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/ Terrill Welch / 7 Comments

Terrill Welch's avatarTerrill Welch

Themes often emerge when an artist is painting that then become conscious explorations. Such is the case with my latest series of paintings “Squared to the Sea” which began to appear a little over a year ago. The series is likely not finished as I still have some square canvas in the studio. I will add new ones over time as they are completed. Yet it seemed like time to introduce the work as group.

The square is a challenging composition to bring to life with intrigue and interest. I have been drawn to the challenge and the idea and with my ongoing love of the sea it seemed like a worthy exploration. The following paintings are organized in a pleasing visual order for your viewing pleasure. Please note, as is often the case before I can present a series,  some of these paintings are already part of private collections…

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Painting the Desperation of Wanting to Stay Alive

/ Terrill Welch / 17 Comments

Claude Monet is quoted from a conversation with an American neighbour in Giverny as follows:

When you go out to paint, try to forget what objects you have before you, a tree, a house, a field or whatever…. merely think here is a little square of blue, here an oblong of pink, hear a streak of yellow, and paint it just as it looks to you, the exact color and shape, until it gives you your own naive impression of the scene before you. (reference Claude Monet 1840-1926 by The Art Institute of Chicago catalog published 1995)

I suppose you think I am going to argue with this sound advice!? No I agree and my brushes feel the same. Yes, of course I consulted my brushes and they spoke to the canvas and we are all in the same painting with Monet. However, as we conferred we also notice that Monet had left something out in his recipe for painting. It is not enough to get the colour just right or the shape just so.

A painter must paint the desperation of wanting to stay alive.

Here is a very wet detail from my painting today where I worked on this “must.”

Image

No matter how beautiful and accurate the painting of the light or interesting the composition, the painting must leave the viewer with an understanding that the painter knows that the moment in the painting is a gift in time – one worth being alive to experience. This must be said in every brushstroke, every slice of the palette knife, every squeeze of the paint tube and in absolutely every decision the painter makes to execute her vision into that brief second of a moment on a canvas.

SPROUT: How do you create with the desperation of wanting to stay alive?

© 2012 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

Terrill Welch online Gallery at http://terrillwelchartist.com

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Surprise!

/ Terrill Welch / 10 Comments


 

We have been working hard this week with many of you sharing through twitter, facebook and your blogs Monday’s post “Quit Fracking with Our Water.” If you read the comments, you can see all that has been done. Thank you, thank you, and thank you! Your support, engagement and sharing of your circumstances and findings are just what was needed.

So I just had to pull a face and lighten us up. Actual this is a face of mine I keep on file. It is also the one that Laurie Buchanan requested I post a couple of weeks ago. I keep it for just such occasions. I keep it because taking ourselves and life too serious to often can lead us to believe and act like we are all going-to-hell-in-a-handbasket-before-sunset. Not true… it just feels like that some days. So this is my face for warding off the evil face of hopelessness. I am grateful for today.

We have worked hard and now it is time to play so we can come back and work hard again another day. But before we go, have I told you recently how much I appreciate each and every one of you? – because I do 🙂 Thank you, always, for being part of the Creative Potager – where imagination rules.

Sprout question: When was the last time you pulled a face for the fun of it?

And as I close off, my heart goes out to the people of Alabama and other States as they start to recover from this week’s deadliest tornado outbreak in almost four decades .  Sending light and energy.

© 2011 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

Terrill Welch online Gallery at http://terrillwelchartist.com

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A moment with Frank Jordan

/ Terrill Welch / 20 Comments



After his daughter found my book and letters he was keeping, I was notified today that a special friend, Frank Jordan, died last Sunday. He was 90 years old. He lived a full life! I will miss him. He has had such a powerful influence on me. It was so nice of his daughter to phone. She asked if she could keep his book and the letters I had authored. I said “yes” surprised that she asked but happy to reassure her that yes she should keep them.

Some people I connect with deeply, regardless of age or gender. Frank Jordan was one of those people. He loved life even with its tears but mostly he found its joy, love and wonder. Others might miss it – not him. I know he was at peace with his life because he told me so the last time we spoke on telephone in the early summer. I know he will meet his tomorrow with enthusiasm.

Here is a passage from my book Leading Raspberry Jam Visions: Women’s Way about the man of whom I speak….

[Frank Jordan] is a personal mentor I have been honoured to have in my life since childhood. For me his life represents a high measure of success. You will not find his poetry and wisdom in university libraries but you may find it published on the placemats in small restaurants in the region in which he lives. You will not find his wealth ranked amongst the top 25 families in Canada, nor will you even find him given recognition for his wealth within his own small community. His paid career work ranged from jobs such as driving a school bus to janitorial work. His volunteer work ranged from voluntary ambulance attendant to knitting blankets for the hospital auxiliary and the local transition house for women leaving abusive relationships. He does not own his own home or many other material goods.

Are you beginning to question why I feel this individual is successful?

Frank Jordan is successful because he knows how to love. He knows how to love unconditionally and expressively in every day and in every moment. He goes by many endearing nicknames that are used by his whole community, not just his immediate family. To be in conversation with this man is to know your own humble humanity and to walk away hugging yourself – and the whole world at the same time. He has a gift that is rare and valuable. His gift is complete appreciation for life and living. Most recently, we were engaged in conversation as I walked out with him to his car, and he told me how he used his ‘little helper’ (as he shook the cane used to steady his 83-year-old stride) on days like today – days where he was required to be on his feet for several hours. He told me how blessed he was, because he could still drive during daylight hours. As I stood with him, shivering beside his car, he continued to count his blessings and tell me important stories that he knew I needed to hear. I listened intently, appreciating his calm, confidence as he said “you know god loves me so much that I just can’t help myself! I have to spread it around!” His face is lit with the excitement of his conviction, and even from my rather non-committal stance, I would be hard-pressed to deny the existence of his god or his love.

Then with equal importance he continues to tell me how his wife, who is several years older, has not being doing so well. His face is transformed by the sadness of his thoughts. Then he gives his head a little shake and looks up at me before continuing: “most recently she had been having a particularly bad day, and was in tears trying to get dressed, because she was unable at that time to dress or undress herself.” At this point in his story, his eyes start to squint with pleasure: “well, I went over and gently helped her, as I laid out my own complaint – I said, ‘well woman, you know I love you dearly, and I do not mind helping you take your clothes off at night, but it seems rather cruel to ask me to help you put them back on in the morning!’” He described how her tears gave way to laughter as she called him “an old fool,” and blushed from his continued life-long pleasure in her.

His living is an immediate gift, and his stories of living are a continuing gift that offers up a picture of infinite success, in their telling and retelling. Yet, to acknowledge his success (since it fails to fit the acknowledged and typical definition we as a culture have allowed ourselves to accept), it must be carefully and explicitly stated and justified. He has touched and influenced countless lives in his daily practice of joy, recognition and love. I have unquestioning confidence in the huge worth of the rippling effect of his life’s work, in giving and receiving. The consequence of his influence in my life alone has allowed me to have hope in the darkest moments, to believe in my abilities, to forgive myself when I fall short of my expectations, and to have total fascination and delight in people and in living. He chose to accept and embrace the paid work available to him, and to excel in using these positions to fulfill his true mission in life, which was to minister to those he met in his everyday interactions.

My challenge for us is to question all measures attributed to success – not just those that are beyond the quick and easy definition provided by wealth and position. I ask that we embrace the multiplicity of success, and carefully explore and articulate what we believe is success in a particular situation, and also what consequences result from that success. For me, success is not about getting it right and sailing to the finish line of life. Success is about allowing your persistence to sail your vision through every day… while the breeze of your passion and potential charts your course. (pages 75-77)

I have no pictures of him… isn’t that strange? To have been friends since I was fourteen years old and no photographs? I have never felt I needed any – today is no exception. I can see Uncle Frank anytime I want, by sitting with my heart open, smiling at what the day has to offer.

Sprout question: How might you describe your creative success?

© 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

A Compliment Nothing Special

/ Terrill Welch / 13 Comments

This past Saturday, October 2, 2010, Creative Potager was written up as “nothing special” in the best possible way by Dr. Peter Renner (dashin) a practicing Zen lay-monk and a delightful, engaging and thoughtful host of Living and Dying with Eyes Wide Open. He muses about what he calls amazing photographs about the ordinary around her. He concludes “perhaps that’s what I find most comforting in Terrill’s posts: she directs attention to that which is there all the time, just being, waiting for us to see.” He goes on to quote Marcel Proust’s observation that “The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes.”

This past Sunday, October 3, 2010 Annie Q. Syed wrote about one of Creative Potager’s sprout questions as part of her “Still Sunday” post. She tells of amazing photographs and paintings in a safe harbor drenched in creative magic.

In addition, my paintings were featured yesterday on Art of Day in “Impressionist Painting of Nature by Terrill Welch” Go ahead and drop by. Leave a comment if you are so inspired.

Thank you, dear readers for your continued support and encouragement. I hope you leave with the same sense of value and commitment to your work as what I receive from you.

Sprout Question: What is your favourite story about someone who has admired your work?

Important: If you want gift cards, calendars, photographic prints before Christmas, October is the time to place your order at http://www.redbubble.com/people/terrillwelch.

Original oil paintings can be purchased directly from me by sending an emailing to tawelch@shaw.ca .

© 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

Stuffed Ambercup Squash with Champagne

/ Terrill Welch / 15 Comments

The last day of September has arrived. Golden afternoon sun moves into the long shadows of the fir trees outside her window. Leaving the bed with its crumpled woolen throw and Barbara Kingsolver’s Orange Prize The Lacuna, she climbs the shallow steps up to the kitchen and looks at the orange Ambercup squash on the counter. She hadn’t planned to cook this harvest poster vegetable yet but there are shallots in the wicker basket beside it. She muses about the great handfuls of parsley in her kitchen garden. Then there is that beautiful plump sage over by the fence. Of course it will need some thyme and just a bit of rosemary. By now she has put on her oversized apron and garden clogs and is out in the potager gathering the herbs.

“We are having stuffed squash with shallots, apples and pumpkin seeds” she shouts up to where her husband is working on securing another deer fence at the back of the yard.

He straightens up with a grin that reaches right to the back of his soft brown eyes. He knows that she knows that squash is his favourite food. She grins back.

With a fist full of herbs she is back at the kitchen counter. There is only one way to safely take the head off of a squash. It is with a large heavy cleaver. If hitting the cleaver with the back of her hand doesn’t slice the tough hide of the squash, she resorts to using the rubber mallet from the tool shed to pound it through. This method has never failed her. Today no rubber mallet is necessary.

With the insides of the squash composted, she is ready to make the house smell like savory heaven. She is sure there is a garlic clove over in the garlic holder. Yes, there it is. Butter, lots of butter – well, first a little olive oil is drizzled into the well-seasoned cast-iron skillet. The garlic, shallots and herbs are chopped and ready. A few slices of that heavy multi-grain bread filled with seeds cubed will do nicely. Two small this-year Macintosh apples are sliced and added unpeeled. She eats three pieces of their tart flesh before they make it into the mix. Fresh ground nutmeg and some of that fresh ground allspice too.  Now let’s see… a few pumpkin seeds, maybe a handful. Finally some sea salt and pepper ground with wrist snapping vigor.

“That about does it,” she mutters to the kitchen wall.

Hanging up her apron she remembers wine. She has forgotten to buy wine.

Well, there are a couple of small bottles of champagne chilled that she was given by a friend in August for her birthday. Squash with champagne it will be.

Stuffed and the lid pinned on with large tooth picks, she places the squash on an old pie plate with a bit of water in the bottom and a piece of tinfoil loosely over top. The oven has been warmed to 350 degrees Fahrenheit and the timer is set for an hour even though she knows it will likely take a bit longer.

She thinks that maybe she should write out the recipe but what would she say? Seize a medium sized winter squash and a few shallots. Then keep adding ingredients until you find that you have closed the oven door. Done!

Sprout Question: Can you share your creative recipe?

Best of the weekend to you!

© 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

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Over eighteen thousand visitors

/ Terrill Welch / 20 Comments

Yes, over eighteen thousand creativity seeking visitors have been to see Creative Potager since the beginning of the 2010. To be exact, there had been 18,086 when I checked and 8:00 am PST this morning. After 141 posts and 2, 262 comments it is time to pause, celebrate and offer thanks to these regular Creative Potager supporters…

Laurie Buchanan: I don’t think Laurie has missed even one sprout question. She has faithfully come by and offered her heartfelt answer no matter what the question. Laurie has cheered, encouraged, engaged and inspired me to reach and stretched. We have been connecting online even before Creative Potager existed – in fact for years now. I consider Laurie a colleague and a friend though we have never sat across a table from each other in the same time and space. Thank you Laurie for being Creative Potager’s most regular sprout responder. You can read Laurie’s even day posts at Speaking from the Heart where there is a Colour of Wellness class under way.

Jeff Stroud: Jeff is here leaving comments and sharing almost as often as Laurie. He is a soulful and thoughtful photographer that never takes the easy road just because it is there. Jeff introduced me to the redbubble storefront through his photography a couple of years ago. Jeff has his own growth question for contemplation on each of his post at The Reluctant Bloger that will add another boost to your creativity.  He is a passionate practitioner of Julian Cameron’s The Artist’s Way.

Kathy Drue: Kathy is a blogger extraordinaire with her Lake Superior Spirit blog receiving 64,311 visits since the beginning of the year. She often appears on the front page of WordPress and is interviewed from time-to-time about her blogging experience. Writing is Kathy’s passion and photography her supporting anchor. I am proud and thrilled that she finds the time and interest to drop in to Creative Potager.

Sam Juliano: Sam, like Kathy, is part of the blogosphere elite with his Monday Morning Diary posts at Wonders in the Dark sometimes receiving over 2,000 visitors in one day. Oh! Fair warning, horror films are the focus of current reviews. Remember it is make up. Each week, from almost the beginning, Sam has visited Creative Potager and reported back with a live link to his readership. Not only that, he did a full interview post Artist and Nature-Lover Terrill Welch: Mayne Island’s resident ‘Creativepotager” this past August. Sam will always be noted in Creative Potager’s hall of fame for his generosity, warmth, intellect, and inspiration for the arts and in particular film.

Jerry Shawback: A self-portrait artist, Jerry doesn’t always leave one of his reflective and thoughtful sprouts but I find him everyday in my tweet stream. He is passing along the latest post or just mentioning Creative Potager as he goes about retweeting from his outstanding list of artist and writers. Jerry is one of the reasons that about 40% of Creative Potager visitors come from Twitter. Some of these visitors leave comments but many more simply read, then tweet the link out to their tweet friends. Jerry is an important part of that exchange. Jerry is another artist and painter that I feel a deep resonance with and you can see some of his work at his profile on TheWhole9 website. His dedication is inspiring and his work shows this commitment to daily practice.

Leanne Dyck: Leanne is a fellow Mayne Islander who takes every possible opportunity to send a “shout out” on her website OKnitting.com or on her blog Author Leanne Dyck about Creative Potager or my recent solo art exhibition. She leaves sprout comments as time permits as she is a full-time writer meeting deadlines for manuscripts and revisions with publishers. It is a joy and a pleasure to have someone who lives just down the street drop in online, connecting my virtual home with my physical home.

Kimberly Grady: Kim is a butterfly sprout responder that brings her transforming presence as she is inspired. It might be here or it might be a comment on Facebook but wherever she shows up, I am always glad to see her and enjoy her unguarded reflections. She may visit her blog Butterflies Are Blue if you leave a comment…but again, she just might drop by and comment on your blog instead. Whatever, happens I know Kim will be inspire you to be genuine, to be yourself and to be creative.

May I request dear readers is that you visit these generous and gracious  individuals and leave them a comment of thanks for helping make Creative Potager the inspiring garden of creativity that it is?

Thank you, dear friends, for hanging out with me in my creative kitchen garden.

Sprout Question: Who would be the top seven on your list of creativity supporters?

© 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

Break n Enter

/ Terrill Welch / 32 Comments

No it wasn’t my property, thankfully. But I’m sure these boat owners are not going to be happy when they discover these funny but smelly uninvited guests have trashed the place.

They’re caught red-pawed in the act. Handcuff those sea otter! (oops! I mean river otters. Special thanks to Ken Peterson from Monterey Bay Aquarium for the correction)

Photos were taken on the dock at Brentwood College in Mill Bay at 19 hours and 33 minutes on the 31st day of August 2010.

Sprout Question: What relationship does humour have to your creativity?

Note: My solo exhibition, Sea, Land and Time, opens tomorrow evening at 7:00 pm https://creativepotager.wordpress.com/2010/08/29/bring-your-cheque-book . And Creative Potager has a new page Artist Biography .

© 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

Sagebrush blue dawn

/ Terrill Welch / 13 Comments

I wake sleepily from disturbing dreams where I walk across a border crossing into the U.S. with plans to take a bus somewhere into a city I don’t know. Then miss the bus and it is dark.  The morning’s soft edges and my dream bring me back to earlier this summer and the high desert in Oroville Washington. There was a photograph I wanted to play with. Let’s have a look….

View full resolution and purchase print of painting here.

Can you hear the morning dove? Is the sagebrush perfuming your lungs with a slight hint of damp dust from the night’s thunder showers?

Sprout Question: How did you greet the dawn today?

Note one: Yesterday Sam Juilano, from Wonders in the Dark, posted an interview with me that if you haven’t already read you might want to wander over to Artist and Nature-Lover Terrill Welch: Mayne Island’s resident Creativepotager. Special thanks to all Creative Potager readers and twitter followers who have already been and commented. And an extra special thank you to Sam. Though I find it overwhelming to see my  ordinary life so extraordinarily presented, it has been fun.

Note two: Creative Potager has a new page Artist Biography and a post announcing my solo exhibition “SEA, LAND AND TIME.” Please share both as appropriate.

© 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

Red Umbrella and Wedding Photography

/ Terrill Welch / 18 Comments

Wedding photographer, Federico Vanoli, effectively uses a red umbrella to draw our eye across the frame and back into the gaze of the wedding couple.

Federico has graciously provided a few images for Creative Potager of my daughter Josie and her husband Ryan’s wedding. You see, I was too busy to take photographs that day.

There was the overseeing of the set up for the ceremony.

There was the strengthening of the thin thread for the clasp at the top of the wedding dress.

Just to name a few. But thanks to Federico and his assistant Jo-Ann, we do have some outstanding photographs. I am going to intersperse comments from Federicio (Fede) and then from Josie in between the images so we can savor the experience.

bridesmaid and estition with Josie

When Terrill asked me to write a bio as an introduction to the pictures that I took at her daughter Josie’s wedding, I went for: born in Italy, moved to Canada, living in Victoria. Surprisingly, that did not make the cut, so now I have to redo my homework.

Born in Italy, correct. I’m from a small town in the north, close to Milan. Love brought me to Canada.

I’ve been interested in photography since I was a teenager. I set up a darkroom (which means a room to work when it is dark out) in my parents’ home. I still find magic seeing a picture coming from a white sheet of paper. I’m still using black and white film for my personal work even if it is getting quite difficult to find places to develop it.

Josie with her brother Kris walking her down the aisle photo by Jo -Ann

Self taught, I then attended the Western Academy of Photography in Victoria, in 2009. That experience showed me how complex photography is. From a friendship with one of the teachers, the photographer and gallery owner Quinton Gordon, I got interested in documentary photography. Being an unobtrusive observer and a witness but at the same time having the freedom to give my personal interpretation, be part of a moment but not manipulate it—with this kind of approach I started taking pictures of weddings.

'the kiss"

Being part of a special and joyful moment is extremely satisfactory and rewarding. I like the intensity and the variety of the events, the emotions and the “real” moments.

Josie gives her bouquet to her grandparents who have been married 54 years

I would like to thank Terrill for giving me this opportunity to show some of my work and writing more than a sentence about myself.

Josie has this to say….

There are many aspects of Fede’s approach to our wedding photography that I liked. Before the wedding, he asked a lot of questions, listened well, and made notes.


Fede is quick, and stealthy, and I actually didn’t even notice he was there during the ceremony (but I saw him in other people’s pictures later). He is confident, but humble, and this combined with his happy demeanor was very reassuring (almost soothing) during a very busy day.

So if you have a wedding coming up and you are considering a wedding photographer, I recommend Federico Vanoli and you can reach him by email at balores17@hotmail.com

Sprout Question: If you were to write a biography about your creativity what would it say?

Note: Creative Potager has a new page Artist Biography and a post announcing my solo exhibition “SEA, LAND AND TIME.” Please share both as appropriate.

© 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