For the Love of Brown-Eyed Susan

January 9, 2012 / Terrill Welch / 10 Comments

The gray and rain of January give a person a chill that can only be warmed by thinking of summer while sipping a hot cup of mint tea. This and a photograph of a clump of Brown-Eyed Susan taken during my August trip to Saturna Island are providing a zing to my Monday.

These beauties were in the lush garden of the Saturna Lodge B&B.

SPROUT: What are you doing to warm-up from the winter chills?

P.S. MY original oil painting STORM COMING is on its way to a new home in Ohio today. I will miss it but I know it is going to a very good home.

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

Mayne Island Dawn of 2012 (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
THE SEA TO ME original oil painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
Saturna Island in September (creativepotager.wordpress.com)

Abstract Sensing

January 6, 2012 / Terrill Welch / 10 Comments

Sometimes nature delivers the finest abstract compositions such as yesterday late in the afternoon at Georgina Point on Mayne Island. We only had a few moments of sun but they were a nice reprieve from the gray and rain of west coast winter. I was glad I was there, camera-at-the-ready, to take this photograph.

Good morning, happy Friday and the best of the weekend to you!

SPROUT: What natural abstract composition has recently caught your attention?

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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

PRECIOUS SECONDS – Mayne Island in paintings and photographs (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
Mayne Island Dawn of 2012 (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
THE SEA TO ME original oil painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)

THE SEA TO ME original oil painting by Terrill Welch

January 5, 2012November 7, 2013 / Terrill Welch / 6 Comments

Fresh brush strokes, loose and easy, flow onto the canvas of a new painting.

Lusty dank seaweed brings its dark beauty to the summer sandstone shores along the inside passage on Saturna Island. My hand remembers.

The painting swells towards completion and then seems to drift and with an unexpected unsettledness. Incomplete and shifting on the canvas, I leave it for weeks sharing only a detail.

I approach it again – defining the sea and softening the mountains into a grander relationship between sea and sky – closing in the view and leaving a greater sense of more to see beyond the edges of the canvas. Finally the painting seems to settle. However, I suspect it may always seem just a little restless, inviting the viewer into the ripples at the water’s edge with one eye skittering off to the distant mountains, then back to the rocks in the foreground.

THE SEA TO ME 12 X 12 inch oil on canvas

(Original painting is now sold. Print available HERE)

SPROUT: What are you leaving unsettled for future competition?

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

Begin 2012 with what you have – oil painting in progress (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
SPILLING OVER original oil painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)

A painting starts with a humble beginning – reminding me of Séraphine

January 5, 2012January 6, 2012 / Terrill Welch / 12 Comments

Darkness is settling heavily down on an already soggy afternoon. I have worked with my daylight lamp most of the day, finishing a painting and then touching up a new one and an older one. Now, I am roughing in a 30 X 40 inch oil on canvas tentatively called REACHING THE SEA. Each painting starts with a humble beginning, filled with hope and possibility. I love this stage. It is easy to put expectations aside. Later I will have to be firm about staying in the process but not now.

It doesn’t look like much yet and as I struggled to get quick shot of it to share with you, I wished for more light. For some reason, this reminded me of the French Artist Séraphine Louis, also know as “Séraphine de Senlis,” who would work during the day as domestic worker – and then she would paint by candle light late into the night. She also had to find and buy the ingredients to mix her own paints. At this moment, I hug my digital camera and give thanks for my daylight lamp, my prepared paints and canvas, and the luxury of being able to focus just on my art.

SEED: Who is Séraphine de Senlis? I first became acquainted with her through the 2008 French film Séraphine directed by Martin Provost. Sam Juliano from Wonders in the Dark was the first to bring the film to my attention. Yolande Moreau is brilliant as Séraphine and the film won seven French Cesars (Oscars). But who is Séraphine – the artist born in 1864 and who died in a mental institute in 1942? I am off to find out!

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

SPILLING OVER original oil painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
Begin 2012 with what you have – oil painting in progress (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
SEA AND CLOUDS original oil painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)

Singing Seas with Tafoni Rhythmic Response

January 3, 2012January 3, 2012 / Terrill Welch / 16 Comments

The musical voice of the sea is forever calling me to its shores. Sandstone, washed and shaped by the tidal chorus, seems to hold the notes of the sea in rhythmic response. The small holes in the stones are called “tafoni” – such a beautiful smiling kind of word.

(image is available for purchase HERE)

SPROUT: What are you listening to singing its sweet natural song today?

SEED: Have you ever wondered about what makes these fascinating holes in the sandstone and other rock formations? They can be found in many places in the world not just here on the southwest Coast of Canada. I didn’t the formation of the holes had a name until quite recently. I am not sure if it has been decided just exactly how or why the holes exist in the patterns that they do. Here is a link to a lengthy explanation by Nick Doe http://www.nickdoe.ca/pdfs/Webp26c.pdf Whatever the reason or the means by which the rocks are as they are – I love them!

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

Oh How the Sea Calls to Me (sincitygirl73.wordpress.com)
Mayne Island Dawn of 2012 (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
SPILLING OVER original oil painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)

Three Mayne Island photography landscapes go to Vancouver

January 2, 2012January 3, 2012 / Terrill Welch / 2 Comments

The year of 2012 has started out on a high note here at la casa de inspiracion. A new collector of my work will shortly be receiving three extra-large approximately 20 X 28 inch photography canvas prints to complete the remodeling of her home in Vancouver. Shall we have a look to see what she has chosen for her walls? Yes? I though you might say that.

MIST

(image is available for purchase Here)

ARBUTUS STRAIT OF GEORGIA

(image is available for purchase Here)

and the ever popular…

TRAVELING INTO THE MIST

(image is available for purchase Here)

SPROUT: If you could collect anything you wanted what would it be?

SEED: Have you ever wondered how I define “a collector of my work?” It is someone who has three or more pieces of my Fine Art. It could be three or more photography prints or three or more original paintings or a combination of both. Here is a link that I recently wrote for my Google Plus – Terrill Welch Fine Art page about buying an original painting https://plus.google.com/115927302973552189234/posts/aVAcdo661WE The same advice holds to be equally true for photography Fine Art. In addition, I would like to suggest this fantastic article by art consultant, advisor, author, and independent appraiser, Alan Bamberger, “How to Collect Art Like a Pro – Building a Collection.” It is like an advance course in learning how to buy what you love.

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

Studio Tour Tomorrow (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
PRECIOUS SECONDS – Mayne Island in paintings and photographs (creativepotager.wordpress.com)

Mayne Island Dawn of 2012

January 1, 2012January 3, 2012 / Terrill Welch / 32 Comments

My first photograph of 2012 is taken before daylight as I scramble out over slippery rocks to the edge of the surf at Reef Bay on Mayne Island.

Unlike other favourite photography location in the world. I am the only one there. Not even a dog barking in the distance – just me and sea waiting to greet the day.

Sometimes a person must search for signs of dawn in order to be sure of the specific point of its arrival. It is not time yet but soon.

The lights of Vancouver are starting to fade in the distance from where it hunches below the cloud-covered coastal mountains. A softness surrounds the breath of this new day.

With each rolling wave the moments pass through my camera shutter. The sun has not quiet risen but with fingers stiff from the cold I press down to capture the first light on the sandstone shore.

Is this it? Could this be the moment we are waiting for – the dawn of 2012?

Possibly but let’s just wait a little longer.

Ah yes, there is a soft light starting to soak into the heavy clouds over the mountains.

A full dawn has come to Mayne Island.

Only twenty minutes have passed from the first rock we admired and we are now enjoying the richness of our first dawn in 2012 here on Mayne Island.

As we watch the brightness recedes into the soft reality of an overcast day January 1, 2012 here on Mayne Island off the southwest coast of British Columbia Canada.

SPROUT: What is the first thing you noticed about your first day in 2012?

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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

PRECIOUS SECONDS – Mayne Island in paintings and photographs (creativepotager.wordpress.com)

Begin 2012 with what you have – oil painting in progress

January 1, 2012 / Terrill Welch / 8 Comments

I am hoping to get down to the seashore for dawn but the rain has arrived first. So, refusing to be left empty-handed on the first morning of the year, I have decided to share a detail from a painting in progress.

The over all painting is still not settled on the canvas yet but I like this part of it.

SPROUT: Do you find this sometimes too – where a detail may even become the finished work?

In this case, I think the complete 12 X 12 inch canvas will come together but we shall have to wait and see.

Wishing us all the most inspiring, imaginative, creative and successful 2012!

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

Studio Tour Tomorrow (creativepotager.wordpress.com)

Toast is Best

December 31, 2011 / Terrill Welch / 8 Comments

This young fellow has been my early morning breakfast company for the past few days. We love our organic, heavy, wood-oven baked bread, toast in the morning. With both of us being natural morning people we have even left mom and dad sleeping on occasion.

Wishing everyone a safe and Happy New Years Eve.

Sprout: Who is the newest person in your life you are enjoying getting to know?

Reference: http://www.ibiblio.org/wm/paint/auth/gogh

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

Nothing Heavier and calling on van Gogh

December 28, 2011December 28, 2011 / Terrill Welch / 12 Comments

There is nothing heavier than west coast winter clouds that reach down and touch the toes of the earth for days. It is a never-ending dull dawn that is late coming and then softly sinks back into night sometime after lunch. A person can lose perspective and become disoriented as she waits and waits for the sun to make an appearance. But for now the curtain is down. Slightly disgruntled and a little restless, she slowly turns the pages in her book.

Good morning… I think 🙂

Sprout: When was the last time you saw the sun? Tell me, how is she doing?

Seed: Perspective is so much more than the relationship between the things on the canvas. I want to paint but the thought of all that gray showing up is enough to leave the paint brushes in the jar for just a wee bit longer. Maybe I will go hang out in Vincent van Gogh’s “Olive Trees with Yellow Sky and Sun” painted in 1889. Just look at those brushstrokes!

Reference: http://www.ibiblio.org/wm/paint/auth/gogh

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