A distant detail of painting in progress

April 10, 2012 / Terrill Welch / 10 Comments

It is Tuesday and my larger painting of “Rainy Day by the Sea” has been “resting” since last Thursday. The long Easter weekend has come to an end and I have a long list of petty tasks to do. But first one must paint don’t you think?

Here is a 3 x 5 inch distant detail from the 16 x 20 inch painting I am working on. It was never intended to be viewed with such up-close scrutiny but I like doing this sometimes. The marks of paint only lightly suggest their subjects leaving lots of room for our imaginations.

SPROUT: What do you see or think you see in these fleeting strokes of paint?

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

Looking Over My Shoulder in the Studio (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
RAINY DAY BY THE SEA oil on canvas study by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)

RAINY DAY BY THE SEA oil on canvas study by Terrill Welch

April 4, 2012April 4, 2012 / Terrill Welch / 21 Comments

Do you remember my recent photograph of “In the Rain at Cattle Point Victoria B.C.“? Well, I have been musing about painting it.

I don’t often do a study before tackling a larger painting but I was painting and repainting a particular idea over and over in my head so I knew there were painting challenges I was having trouble working out. So this morning, I decided to do this greeting card size palette knife study on a 5 x 7 inch gallery wrapped 1.5 deep canvas.

(to purchase contact me via email: $150.00 – once it dries 😉

One of my aims is always to let paint be paint when I am working on a canvas. Nothing helps with this more than a palette knife. I have the most gorgeous, small and springy knife that was a gift from my parents when I was fourteen years old. I have a newer one but it just doesn’t have the same flexibility and the same balance as my first. Kinda like a good saddle, once you find one that fits you and your horse, or this case me and my canvas, a person doesn’t desire another.

I didn’t work out all of my painting challenges but I did find an answer to some and enough so to continue on to a larger canvas.

And none of you caught me in my error yesterday but the Studio Spring Sale Event doesn’t end until tonight. Sorry about that. Me and dates often have a rather fluid relationship 🙂 I have it corrected now.

SPROUT: What is your creative “study” practice in preparation for larger works?

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

THE SEA TO ME original oil painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
ROCKS AT SUNRISE original oil painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
REACHING THE SEA original oil painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
In the Rain at Cattle Point Victoria B.C. (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
New paintings by Terrill Welch in the Artsy Home online Gallery (creativepotager.wordpress.com)

The Story of the Nightgown and the Paintbrush

March 31, 2012March 31, 2012 / Terrill Welch / 12 Comments

The nightgown sighed heavily on the sales rack. Will she ever make up her mind? Calculating, calculating – I am a nightgown for heavens sake! How difficult can it be? I look like the other two she bought more than three years ago. I am white. I am cotton. I have no itchy lace. I am the right size. I am ON SALE. I am perfect! Still she feels and rubs me raw between her painterly fingers and hesitates. Ah finally. She is lifting me up and taking me carefully to the counter – still frowning mind you. But the decision has been made. There, $40.32, that wasn’t so painful, was it? If only I could get her to smile now instead of muttering that she really doesn’t need me.

The large bristle paintbrush laughed and shouted to all the other brushes on the art store shelf. Stand back boys. She is coming for me! I can see that glint in her eyes. I will put money on it. She will have me in her hand before the store door closes itself behind her. Yep! Here she comes. The paintbrush puffs himself extra bristly and tall.

The little brushes rolled their eyes and want to slap him silly. They have seen this before. An artist walks in and doesn’t even check the price tag on this boastful beast. They just pick up the big bushy brute and head for the counter.

They can hear the clerk heard saying “that will be $41.45 please.” The artist laughs lightly, hands over the cash. No, no a bag won’t be necessary. She puts the new brush in with her nightgown and is already thinking about the first painting she is going to paint with this sashaying dandy.

SPROUT: What buying habits are influenced by your creativity?

P.S. If you haven’t already, do dropped by and mused over or shared the link for the Spring Studio Sale as this artist has her eye on another dandy brush or two 😉

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

ROMANCING SUMMER BY THE SEA original oil painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
Coastal Winter Storm original oil painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
New paintings by Terrill Welch in the Artsy Home online Gallery (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
ROCKS AT SUNRISE original oil painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)

New paintings by Terrill Welch in the Artsy Home online Gallery

March 4, 2012September 18, 2014 / Terrill Welch / 12 Comments

Getting on with the painting of being an artist never seems to be an issue. But getting them out and available for you to purchase is as inspiring as sweeping cobwebs off the sealing. It is not that I don’t want them to be available for purchase. It is the tediousness of filling in all the boxes for posting that often has me saying to self “maybe I will just paint one more and then post them all together.” And we both know how that goes – one more becomes five more before I settle in to a quiet Sunday like today and start adding new work.

So just in case you have one of my original paintings on your “wishlist,” I now have a few more of my new paintings available on the Artsy Home online Gallery including this 30 x 40 inch oil on canvas –

REACHING THE SEA (Note: this painting is no longer available)

The full gallery of my original oil paintings currently available can be viewed at http://www.artsyhome.com/author/terrillwelch

Yes, there are still a few more to add. I am in the process of editing the photographs right after I post this for you. But there is one new one that will not be released until Wednesday. I promised to keep you posted 🙂

SPROUT: What is your very most favourite Sunday creative family rated activity?

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

GREETING DAWN original painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
ROCKS AT SUNRISE original oil painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
SPILLING OVER original oil painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
ORCAS IN EVENING original painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
WEST COAST SUNRISE postcard painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
MANAROLA WINTER AFTERNOON original painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
Coastal Winter Storm original oil painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
THE SEA TO ME original oil painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
REACHING THE SEA original oil painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)

WEST COAST SUNRISE postcard painting by Terrill Welch

March 1, 2012 / Terrill Welch / 10 Comments

This painting is a 4 x 6.5 inch oil on special paper postcard that I did for David Sandum’s #twitterartexhibit fundraising project. It will be going in the mail to Moss Norway as soon as it dries.

This project is an amazing collaboration between artist David Sandum, twitter artists and the Moss public library in Norway. This year the funds raised will go to support The Women’s Crisis Center in Moss, where abused women and children can get help. The center also provides a 24 hour phone-service, counseling, food and shelter etc. It but has lost a lot of funding the past year and the staff has been cut from 19 to 11. This is a very important cause, not only for the women in a crisis situation but also for their children.

If you are an artist, have a twitter account and want to participate here is the link for more informationhttp://davidsandumart.posterous.com/call-for-artists-2nd-twitter-art-exhibit-in-m

SPROUT: What is the tiniest creative work you have ever done?

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

REACHING THE SEA original oil painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
ROCKS AT SUNRISE original oil painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
ORCAS IN EVENING original painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
Coastal Winter Storm original oil painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
MANAROLA WINTER AFTERNOON original painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
THE SEA TO ME original oil painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
GREETING DAWN original painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
SPILLING OVER original oil painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)

GREETING DAWN original painting by Terrill Welch

February 8, 2012February 10, 2012 / Terrill Welch / 22 Comments

As the seagull tucks its head around the morning light sings out a warm greeting. This oil painting is 6 x 6 inches with a 2 inch wood cradle and is the smallest painting I have ever done. No frame required. This very small richly textured sunrise seascape is part of a new series “Squared to the Sea.”

GREETING DAWN would enhance a bedside, small bathroom wall, examining room or waiting area giving rise to serenity and peace.

UPDATE: February 10, 2012 This painting is now SOLD and off to Dakota U.S.

SEED: I am enjoying exploring this expanded sunrise and sunset palette of colours in both my painting and photography. I wonder what secrets these colours hold for us? Do they have a special place in our heritage of colour experience? I am starting with this children’s website for Weather Optical Illusions.

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

ROCKS AT SUNRISE original oil painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
Coastal Winter Storm original oil painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
THE SEA TO ME original oil painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
REACHING THE SEA original oil painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
SPILLING OVER original oil painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)
ORCAS IN EVENING original painting by Terrill Welch (creativepotager.wordpress.com)

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)

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)

SPILLING OVER original oil painting by Terrill Welch

December 2, 2011December 2, 2011 / Terrill Welch / 26 Comments

Do you remember back in early September when a following sea was making a grand entrance onto the shore? We had taken a long walk together admiring the arbutus trees and then the sea.

Well one of those photographs kept nudging at me to put it on canvas. So here we go.

From some very dark beginnings

I sketch in some guiding marks for the composition.

I begin to work in the primary forms.

If we look a little closer you can see these are easy and free strokes suggesting rather than predicting what is to come.

I build up the paint and enjoy the movement of water coming into the canvas.

At this point the canvas is getting too wet to do anymore.

Besides it had started to snow outside.

So I left the painting to rest and stuck it where I could keep an eye on it. Over the next week or so I would pick it up and work on it some more as it became clear what it was it was asking for. Finally, here is the finished piece.

SPILLING OVER 12 X 12 inch original oil on canvas painting by Terrill Welch

The painting is available for purchase in a new online gallery Artsy Home along with some of my other original paintings. Yes, you can now buy my work directly from this site using all sorts of means. Isn’t this grand? I will be adding more pieces very shortly.

Sprout Question: What is spilling over in your creativity?

Please note: It is December and I shall be on a vacation from regular blogging. You will still hear from me such a special holiday post and near the end of December I will be post a two year anniversary post for Creative Potager. Regular scheduled posts will then begin again the first week of January.

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

Not Much to See

November 28, 2011November 28, 2011 / Terrill Welch / 10 Comments

Sometimes when there is not much to see it still feels just right, particularly on Monday morning. I like to ease into the week still blinking away the coziness of the weekend.

It is an ordinary sort of morning down by the water and there is not much to see.

I like it anyway, the quiet, unimpressive business of ordinary life. The studio is about the same. I finished one painting but I still need to take a photograph. Then I started on another. As I have been saying, not much to see yet. But would you like to peek over my shoulder? Alright, but no comments about my painting apron only partially covering my nightgown. No complaining that it isn’t quite daylight yet, nor that I didn’t make everything pretty. It is a reference snapshot. It is also going to be a bit crowded but I think we can all squeeze in. Okay, okay I will show you….

Sam, can I get you to move to right so Leanne can see as well. Laurie I know you are excited but there isn’t enough room for you jump up and down right now. Maureen, you can come a little closer and squeeze in there on the left. Jeff if you come over by me I think you can see over top of Patricia. Shakeira, Sue and Josie… hum! Oh no! Here comes… we are just going to have to have another viewing when the painting is finished.