the quality of light by exploring the spontaneity and immediacy of lively colour and rapid brush strokes with no hint of drama or sentimentality.

“spring salad” photograph rendered coarsely in oils – view full resolution and purchase here.

Then I thought about Creative Potager and those of you who regularly through your comments and my connections to your own sites are part of my creative community. To name just a few…

The use of line and creating greater connection between drawing and painting. Jerry Shawback http://www.thewhole9.com/jerryshawback

Always giving our best and writing from a place of showing rather than telling. Laurie Buchanan. http://holessence.wordpress.com

Bringing the flow of her everyday into focus for the rest of us. Kathy Drue http://upwoods.wordpress.com

Sharing the exquisite world of film as a creative medium of expression. Sam Juliano http://wondersinthedark.wordpress.com

Discusses the practicalities of promoting and selling art work. Itaya http://itaya.blogspot.com

Shares her studio process and her success while celebrating and acknowledging yours. Martha Marshall http://artistsjournal.wordpress.com

Sprout Question: With whom are you presently discussing your creative ideas?

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

Purchase photography at http://www.redbubble.com/people/terrillwelch

Creative Potager – where imagination rules. Be inspired.

From Mayne Island, British Columbia, Canada

When the universe says YES

March 30, 2010March 30, 2010 / Terrill Welch / 16 Comments

First, I say “good morning” to the painting I worked on yesterday.

11X14 inch water miscible oil painting in progress

Then taking my coffee, I slip on my garden clogs and meander towards the gate. Robins chatter and other morning birds sing in the new growth on the maple tree.

I closed my leadership coaching practice at the end of December in 2009. Or at least I thought I had. I made an announcement. I took the website down. It was after that I noticed something odd begin to happen.

Clients began calling and emailing asking “you will still see me, won’t you?” I said, “maybe in the future – can I give you a referral?” No they said. They will wait until I am available. I explained that I may not be available – at least not for a long time. But they were prepared to wait and see.

Then I was interviewed for a coaching article by Noomii.

People contacted me in a panic because my website was down and they were looking for my book, my by-donation approach to service design and so on. So I put Terrill Welch – A Woman behind Women back up.

Then there was the interview last week by Midwife for Your Life. Of course, there is also the book reading for Leading Raspberry Jam Visions: Women’s Way April 24^th. What is a woman to do?

So feeling a little like a carpet salesman who is always going out of business… I turn the handle to the studio.

I switch on the lamps and smile.

The universe is saying “yes” even though I was saying “no.” I hope we can agree on a both/and – doing both creative work and a little of my unique by-donation triple bottom-line coaching… say maybe just for a part of a day on Tuesdays. I do so much love the work – all of it.

Sprout Question: What do you do when the universe says yes?

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

Purchase photography at http://www.redbubble.com/people/terrillwelch

Creative Potager – where imagination rules. Be inspired.

From Mayne Island, British Columbia, Canada

The Essence of Things

March 29, 2010March 29, 2010 / Terrill Welch / 12 Comments

“You should paint the essence of things” Pissarro instructs a younger artist.

“Where we are separate” quick water-colour painting sketch by Terrill Welch

Last evening I was having a love affair with the work of Camille Pissarro (1830-1903). I have often had comments on my work about its impressionist style. However, having not formally studied art, or the history of art, my self-taught-ways left me replying “I don’t know much about the principles of impressionism. I just like to capture the light and the essence of my subject. The energy in a work should be alive and vibrant even if it means sacrificing correctness.” Last night when I read The Life and Works of C. Pissarro by Linda Doeser (1994) I understood why people smiled knowingly at my comment and said no more.