Drawn to Simplicity in the Photography and Painting Process

January 27, 2014January 27, 2014 / Terrill Welch / 7 Comments

A slow start to our Monday with heavy fog wrapping the house in warm silence. The dark black coffee is good.

The youngest step-son is here visiting adding a sprinkle of laughter to our mix. My sweetheart is being host and making breakfast and more coffee. Life is good and content as I hear the pages of the Saturday Globe and Mail turning slowly just outside my view from the studio in the loft.

With this backdrop, I am musing about the relationship of space to our lives and our well-being. I want to share an image that is my own laptop background at the moment called SERENE SEA…

I haven’t made it available yet for purchase as I am not sure if its power and lure goes beyond my own satisfaction. You see, these rare moments of spacial expanse with such simplicity are rare both in nature and life. I long for these uncluttered fragments of surreal and sparse existence. Even a few posts from an older part of the pier with the island hinted at in the background feels like too much in comparison.

ABSTRACT MIST

This doesn’t take away from the beauty of another island in the same landscape.

GEORGESON ISLAND IN WINTER MIST

Quality Prints available HERE.

Or even adding in a bit of the bay is a pleasant frame as well…

BENNETT BAY GULF ISLAND NATIONAL PARK

Quality Prints available HERE.

Or a few branches framing the farther off Edith Point…

EDITH POINT ENCHANTED

Quality prints available HERE.

I admit some of the qualities of the first image still exist in the photographs that follow it but the spacial void is seriously diluted. Our view is noticeably anchored to the land. But is it a distraction or a necessity?

In this reference of thought I made some assumptions that the first image, which has been holding my attention, would be of no interest to others. This assumption was so compelling that I did not release this image or the next one for purchase. Yet, I personally come back to them again and again. I seem to take one step towards more inclusion and definition in my last three paintings while there is still a sense of keeping the landscape compelling with its simplicity. To explore this tension in the rendering of the paintings further, there are three recent works that I released yesterday over on my website Terrill Welch Artist in the post “Sky and Sea in Three West Coast Contemporary Landscape Paintings”

I feel myself leaning more strongly in my most recent paintings towards daring to hold a sense of completeness with a painting similar to the first photo composition of SERENE SEA. I sometimes wonder if this was a pull that Mark Rothko experienced in his studio when he painted those large patches of colour. Anyway, it probably will amount to nothing on the easel but still I must give its due. I must pause and consider.

Well, my coffee is now cold and the half of a fresh pear I had earlier has long worn off. It is time for a late breakfast and to see what else the day has to offer.

What are you pausing to consider these days?

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

Fourth Year Creative Potager Blog Anniversary

December 30, 2013 / Terrill Welch / 15 Comments

Just three days ago, on December 27th, it was the fourth anniversary of Creative Potager. During this four years, the space has shifted and changed with the patterns and needs of my life. We have shared much haven’t we? Blogging is sometimes a little like a public journal. It captures more than we intend because of the comfortable conversational exchanges. It doesn’t capture all of course. An artist has to have a few secrets. But it does string together my intentions, my focus, the main events and the rhythms of my work. Much has happened in four years and much has remained the same.

I still take you on long walks where the winter afternoon light is fine.

Quality photography prints available HERE.

Places where the Surfbirds entertain with flashes of white above the water.

Mallard ducks can surprise as I climb over large sandstone rocks along the shore.

Quality photography prints available HERE.

Places where trees embrace moments that we may not have noticed otherwise.

Places on a small island off the southwest coast of Canada where the sea is ever-present.

Thank you for walking with me this past four years.

Thank you for joining me in the studio to render these impressions from our walks.

Together, we have mixed paint.

We have brushed it onto canvases and gessobord.

We have pushed it around with a palette knife.

In a effort to render those walks and those moments, where the heart and soul is most alive, I have worked hard both en plein air and in the studio. And you have been the most gracious, supportive and encouraging of company.

Tomorrow, I shall post on the Terrill Welch Artist website my personal selection of the best thirteen of 2013 paintings. There were over fifty finished works to consider so it wasn’t an easy task to choose just thirteen. However, without hesitation I can say it was a good year and a year you were so much a part of making it so.

Thank you! You are one of the finest of Monday morning blessing.

This not the end of course, just a pause for acknowledgment before we proceed into 2014 which is shaping up to be a truly grand adventure. More about this next week.

I have no question today so I ask instead – What question do you most want to answer before the end of 2013?

Please note: The last four photographs were taken by photographer Allison Mullally at a recent studio photography shoot.

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

Storm Watching – large contemporary seascape (terrillwelchartist.com)
Arbutus by the Trail – small contemporary landscape painting (terrillwelchartist.com)
West Coast Island Road in October – contemporary landscape painting (terrillwelchartist.com)
New Release – August Morning Reef Bay landscape painting (terrillwelchartist.com)

A Tall Tale of Autumn painting resting and another Emily Carr story

December 16, 2013December 14, 2013 / Terrill Welch / 19 Comments

With the holiday season upon us, I truly should put the paints away and get cards and presents ready for delivery. But one more I said to self, just one more to make it an even 50 paintings completed this year. That was last Thursday.

There are no work-in-progress images only this one that was taken as the painting came to rest. Forgive me if you have already seen this painting in progress, along with 8, 965 others last time I checked the post on Google plus alone. It has now had two small edits, wee clean-up adjustments and will get its final photograph soon. But it seemed to be asking to be my Monday morning blessings image for mid December 2013 and so here we are.

Why a tall tale of such a simple autumn painting, you might ask? It is because the combination of fog and memory keep it from a cleaner truth. These are my childhood trees – popular trees growing on the riverbank. They are my first subject of paintings. I cannot pick up a brush to render them without being transported back through time with its many stops before these trees. These are trees I met before there was even a field in front of them. These are trees I introduced my first lover and later others. Then much later my now husband. These are trees I walked beside while I carried my babies and then with them while they carried theirs. These are the trees that my mother and father have walked with me since they were younger than I am today. Painting the spaces of light and shadow in between is filled with the residue of many visits. It is a tall tale that gets taller with each telling. All I intended to do was to use up the paint leftover on the palette.

A TALL TALE OF AUTUMN STUART RIVER resting 16 x 12 inch oil on canvas

This time of year is family time and I suppose in my case tree time. Which brings me to another tall tale and that is a strange happening last Friday on December 13th. I happen to notice that the Creative Potager blog views were going a bit crazy. So I looked and it was this post “Emily Carr Mystery Solved” from November 9, 2010 more than THREE years ago! What could it be I wondered? Well after a couple of hours and views were still piling up from Canada I did bit of sleuthing. It was Google.ca who was celebrating the Canadian landscape painter with a doodle on their home page. What you might ask would this have to do with my very old stale dated blog post? It had to do with what came up when a person clicked on that doodle. The image and search results included this blog post right near the top, not at the very top but near enough to entice the curious. So belated 142 happy birthday Emily Carr, another painter of trees.

For those in Vancouver, British Columbia over the holidays an exhibition of more than 40 forest paintings by Emily Carr will open at the Vancouver Art Gallery on Dec. 21, 2013. Emily Carr: Deep Forest will run until March 9, 2014. The show spotlights works created by Carr in the 1930s, most of them depicting scenes within 25 kilometres of her Victoria home. The paintings in the show are almost all drawn from the Vancouver gallery’s permanent collection. The gallery is home to the most significant collection of Carr’s work in the world, comprising 254 paintings, drawings and other works.

So there we have it two tall tales and a blessing of trees all round!

What tree or trees might you offer a blessing on this fine winter Monday?

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

Emily Carr (tweedsmuirlibrary.wordpress.com)
Emily Carr painting sets new record, selling for almost $3.4 million (vancouversun.com)
Seaside Mayne Island – Large Canadian Landscape Oil Painting (terrillwelchartist.com)
Chasing October Sun by the Sea – an en plein air oil painting (terrillwelchartist.com)
Arbutus on Mt. Park – landscape oil painting (terrillwelchartist.com)

Storm Watching and its progress on a large canvas

December 9, 2013March 21, 2015 / Terrill Welch / 13 Comments

At 10:00 am today the morning light was not strong enough to work without the studio lamp. It is heavily overcast and last I checked there is a wee bit of snow expected. However, I was able to put the finishing brushstrokes on this large 30 x 40 inch oil on canvas painting this morning. It may be weeks before I can get a decent photograph of it so we will take a look now at the shiny-wet resting point of STORM WATCHING.

We may think that this painting began with this quick painting sketch on the canvas.

But we would be wrong. It all started on Friday December 6, 2013 at about this same time of day when the power went out. I was surprised as there was little wind at la casa de inspiracion. But then the email notifications started coming in with Ferry boat cancellation and they were for the Inside Passage which is not common at all. So I knew then that there had to be wind somewhere and took a guess that it was on the east side of the island.

Sure enough it was blowing a bit out there. But this isn’t the spot we need to be. We have to walk out to Campbell Point in the Gulf Island Park Reserve because the waves are break on the rocks in a big way. Let’s go and have a look. Dress warm and still expect to the wind to go right into a person’s bones and starts sawing away with an ice-cube.

Scrambling out onto a rock ledge the wind whips my big lens and me around with the same ferociousness as the sea. But I am determined. I hunker down low and steady myself against the roar. WILD SEAS WITH MOUNT BAKER IN THE DISTANCE

(Detailed view and quality prints available HERE.) There was no chance of using a tripod in these conditions. It was all up to my stabilizers and years of practice of framing and shooting waves. There wasn’t much time because I would get to cold to be able to work the camera and it was no place to be getting stiff and wobbly when I stood back up from where I was crouching. So steady does it. FULL STOP

(Detailed view and quality prints available HERE.) BREAKING OVER TWICE

(Detailed view and quality prints available HERE.) Sunday as in yesterday I pulled out the large canvas and placed it on the easel. I wanted the immediacy of this moment while it was still fresh to me on a cellular level.

The continuous motion of the winds and the sea stir sea-spray high up onto the cliffs above. I want that. I want that feeling of stirring and motion. I decided no underpainting so that spray would have the advantage of the white underneath. I had noticed the spray shadow in one of my reference images and took advantage of this to create additional depth. I worked on getting the painting down with as few brushstrokes as possible.

I want us to be slightly queasy from it as we are swayed in the waters and crash against the rocks within our viewing of this painting.

At the core there is a knowing and a thimble-size of silence which makes it bearable. This too shall pass. This is the stage that the painting rested overnight. This is where I started earlier this morning and finished at the first photograph which will not be its final of course. For this we must wait for better light.

UPDATE OCTOBER 13, 2014: Link to detailed viewing of the completed painting with purchase information and a link a short (less than six minutes) video where I talk about this painting can be found on the Terrill Welch Artist website HERE.

In conclusion, my Monday morning blessing is patience, admiration and determination. If we are willing to try we can most often do more than we believe we can. A large wave from a large canvas as you forge through the week ahead.

What are you determined to accomplish this week even if the winds of doubt are fierce?

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

Farm In Fog – pastoral landscape painting (terrillwelchartist.com)
Seaside Mayne Island – Large Canadian Landscape Oil Painting (terrillwelchartist.com)
Chasing October Sun by the Sea – an en plein air oil painting (terrillwelchartist.com)

A Good Night of Sleep and other Studio Blessings

November 25, 2013 / Terrill Welch / 6 Comments

Last evening I was wondering what I might possibly have to say this morning. But ten – yes ten full hours of sleep has created a bubbling pot of thoughts and ideas. So much for yesterday’s slug appearance

I did spend an hour on Facetime with the “O” boys which likely did some good as well. Yes, I spent part of that time making faces as well. When you are one and almost three years old, making faces is a lot of fun.

So what is it that I have cooking you might ask? Well, I have an idea for a solo exhibition in the spring for one. It is tentatively called “Mostly Off The Wall” and that is all I can share at the moment. I think it shall be a LOT of fun though – maybe even one you would like to travel all the way to Mayne Island to see. March or early April are the tentative dates. This will be just before our planned two to three-month trip to Europe where I shall paint my way in leisurely around a very few selected locations. These are the plans if all goes well that is. But a person has to put a mark in the sand if anything is ever going to move from a dream to reality. These are my marks on the horizon of 2014.

In the mean time, ARBUTUS BY THE TRAIL has been released over on my website at Terrill Welch Artist if you care to have a wee visit with this small impressionist style west coast landscape oil painting.

There are also two new photographs from our resent close-to-home vacation time in and near Victoria, British Columbia. These were taken in East Sooke Park and you may appreciate the difference of the stone compared to that which is mostly found on Mayne Island. Getting very close to facing the open seas on the southwest coast Vancouver Island this harder stone is much more prevalent.

CREYKE POINT: Braced against the Pacific’s unrelenting chastising, proud and strong they resist. The hard stones may have their misgivings but their closeness to the sea is not one of them.

Quality prints available HERE.

CASTLE ROCKS: The castle-top rocks with a window to the sea swell the imagination.

Quality prints available HERE.

What are YOUR marks on the horizon of 2014?

So there we have it! May your Monday be filled with attention to your blessings and good-will.

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

Arbutus on Mt. Park – landscape oil painting (terrillwelchartist.com)
Seaside Mayne Island – Large Canadian Landscape Oil Painting (terrillwelchartist.com)
Chasing October Sun by the Sea – an en plein air oil painting (terrillwelchartist.com)
Canadian Contemporary Landscape Painting Rhythm of the Sea Edith Point Released (terrillwelchartist.com)
Arbutus by the Trail – small contemporary landscape painting (terrillwelchartist.com)
New Release – August Morning Reef Bay landscape painting (terrillwelchartist.com)
WELCOME To The British Columbia (morevisas.com)

Art Interview, Open Studio Guests and a Birthday

November 11, 2013November 11, 2013 / Terrill Welch / 8 Comments

Today is a rest and resilience day but before I wonder off I want to share a short Monday morning blessings post. Well, possibly it will be short – I have a lot to thankful about.

First thank you to the more than 100 collective online and face-time fans and patrons who came to my Open Studio event. You are all amazingly gracious in your support and encouragement. The paintings and photographs just glowed under your kind words and observations. My personal favourite store is about two wise women who came in and found a seat in the main part of the show – process that was only delayed slightly as they said hello. The one guest explained that she just needed to settle in and be with the paintings and the surroundings for a while before she could truly enjoy them. After bit, they started to chat about an aspect of this painting or that painting – a colour, the movement or a memory that was trigger. The work was truly “seen” in the much the same way as they were painted.

What a blessing for any artist to eavesdrop on such conversations!

Then on Sunday there was a surprise publishing of an Interview about me by Michigan poet and author Charles van Heck in the Life as a Human magazine. It is part one of two parts. The second half will be published next Sunday.

Though by Sunday I had a most heavy heart for the hardship and deaths from the typhoon in the Philippines. I was feeling like I should close up shop and not be celebrating my paintings and photography at all on such a sad weekend of loss. But one of the studio guest reminded me that in the face of tragedy we often need to be reminded of the beauty in the world in order to bring balance and hope to bear our great losses.

There is also something else that can fortify us at times like this and that is the first birthday of a grandson. It was a year ago today that the second “O” boy was born. His grandma and grandpa “O” are there visiting on his special day today all the way from the middle of Canada.

I was able to have a short face-time video call with the family this morning. A treasured blessing indeed!

Now, I am off to spend at least part of my day walking by the sea.

It is Remembrance Day of course and I am thankful for those men and women all over the world who dedicated and lost their lives for the peace we have today.

I wish you all a fine week and ample time for quiet, peaceful resilience.

What is your most powerful reminder of resilience?

P.S. On Wednesday, the next Art Review comments about a specific painting will be posted on the new Facebook Page Art of Terrill Welch. Please drop by and have a read if you get the chance.

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 waits for no ferry nor west coast daylight, online Studio is OPEN (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
Introducing Art Reviews, Comments, Engagement and Interaction with Art of Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)

Open Studio event and other Monday morning blessings

November 4, 2013November 4, 2013 / Terrill Welch / 13 Comments

Have I told you about the Open Studio event this coming November 9th and 10th from 11:00 am to 3:00 pm? Yes?

(photograph by photographer Allison Mullally )

Well, I shall stop working for a moment and please allow me tell you one more time – it will be both and online (right here on Creative Potager) and physical event with a fancy title – ANYTHING BUT NEUTRAL. More information is available on my website HERE.

Open Studio Event Update – I encourage your online participation rather than trying to make this a day trip from either Vancouver or Victoria. As of November 4, 2013 B.C. Ferries advises that The Queen of Nanaimo ferry from Vancouver to the Southern Gulf Islands is not running due to damage in high winds. There is no other vessel at this time to take its place while it is being repaired. Passengers are being rerouted through to Victoria.

I was out for a walk yesterday afternoon and a nice couple said they loved the ad in the local paper and hoped that I had lots of parking available because I was going to need it! Sounds good doesn’t it?

Let’s us see if I can perform a little magic and get you a map for the Mayne Island artisan studio tour.

You see there on the top left – I am number ONE as in “1 ” or first on the tour which must be good luck wouldn’t you say? Oh, you noticed that the brochure says the Open Studio goes until 4:00 pm – well what is an hour or two when a person is on island time? As long as you don’t expect to stay for supper it is all good.

How does this come into my Monday morning blessing? Well, it started with a conversation with a friend on facebook when we were talking about the success of my art work over the past couple of years that got started because of finding money in my email for a painting that had sold. My part of the conversation went something like this – there is a much deeper exchange than that of purchasing goods when one of my paintings finds a new home. It is hard to explain but, as you likely know, my work is expensive. A decision to purchase, I am sure, is never made lightly. Yet, once that decision is made there is a kind of graciousness that happens as money and painting or photograph or even a calendar or card changes hands. Hum… how to say it – like a deep mutual bow of appreciation, punctuated by these sometimes surprise email payments. I feel so fortunate as an artist to have been given the opportunity to not only create and do what I love but also to be appreciated for my hard work. It is far-to-rare of a blessing in life I think.

I take a bow and thank all you readers for your ongoing support in so many ways. Thank you!

Now for the “other” part of my Monday morning blessings. How about this?

I was away most of last week helping out with the two “O” boys. This is the eldest being very still so he can get mom to put his mustache on for Halloween. When his dad asked him what he wanted to be for Halloween this young fellow said “a cookie.” Dad said okay then – one chocolate chip cookie costume coming right up.

It is a funny thing sometimes about working and being online. There is this together and separate thing that happens in a different way than going to the office. Well, maybe not so much different but it shows up differently. Anyway, I decided that it is finally time to set up a facebook Art Page. You will see its badge to the left in the sidebar. Please go and have a look and even give it a “like” if you want. I still haven’t figured out how to easily get to my “liked” pages so if you have a trick I would love to hear about it. Mostly I search them by name when i want to go visit. There is something real special going to happen on Art of Terrill Welch – art reviews of both my paintings and photographs by a team of reviewers. That is all I am going to say right now other than to let you know that the first review will be posted this Wednesday. See, here we go – another blessing. Several writers and fans of my work have come forward to start this new adventure with me. Now isn’t that just amazing!? Pssst! Some of them you will know, I am almost sure of it. More later 😉

What is in YOUR mix for Monday morning blessings?

P.S. Two new paintings have been released on the website at Terrill Welch Artist. I would tell you about them but that would spoil the surprise. Okay, Hint – there are two quick links in related articles below.

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

Chasing October Sun by the Sea – an en plein air oil painting (terrillwelchartist.com)
Seaside Mayne Island – Large Canadian Landscape Oil Painting (terrillwelchartist.com)

In the Art Studio Still Life Painting

October 20, 2013October 20, 2013 / Terrill Welch / 9 Comments

Until the end of December, my Monday morning posts are about noticing blessings and things I am thankful for receiving. Due to my schedule this week, I am posting on Sunday instead.

What I am noticing is that I often take action when I am feeling blessed. For example, I am thankful for the local apples and pears we have been devouring over the last couple of weeks. So good! In fact, good enough to want to put a few in a new still life painting.

First, let’s set everything up and take a photograph or sixty just for fun. The painting will be from a different perspective but this gives us the idea…

Image available for purchase HERE.

Now for the beginning of the still life painting.

It is hard to see but the whole canvas has a light wash to tone down the white and then I just begin to find the shapes and colour relations not really worrying about the final result too much at all. Things will change and move around with time and light. The idea is just to get started somewhere.

Working wet-on-wet or alla prima I continue to build up the paint on this roughed in start. The minutes slip by and eventually the painting time can be counted in a few hours…

I must quit now. There is a meeting. There is super and then the full moon pushes against the fog and sleep arrives under the night sky. In the morning I push on. I set it to “rest” and have some breakfast. I make a few edits. The day passes into night and I make few more edits on the still-wet oil painting, until …

PITCHER APPLES PEARS on a 16 x 20 inch canvas

We now have a study of whites and how they are always leaning towards one colour or another. The tastes, smells and texture of this still life have slid onto the canvas. For this magic of creative process I am thankful.

Now to clean up the studio but before we do, one last shot…

Some of the pears and apples have been eaten. The brushes have been clean and the paint on the palette is drying but it is all still here.

May your Sunday be rejuvenating and bring a sense of awareness and comfort.

What blessings do your actions tell you that you are noticing?

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

Alla Prima: An Artist’s Race (paigeclarkfc.wordpress.com)
Plums Apples and Mostly Sunflowers still life painting (terrillwelchartist.com)
Blackberries Golden Plums Transparent Apple Still Life Painting (terrillwelchartist.com)
Golden Plums An Apple And A Green Vase Still Life Painting (terrillwelchartist.com)

Sea Autumn and Studio – A Canadian Thanksgiving Monday on Mayne Island

October 14, 2013 / Terrill Welch / 10 Comments

Whether it is the cool rhythm of the sea we crave

and long to reach

or the crunch of fallen leaves

in the warm sun

being in the studio, with its basket of paints,

and waiting brushes,

takes a backseat for most of a luscious Canadian Thanksgiving on Mayne Island.

Well. almost. Today is the day that my new studio assistant will come by for his orientation. We will wander through the work place that I have cleaned and organized in his honour.

Then we will go through a typical work order to do the final work on a piece of work so that it is ready for purchase. You know, all those tasks like getting it into the online inventory, putting on the hanging hardware and if needed, painting the edges. By now I am sure you know how much I really do not enjoy painting the edges of my paintings, yes? I am so excited about finally getting this help in place as I am a wee bit behind as I keep painting new work without doing this final bit of administrative work.

I am most thankful for the sun, the sea, the autumn leaves, a clean studio, a studio assistant and the health and well-being of my large family. I am truly blessed on this fine and great annual day of thankfulness. All the best of a Canadian Thanksgiving and Monday blessings to you!

Can you tell us about a time when you stopped fighting yourself and hired work done that you could do but were not?

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 History of Canadian Thanksgiving (Infographic) (lowdownblog.com)
A Soul Pancake for Canadian Thanksgiving (colleenogilvie.wordpress.com)
Happy Canadian Thanksgiving (treehugger.com)
Canadian Thanksgiving (conradbrunstrom.wordpress.com)
SOLD The Mt. Baker Reach Canadian landscape painting (terrillwelchartist.com)
From Mayne Island to Mexico City… (nomadicsenior.wordpress.com)

Off to kick leaves and have a good visit

September 19, 2013 / Terrill Welch / 9 Comments

It is leaf kicking time! I am heading north for better than week to visit with family. With a bit of luck, I will come back with at least few photographs of brilliant autumn colours. I can’t make a promise but I can assure you that there is a good possibility.

In the meantime, I have been busy with a large stack of administrative work with little time to paint. But I do have a new large 60 x 36 inch oil on canvas resting called SEASIDE MAYNE ISLAND

It is not released yet and still needs a final photo shoot. I will also do a full work-in-progress post for us sometime in early October. Regardless of its newness and still “resting” status, I placed the painting in a prominent location last evening for a dinner we hosted with good friends and collectors of my paintings and photography.

The hit of the evening, after SEASIDE MAYNE ISLAND of course, was a new still life painting…

AUGUST STILL LIFE WITH CEZANNE AND MATISSE
36 x 24 inch oil on canvas

There are distinctive elements of Paul Cezanne‘s work that go far beyond his use of colour to represent form. He had a way of presenting different viewpoints in his compositions that was and is exciting. This is something that Henri Matisse continued to explore while allowing the paint to become colour fields of flat surfaces. At one point in the of the development of this work I had a choice. I could continue to build up the colour fields or I could continue to follow the light and movement within the landscape. Matisse of course was arguing for letting paint be paint in its colour and simplicity. Cezanne was slowly working his way into the tension of form and structure of the still life using colour as his guide. I observed. I thanked the masters. Then I picked up my brush and continued to paint the light and movement between the forms until the painting came to rest. Edges are currently unfinished and can be completed to meet your needs.

Detailed view and purchase information at:
http://www.artsyhome.com/product/August-Still-life-with-Cezanne-and-Matisse

Where might be your favourite Leaf-kicking stroll when the golden light is shining low through the trees?

Psst! I have also started working on my second art book. The working title is ANYTHING BUT NEUTRAL: Mayne Island in paintings and photographs, Volume Two. I have about 57 of the estimated 80 pages completed in draft form. Tentative release will be early November. I shall keep you posted as it progresses 🙂

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