art

Impermanence

/ Terrill Welch / 22 Comments

I share with you these pears dancing in the light of the sun coming through the window. But they are no longer there. We ate them. They were delicious. The photograph is history like all photographs has captured history.

(image may be viewed and purchased here)

Impermanence is difficult concept to viscerally accept. My limited understanding comes from Buddhist practices but it is an idea that has fascinated me since I was a small child and realized that turning of the earth gave me a glimpse of visually watching the passage of time. In fact, it is fair to say that expression of impermanence is a strong underpinning in most of my paintings and much of my reflective writing.  The Buddhist notion of impermanence is that all of conditioned existence, without exception, is in a constant state of flux. Here a section on the subject from wikipedia:

According to the impermanence doctrine, human life embodies this flux in the aging process, the cycle of birth and rebirth (samsara), and in any experience of loss. This is applicable to all beings and their environs including devas (mortal gods). The Buddha taught that because conditioned phenomena are impermanent, attachment to them becomes the cause for future suffering (dukkha).

Conditioned phenomena can also be referred to as compounded, constructed, or fabricated. This is in contrast to the unconditioned, uncompounded and unfabricated nirvana, the reality that knows no change, decay or death.

Impermanence is intimately associated with the doctrine of anatta, according to which things have no fixed nature, essence, or self.

Though I do meditate and go to the odd meditation retreat, I am not a practicing Buddhist. But there are times when I find that the Buddhist doctrine resonates and helps me to live a better life – with less suffering. Such a time is when the hard drive of my computer crashes beyond recovery. Some things were lost. Some things have been found in other places. I wasn’t and I am not particularly worried or grieving about any of these things.

What did strike me in a new way was the concept of impermanence. It was like I had been accumulating this understanding for years and all of a sudden I had a glimpse of it – just for a few days and even then only for a few hours at a time. I was able to experience impermanence beyond what my brain had constructed … it was tangible in the cells of my body, the earthquakes in Japan, David’s stroke, the birth of my grandchildren, the lines on the backs of my hand, and the daffodils in the woods.

(image may be viewed and purchased here)


This wasn’t a sense of peace and ease I was experiencing – I was terrified. My experience of the world, through my five senses, was no more permanent than the passing light between the trees. I was borrowing these experiences and stretching their presence through memory, writing, painting and collecting data on my hard drive. My thoughts go to Atlantis, the Egyptian pyramids, the ancient Greek poet Sappho – all passing moments in time with just a few fragments left visible through story, crumbling earth and fragments of poetry.  I grasp that my existence, my being, and my experiences are all expressions of impermanence. For a few moments, okay hours, it was hard not to hyperventilate and go screaming naked through the woods.

But after awhile I concluded, nothing had changed. These things were the same before I looked them squarely in the eye. My knowing did not chance impermanence – only my experience of impermanence.

(image may be viewed and purchased here)

This week I shall work on another painting. I shall do it with conscious awareness of my impermanence and its impermanence.

Sprout question: How does impermanence express itself in your creativity?

© 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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FIR TREE original oil paintings by Terrill Welch

/ Terrill Welch / 18 Comments

This week my hard drive crashed and it is not recoverable. Fortunately, most things were backed up and my photographs were on an external hard drive and most of them are backed up again on flash drives. I lost a few images but not many. Lucky! However, I did lose all my newer email addresses so if you have exchanged emails with me in the past year, and would like to continue to be in touch, drop a line and I will add you to my address book.  Somehow this all seems to be less of an issue now that we have facebook, twitter and such. I might even be persuaded to pick up the phone 🙂

I plan to write a more about this experience on Monday in a post called “impermanence.”

Now, let’s have a look at this week’s painting. I started out just going to paint a few edges but these two small canvases had a ground on them and were sitting beside the easel. Well I looked at the edges of another painting and I looked back at the two canvases. The 8 X 8 inch pair just had to be done.

I knew what I wanted to paint. We have been getting a lot of evening sun here with glorious gold light hitting the trees just before it leaves us for dusk.

Starting from “ground.”

A ground is different from a underpainting even though it may be the same colour. With a ground there is just a layer of paint that is put down with no intended painting blocked in or even in mind. Yes, I dislike wasting paint so these canvases were just too close to the last underpainting I was doing and they were grounded 😉

The painting took shape quickly.

I didn’t stop again until close to finishing.

When hung, the two paintings would be separated by a couple inches – I think, maybe more. Or they could be hung like this ….

This side by side is possibly my favourite.

Here they are trimmed up pretty with no distractions.

FIR TREE SKY original oil painting by Terrill Welch

FIR TREE POND original oil painting by Terrill Welch

I haven’t had a chance to decide if I will sell them separately or only as a pair. What do you think? Should they be kept together or be allowed to go into the world separately and be a surprise to some unsuspecting buyer that there is another half to their painting?

These paintings will be part of my upcoming solo show “Study of Blue” opening June 30, 2011 at the Oceanwood Resort here on Mayne Island.

UPDATE: FIR TREE SKY has been SOLD at the opening on June 30, 2011. FIR TREE POND has been SOLD to a separate buyer at the close of the show on July 27, 2011.

Sprout question: What keeps you rolling through unexpected events with ease?

© 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 walk to the blossom tree

/ Terrill Welch / 22 Comments

The sun had slid into home base just add of dusk. We decided that a walk would do us good. Besides, there is a neighbour’s tree I want to photograph while it is in bloom.

On the way, David spies these bird houses in the sun. I am smitten with their brightness against that aging wood of the building.

We must walk quickly now as the sun is already catching treetops between the shadows.

Ah, there it is.

We are a little late but it is still lovely. What a lot of blossoms!

Let’s see if we can find just a few for a close up.

Great fun. A little closer maybe?

Oh yes — one of my blossom photos is being used for the poster of Cherry Blossom Festival in Abbotsford British Columbia. This city of about 120 thousand is hosting a sister-city project to raise funds for Japanese relief. I am honoured that they requested my photograph to promote the event.

(view or purchase the photo in this poster here.)

There is a little credit running along the right side of the photo that has me grinning every  time I notice it 🙂

My intention this week is to paint the edges of my paintings that are already finished. I moved the rhubarb to a sunnier location yesterday and while I was out there I saw a few other things I want to get started on. This musing time – as I am doing these things I will decide on my next big painting.

If you get a chance, stop by my new Online Gallery at http://terrillwelchartist.com

I wish you a blooming good time this week.

Sprout question: What is blooming in your creative garden?

© 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.

SALISH SEA 4 original oil painting by Terrill Welch

/ Terrill Welch / 14 Comments

I am introducing the painting process of SALISH SEA 4 with a quote from Elizabeth Rosner’s book Blue Nude published in 2006:

It was what he admired about Bonnard, or at least what he loved about the famous stories in which Bonnard was applying paint to works already hanging in other people’s houses. Something about never letting go, always feeling there was one more stroke to be added, one more note of the Unfinished Symphony. As if even death wouldn’t be the ultimate form of completion but just another stop along the way.

(p. 58)

The underpainting that is the foundation of this 24 X 48 inch canvas was included in Monday’s post “The Breath of Stones.” There are 10 images in today’s post capturing the beginning to end… if there is one… of creating SALISH SEA 4. I will make an effort to be brief but there seems to be much to say.

They are a little hard to see but the top right paints are French Ultramarine blue and Viridian. These two colours will play prominently in the development of today’s painting. I sometimes use my own photographs for painting reference but I am not known to “paint” a photograph. I often take several reference images for paintings — similar to how artists used to sketch and then use these as reference for developing a painting when they got back to the studio. Though sometimes a painting may be close to the reference image, the photographs are meant to influence and guide but to not to be copied. Otherwise, I might as well keep the photograph and print it on canvas …. and sometimes I do just that!

Are you ready? She’s a bit bright but here we go …

A gray beginning and it doesn’t look like much yet.

I am using mostly a 2 inch brush here. My aim is to keep the painting loose and flowing. The small palette knife you see there is just being used for mixing. Now to add a little teal blue.

Working for a long while and equally using a #10 brush, along with my 2 inch brush,  I get basic elements of the painting in place.

A part of me wanted to pause right here and not go any further. But after a break I decided to keep working.

Picking up the large 2 inch brush again I whisk paint onto the canvas in big strokes. The sea is rolling in and I am riding each wave. If you remember my challenge was to bring the viewer into the painting from the top left and move their eye forward and down to the bottom right. See at the end if you think I have succeeded.

I have started working with three different large palette knives to build up selected texture. Then I add some highlights but the painting is saturated. There is a glare from bright sunlight and my body and being are tired.

It is time to stop – for now.

Over the next two days I spend a few hours adding a stroke here and there. I brighten up areas that have become muted from painting wet on wet. Mostly, I observe, feel, breathe and let it be.

Then on Thursday morning I started in early painting and had it finished in a couple of hours.

Well, almost… I think!

SALISH SEA 4, a 24 X 48 inch cotton canvas original oil painting by Terrill Welch. This painting will be shown as part of solo summer exhibition opening at the end of June. If you are interested in purchasing in advance of the show please contact me directly via email at tawelch AT shaw DOT ca .

This is one painting dear readers, that I suspect more than one of you will be completely enamored with an earlier version. But that is how it goes when you are privy to the creative process of a painter.

I dedicate this painting to French Impressionist painter Pierre Bonnard (1867-1947) who also favoured using violet in some of his painting.

SALISH SEA 4 is definitely another stop along my way.

Sprout question: How is your creativity just another stop along the way?

Happy April fools day and best of the weekend to you!

News Flash: Introducing Terrill Welch’s Online Gallery at http://terrillwelchartist.com (okay it is a small flash… there is still a lot of inventory to enter but it would be great to hear what you think)

© 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

Impression of an Artist

/ Terrill Welch / 24 Comments

Week after week I visit myself on the canvas of a painting, through the frame of an image or between the words of a paragraph. Do these impressions provide any further insight into my being and my interpretation of my world?

I like to think they do. I like to believe that these creative endeavors cast at least a shadow of truth on what I often think of as my core essence – that part of me that isn’t body or earth-bound in this life time. But is this really a possible truth?

As the paint is chosen, mixed and applied without thought, I like to believe there is a subconscious part of me that knows what it is doing. But maybe it is all accidental fragments of my conscious mind colliding with the paint, the canvas and the movement of my brush.

I am doing a study of blue – a series on the shades of blue. What I am discovering is that blue is more than a colour. Blue is a spiritual void for reflection… as I paint the sea… the shadows of the trees… or the sky. If I had known how wide this void would open up, would I have committed to the series?

Ah, no point in musing about what might have been.

This week I have one 10 X 12 inch cotton canvas underpainting ready for completion. In my imagination the heavy clouds press down with formidable force over the dark seas. May I be able to hold this moment long enough to reach in and pull out something that is the essence of me, of you and of the very world itself.

Sprout question: What impression best describes your creative self?

© 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

Salish Sea 3 original oil painting by Terrill Welch

/ Terrill Welch / 14 Comments

From start to finish a painting often has many pauses. Salish Sea 3 is a prime example as this small 8 X 10 inch seascape oil painting took two weeks from start to finish – mostly “resting.”

I begin as usual by working the underpainting.

In this series of paintings I have been inspired to paint the sky first and work into the picture from this vantage point. This isn’t a usual approach from me but it is what has been happening for the past two paintings. So we will go with it.

Next I start building up the blues.

As I continue to work a context is created for the painting to begin to breathe on its own.

Sorry about the bad photograph. I was having trouble with some glare from the light coming through the window of  the studio. Note to self: holding a painting and photographing it is not a useful strategy to resolve glare.

I begin to find my way into the painting – it is like running your hands over your bedding in the half-light of early dawn. You know where you are but there isn’t enough light to see beyond a few vague familiar shadows.

This is most often the place I pause. There is an excitement that rises from my bones and spreads up to the hairs on top of my head. I watch and wait sometimes only for a moment, sometimes stopping for tea and sometimes stopping until the paint dries. Today it was only long enough for tea. I wanted to work in the waves wet on wet.

Now it is time for a rest. It is a rest that last for nine days. I puzzle and muse. I move the painting around to different locations. I sleep on it. I glower at it. The painting is “okay… I guess” but it doesn’t have the SNAP I would like it to have. Finally, I decide what it is and what I need to do. A couple of small changes really. I will leave you to discover them if you choose. Or you can simply enjoy the finished work.

Salish Sea 3,  8 X 10 inch cotton canvas  original oil painting by Terrill Welch.

This painting will be shown as part of solo summer exhibition opening at the end of June. If you are interested in purchasing in advance of the show please contact me directly via email at tawelch AT shaw DOT ca . The price of this work is $280 Canadian unframed.

As for my other intentions, I started another underpainting but the taxes and tune up for Miss Prissy had to be rescheduled for next week. As my father would say “it’s just the way the cookie crumbles sometimes.”

But this is far too light-hearted as I pause for a moment send light to Japan and all areas experiencing the impact of the 8.9 quake and tsunami. This post was written before I heard the news last night on twitter about an hour after the earthquake off the northeast coast of Japan.

Sprout question: Where might your creativity need a pause?

© 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

slow start but rolling

/ Terrill Welch / 18 Comments

Ah, to sleep in on a Monday morning after a full weekend.

Oh my gosh.

Does it ever get any better than this?

We even caught some sun on a 5 km stroll along the sea.

Life is good.

Now it is time to get back to work.

This week I must get my books and paper work to the accountant so the taxes can be done. While I am in town, Miss Prissy (my 1991 Ford F150 4X4 pick up) will be scheduled for a check up.

There are also some unrelated-to-art projects in a crucial stage that require my full attention.

So with this in mind, my intention for the week is to finish one small painting I started last week, do the underpaintings for a couple of tiny canvases and pick up some large canvases when I am in town. We shall see. Friday will tell the story.

Sprout question: What are you glad you set aside this week so you could play at life?

© 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

ONE original oil painting by Terrill Welch

/ Terrill Welch / 18 Comments

In a studying the shades of blue this painting of ONE has been the most demanding so far. It required the ability to work with four different blues to create the rich depth and reflections. I have little to say other than I am pleased with the results.

Palette for ONE

Beginning to work the underpainting

Working it a bit more.

Starting to get a feel for it.

Many hours later.

Making some minor corrections and time for a rest.

I came back to the painting the first thing the next day and finished it…. ta da!

ONE 24 X 36 inch cotton canvas original oil painting by Terrill Welch

This painting will be shown as part of solo summer exhibition opening at the end of June. If you are interested in purchasing in advance of the show please contact me directly via email at tawelch AT shaw DOT ca . The price of this work is $2,400 unframed.

UPDATE: Painting is now available in the ART OF DAY online gallery HERE.

Sprout question: What creative work is currently pushing you to the edges of your abilities?

NOTE: Last evening my original oil painting WHISPER sold to a couple in celebration of their wedding anniversary. I’m happy see it going to a most loving home.

© 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

STORM COMING oil painting in progress

/ Terrill Welch / 23 Comments

We have been issued a wind warning by Environment Canada this evening: Sustained southerly winds of 70 to 100 km/h with peak gusts from 100 to 140 km/h will develop Wednesday morning. So if you don’t hear from me for a bit… it is only because the electricity is out.

I was going to post this painting on Friday along with another I painted this week. But the title of this painting is “Storm Coming.” I decided it would just have to be a Wednesday painting post. Seemed like a perfect day to share its progress.

Starting with the most yellow orange underpainting

I carefully selected a few colours. I’ve decided to capture my palettes for each painting and thought you might like to see.

Everyone has their own methods of organization.

I am not big on organizing my paints in a certain way. I think about what I am going to need and organize them in a manner I will use them.

For example, I am left handed and often work counter clockwise on my palette. Generally I work the whole canvas at once but this painting developed a little differently.

I chose my main brushes and palette knifes often having two brushes and a palette knife in my hands all at the same time.

STORM COMING 8 X 10 inch cotton canvas original oil painting is resting. It may be ready by Friday but maybe not.

Sprout question: What creative storm might be coming your way?

© 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

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Dance with Me

/ Terrill Welch / 16 Comments

Dance with me calls the blue, blue sea.

(image may be purchased here)

Invitation accepted.

(image may be purchased here)

Caught in the arms of the blue sea I am swept across the shoreline – stepping, reaching, giving….

I have an idea for a series of smaller paintings exploring the many shades of the blue sea. These two images keep coming to mind but there are others.

However, my intention this week is to take care of art business. There are new phtography prints and paintings to inventory, a new portfolio page to develop and such things. I may start on some new paintings but that is not my intention. We shall see. Friday’s post will tell the story.

Sprout question: How do you keep your balance when the creativity waters are running fast?

© 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