studio

A Study

/ Terrill Welch / 13 Comments

After yesterdays eclectic group of photos, today is a sparse offering.

These lovely little canvas prints from my East Point Images I shared with you in February the “Simplicity” post. They arrived in yesterday’s mail. I am starting to gather together material for my September solo exhibit and these are going on a particular spot above the books in the library which is hard show.

Like many people I feel physically, emotionally and spiritually naked when I bring my work into the public. This is particularly so do a reading from my writing such as on this coming Saturday or when I have my canvases on the wall in such as the September show. Yet, I have learned that it is a part of “the business of creativity” which must be navigated. So vulnerable or not, the show will go on…

Sprout Question: How do you prepare for a public viewing or listening of your work?

© 2010 Terrill Welch, All rights reserved.

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

rocks and mussels

/ 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?

© 2010 Terrill Welch, All rights reserved.

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

/ 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?

© 2010 Terrill Welch, All rights reserved.

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

/ 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.

© 2010 Terrill Welch, All rights reserved.

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

/ 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.

© 2010 Terrill Welch, All rights reserved.

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

/ 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?

© 2010 Terrill Welch, All rights reserved.

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

/ 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 24th. 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?

© 2010 Terrill Welch, All rights reserved.

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

/ 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.

“sitting” quick water-colour painting sketch by Terrill Welch

Exactness is not the same as expressing the exact emotion in your work.

Sprout Question: Is there a particular method you use to capture the essence of things?

Note: Due to Easter Creative Potager will post Monday to Thursday this week and Tuesday to Friday next week.

© 2010 Terrill Welch, All rights reserved.

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

Painterly Challenge

/ Terrill Welch / 16 Comments

I have been doing underpainting on two canvases. I like to paint on site but that is not always possible so I gather photographic reminders. I rarely sketch or draw on my canvas except to capture rudimentary placement of forms. I do however routinely start with an underpainting which gives me the beginnings of depth and positioning for the development of the painting. Underpaintings are kind of like looking at an ultrasound of a baby in the womb when you don’t know the parents… not very interesting. So if you find this post rather boring – I won’t be offended. Come back tomorrow. It will be something different.

You may wonder how I choose what to paint (besides the obvious of a theme for solo Exhibition Sea, Land and Time at the beginning of September). Long ago I decided that rarely would I paint something that I felt I had fully captured with photography. My painting in is an intuitive relationship with my subject. I want to give to the painting something beyond what is in the seeing. In addition to a compelling subject, I also decide what to paint by choosing a painterly challenge – something I want to explore or a skill I want to strengthen.

For “Sea” my challenge is to be able to create depth in the water while capturing the waves on the surface… I want the viewer to be able to look at the painting and feel as if the water is still moving, wave after wave. Starting with an almost blank canvas, I begin.

Stopping as the underpainting becomes too saturated to allow new colours and shapes to emerge without erasing earlier ones.

With paint still palette, I decide to begin a second underpainting for “rocks and mussels” to address the challenge of giving bulk to something that is dark on the top and light on the middle and bottom… the mussels are added in to keep me amused and give me a break when the rocks become tiresome and frustrating.

I am reminded of a passage in Emily Carr’s painting journal on July 27, 1933 where she writes:

“Oh, these mountains! They won’t bulk up. They are thin and papery. They won’t brood like great sitting hens, squatting immovable, unperturbed, staring, guarding their precious secrets till something happens. At ‘em again, old girl, they’re worth the big struggle.”

My rocks are only little sitting hens – but getting them to “sit” is still my end goal. We shall see over the weeks ahead what we can do with them.

Sprout Question: What specific creative challenges are you setting for yourself right now?

Bonus: An interview with me posted today by Stacey Curnow at Midwife For Your Life Blog “Walking in the Sunshine of My Soul: Special Shoes Not Required.” http://www.staceycurnow.com/blog/2010/03/walking-in-the-sunshine-of-my-soul-special-shoes-not-required

© 2010 Terrill Welch, All rights reserved.

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

30 times Same, Same

/ Terrill Welch / 24 Comments


View Karl Isakson’s 1918 painting “Nature morte” as part of Wikimedia Commons.

I posted the process I used to paint my first oil painting in 30 years yesterday. “East Point Cliffs” is a rugged painting and rough around the edges, however, it is done. I need to begin again as I trust that not all learning is accomplished on one canvas. Yet, I couldn’t even consider painting the exact same image again, and then again. It is just not in my nature. It is an esteemed practice though. I have on my bookshelf from many years ago Complete Course in Oil Painting: Combined Edition – Four Volumes in One (1960) by Olle Nordmark. On page 123 he states the following:

“Beginners are inclined to think that experienced painters get their effects easily, without travail. This is not so. Great masters are great because they are willing to take infinite pains and do the work over again an indefinite number of times at any stage of the painting. Willingness to erase, or to start all over again on a clean painting surface is essential to good painting, whether you are a beginner or an artist of established reputation.”

Nordmark provides an example of Swedish painter Karl Isakson (1878-1922) known for his exact precision of tone. Isakson often discarded as many as 30 paintings of one subject before he was willing to show anyone his canvas. Thirty times. Thirty times painting the same subject again and again until the artist felt he had mastered his subject. As someone who loves colour, the results take my breath away. The pieces are timeless.

View Karl Isakson’s  1919 Udsigt över Svaneke at ArtNet.

I have provided two examples. To see some of Isakson’s other work explore this Google image search here. I even noticed more than one painting that has survive of the same subject.

So… I am publicly making a commitment to paint 30 paintings by the end of 2010 on the theme of Sea, Land and Time. I will, as much as my vulnerability will allow, let you look over my shoulder as I do so.

Sprout Question: Whose creative work before 1940 do you admire and what have you learned from them?

Note: If you, as some of you I know do, have a practice of creating from the same subject many times please feel free to provide a link to your work and tell us what you have learned in the process.

Best of the weekend to you:) Terrill

© 2010 Terrill Welch, All rights reserved.

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