Plein air painting with the company of fellow painter Lena Levin

March 2, 2015March 16, 2018 / Terrill Welch / 2 Comments

Seven days and seven nights at a leisurely pace we ferried and drove down the west coast from our Mayne Island home in British Columbia, Canada until we reach Fremont California in the Untied States. The last 30 minutes coming in on the 580 and finding our way to 880 freeway were the most challenging. I do believe every cell in my body was on high-alert by the time we pulled up in front of our Airbnb rental accommodations on Thursday afternoon. There the car has stayed parked until we leave later this morning!

But this Gulf Island rural painter was gifted with rare dancing thunderclouds, early spring-green Fremont Hills and dramatic light for two days of plein air painting. Fellow artist, Lena Levin, took me to one of her plein air locations in the Quarry Lakes Regional Park both Friday and Saturday morning. While Lena worked on a couple of larger surface in oils that she will finish in the studio, I did small acrylic sketches for reference later when I get back home to my own studio. It was fine way to spend a good part of a morning and early afternoon.

Here is an early stage of Lena’s first painting on Friday with my small setup in the background.

I took the opportunity to capture Lena as she worked.

There is a steady flow from brush to palette to canvas with pauses like those in music before the rhythm begins again.

At times a kind of squinting concentration, that is familiar for me from the inside, crosses Lena’s face.

If you would like to learn more about painter Lena Levin and see more of her work, here is the link to her website: http://www.lenalevin.com . I deeply enjoyed the time we spent viewing and talking about her work in her home studio space. So, if you are interested in her paintings and are ever in the area, I strongly recommend connecting with Lena and scheduling a studio visit.

Looking from my easel in the other direction, we can see the first of three sketch I did over the two mornings.

“big clouds over the green Fremont Hills in California” 9 x 12 inch acrylic plein air sketch on gessobord

In the second sketch from the first day, I allow myself to just simple soak up the beauty of those Fremont hills as the clouds created moving patterns across their surface.

“In their best greens Fremont Hills California” 8 x 10 inch acrylic plein air sketch on claybord

On the second day, I only did one sketch and I spent so much time on it, I am not sure it can be called a sketch any longer, certainly not a “quick” sketch. I was just enjoying the spaces in between and the rhythms of the moving clouds and light so much that I stayed with it.

“willows by the Quarry Lakes Fremont California” a 9 x 12 inch acrylic sketch on canvas board.

There are some disadvantages to painting in an area for only a few days. My memory of Fremont, California will forever be referenced to this fantastic dramatic light on the brilliant green early spring hills and the good company of a fellow painter, Lena Levin. It is wonderful reference but maybe not very representational of this landscape overall. But you know what? I will take it and keep it as mine 🙂 This along with the most delicious and succulent free-range duck that we had for dinner prepared by Lena’s partner Eugene. Combined with rich conversation, walls filled with paintings, much laughter and enjoyment the memories are sustaining.

As many of you know by now, my David is NOT one for visiting. During the three weeks or so of our trip, we made plans to only meet with two people who have both in different ways been part of my online inner-circle for several years. So, I am also grateful for his participation and enjoyment of these visits.

While I pack this morning for our slow journey back up the coast of California and Oregon to our home in British Columbia, Canada – my glass of good-living is full. I have exceeded my expectations for this trip already. To those that gave us so many ideas for what to do in San Francisco and where we might like to stop in our travels along the coast, I thank you! We of course didn’t do many of these activities but in knowing what we could do it was a conscious choice. I am not sure if I will have the opportunity to post again before we return home but know that we are fine and poking along someplace on a windy highway along the coast heading north.

What are one of your own road trips that remain a sustaining reference for well-being?

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

A wild lighthouse chase over on Seven Devils Road and other stuff

February 24, 2015 / Terrill Welch / 6 Comments

The sun is rising all peachy and I have only a few minutes with a low connection so this is going to be quick. Our weather is holding on the Oregon coast it looks like for a bit yet. Here are a few captures from the last few days.

Smaller rocks on Cannon Beach

The brute on Cannon Beach which I walked for 45 minutes to get on the other side of for this portrait.

Sunset at Neskowin with a lone figure standing in awe at its beauty.

First light on shore at Neskowin.

Plein air painting a little later in the morning.

I was photographed by Penny Lulich while we were visiting and I was workin.

As someone commented “a nice place to have an office.” In fact, we liked it so much that we stayed an extra day and watched the sun come up again.

Threading a day at Neskowin Oregon

with a long walk up the beach.

But I did promise you lighthouses and a many devils road and we are about to get to that adventure after breakfast at the Hawk Creek Cafe. Well, maybe we will slip over at Seal Rock for a gander first.

So as you go through Reedsport start thinking lighthouse, any lighthouse will do but maybe start with Umpqua Lighthouse. Nope it is not out on a rock with waves crashing around it but high on a cliff behind a chain-link fence. Still it is a thing of aged beauty and it was time for bread and cheese and a stretch.

It was after, just as we navigated to the scenic route through North Bend that things got a little confusing. David says “what are you looking for?”

“A lighthouse.” I reply with complete confidence.

“Which one?” he inquires looking at the map.

“The first one.” I confirm. “Someplace near Charleston.”

The GPS is sending us through the city section in a maze of turns until we finally end up at Cape Arago with no lighthouse in site. But there are sea lions on the rocks.

And the view is spectacular

In fact there is a red dot on the far row of large rocks which I later believe to be the missing lighthouse. As we go back the way we came I see it once through the trees but that is it. There is no long access to it according to the section of our guide which I didn’t read until after supper last night. At this point David is weary of stop and go and is just as happy to see me punch in “Bandon” on the GPS. Off we go eventually along Seven Devils Road which I am sure was named to taunt lighthouse chasers. David has his eyes closed and doesn’t say a word as I get close to Bandon and turn left before the bridge after spotting the sign for another lighthouse. The wind is whipping up sand that sticks to your smile as soon as the door opens. David just turns a little harder into the passenger seat and pretends I am not getting out. I take a couple of shots of the abandon Coquille River Lighthouse but nothing pleases me in the early evening light. I give up and drive us back out and over the bridge to Bandon turning into old town looking for a place to stay. I drive right through and off on a side road that gives me a good view of the lighthouse which I am sure is the reason I just had to go this way. David opens one eye but says nothing.

I pull out the maps and seriously look for a place to stay. We decide on the Bandon Inn overlooking the old town and are not disappointed. We are given a lower than low season rate by a warm desk clerk for a lovely room with a continental breakfast. For my B.C. folks, it could just as easily be the Super 8 in Williams Lake but with a better view.

Today we should find our way through the Oregon Redwoods and maybe into Northern California. I do see a couple of lighthouses on the map at Crescent City…. shhhh! Don’t tell David. He is still sleeping and it might give him nightmares.

When was the last time you were on a wild goose – lighthouse – chase?

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

Three Painting Secrets Shared Over Tea

February 3, 2015February 6, 2015 / Terrill Welch / 10 Comments

Let’s light the wood cook stove in the outdoor courtyard while a gentle rain wakes nearby tree frogs.

While you are listening, I shall split some wood and set out the makings for tea.

There are a couple of cushions on the cob bench that are just right for us. Now, I mentioned a few painting secrets didn’t I? To refine this just a little – these are this particular artist’s painting secrets that I am referencing, not the generic painter from all genres and all times. Lastly, they are painting secrets only in if we haven’t yet taken the time to consider their relevance in relation to our painting language.

The first painting secret is to hold a tension between knowing and the unexpected. To clarify, I don’t really believe in divine intervention or creativity passing through me from some higher power. Admittedly, my conscious mind is seldom in control of my brush except as I begin and at the completion of a work – so possibly “belief” is irrelevant in this situation. However, I start with an intention. I choose a subject, a medium, a surface and an approach or painting problem. I decide which pigments to set out. This is the “knowing” part of the equation which is heavily influenced by frequent practice such as with this first of two acrylic painting sketches from yesterday.

“Arbutus tree in ray of sun” 8 x 10 inch acrylic painting sketch on gessoboard (update February 6, 2015: this sketch is now sold)

This painting sketch didn’t come out of nowhere. Even though it was painted in the middle of an indoor market day with not a glimpse of the foggy sea visible, the sketch is inspired by an experience from the day before.

While walking, a friend asks if I had done a painting of this particular arbutus tree. I reply – not yet – as I frame my composition – maybe tomorrow though – and the shutter releases. It is these slivers of moments overlapping one-over-another that find their way onto my canvases. How do I capture our relaxed ease which followed from lunch together and now an afternoon January stroll around a small piece of our island? What colours and brushstrokes will translate these feelings, this remembering? It is so much more than this arbutus tree hunch over the sandstone shore, where the sun catches and the fog shifts upon the sea.

This painting sketch is a first attempt to answer these questions. I really haven’t a clue what the answer is but I find I must set myself to the problem just the same. This is the “unexpected” half of the equation. I must move forward without knowing. I believe this is where some painters and creative beings feel they are merely a vessel for the work to come through. I am not convinced. The focus and full-body experience as the brushes move paint onto canvas is undeniable and yes possibly spiritual in approach. But I still claim awareness of my physical presence and leaning heavily on a large basket of experience both from painting and from life. The unpredictable combination of these elements is what is leads us to the unexpected. It is the tension between this knowing and embracing unknown possibilities that is important. To achieve results I must show up and practice my craft frequently. Relying on divine intervention will only get us so far. Then there is work to be done.

The second painting secret is finding precisely the intimate details that are essential. Then I paint these aspect with all of my senses and layers of brushstrokes to expose this specific intimacy. For a landscape or still life painter there is always movement even when it is not at first noticeable. This is because the earth is moving. This grants us a readily identifiable intimacy in our relationship to a precise aspect of that time of day, a specific season combined with our years of experience with this spiraling cycle. These years of experience I reference are is “noticing years” rather than “birth years” which is significant. Currently, with the amount of time humans spend in artificial environments, a person can go their whole life with little conscious awareness and possibly no interest in our earthly relationship in the universe. We must notice in a conscious way in order to deepen and strengthen our painting vocabulary of movement and the interrelationship of light and our subjects. I sense this to be true even in abstract work. The paintings of Richard Diebenkorn whose work will be shown at the Royal Academy in London England March 14 to June 7 2015.

Yet, though our urban surroundings mask our awareness to nature, it takes very little to awaken these sensory experience. Repeated deliberate observation is all that is really necessary. Take this second painting sketch “Steveston morning fog” an 8 x 10 acrylic painting sketch on gessoboard.

The fishing boats are important but they do not float on their own in the morning fog. They are imbedded in their surroundings and are experienced as small against a grand sky that touches right down to the sea. I made them even smaller in relationship to the sky for this reason than my photography reference information.

Maybe even too small perhaps. However, in this translation of my experience it is our human smallness in relationship to the sky and the morning light coming through the fog that was the intimate detail of significance.

The third painting secret I have to share is to release any notion of importance. We must take our work seriously of course but release any investment in a particular outcome of success, recognition or fortune. This doesn’t mean we relinquish these things completely but rather that they remain outside of the painting process and, as much as possible, outside of our lives in general. Yes, well-being is important. Yes, we desire and do much better with safe secure housing and nutritious foods. Yes, we need social appreciation and connection to varying degrees depending on our own temperament. But we need much less of what is defined as success, recognition and fortune than we are led through advertizing and media to believe that we do – particularly in North America. For example, my large old tea kettle has out lasted five electric kettles which I somehow thought were necessary. I gave up on the latter about three years ago. They were costly, environmentally unsustainable due to their continued need for replacement. But I had decided for some reason that the electric kettle was faster and easier to use. In reality not so. Water boils in about the same amount of time whether in the kettle on the stove or with the plug-in variety. There is nothing helpful about having this extra contraption on the counter. I had unwittingly replaced experience for efficiency which if I unravel brings us back to the notion of my importance. I had important things to do so the most efficient path was the one that was most desirable. Hence, I purchased a series of ill considered electric kettles.

Let’s explore what we notice if we value experience over efficiency as we prepare and drink this cup of tea because this old wood cook stove still makes a fine cup of tea though it will take us about three times as long by the time we get the fire going and the water boiling. When I am sitting here in the outdoor courtyard I have no trouble at all remembering that the earth is on its winter turn and half way to spring. I can almost feel the trees releasing the oxygen I pull deep into the bottom of my lungs. This awareness is far more valuable to my painting than the importance of a huge following on social media, a cover feature in a national paper or financial wealth. The turning of the earth, the trees, the following, the national article and financial wealth are all temporary – just as we are. Therefore, I suggest that our attention is best spent on insuring our minimal needs while affording us as much freedom to be aware of our relationship to our environment as possible. And here is the rub – insuring minimal needs may requiring marketing and selling the paintings that are rendered in these passages of freedom awareness we have created by attending to only our minimal needs. Still I will argue that success, recognition and fortune are not an adequate definition of a painter and are useless and possibly harmful aspect to attend to as an artist. They are distractions that defuse our attention from our own temporariness. Resisting mortality is futile. Success, recognition and fortune are temporary observations that spiral around through time, for only a short while. Then these observations, along with the physical paintings will disappear just a we did maybe a few hundred years before. We can’t cheat mortality and the effort to stall the inevitable interferes with what must be painted today.

With these three secrets, the waves can then roll as if moved by our breath.

(detail Sea and Stones French Beach 12 x 16 inch walnut oil on wood with 1.5 inch cradle)

The sky can open up as never before remembered.

(detail Sea and Sky French Beach 12 x 16 inch walnut oil on wood with 1.5 inch cradle)

Well, the last of my tea is cold and it getting dark. Time to call it a day. Before I go, I want to introduce a new blog by a fellow artist and colleague Lena Levin. Some of the ideas I have shared here Lena explores from a historical, academic as well as personal perspective at “Sonnet in Colour.” She recently introduced this new blog in her newsletter as follows:

There is this almost inevitable flavour of self-display in writing (and showing paintings) publicly, and I am extremely introverted — I really don’t want any self-display. Even now, a huge part of me would prefer to just shut up and go paint in solitude and silence. Or read something, or listen, or see. But there is also this feeling that Shakespeare, and sonnets, and paintings, and art in general — all these things often thought of as high-brow, inessential luxuries — are in fact urgently relevant to our day-to-day lives, even desperately needed. And maybe — just maybe — I might be able to share something which someone else needs; open some doors, show some pathways to what fills my own life with so much joy and happiness.

This is why I’ve decided to structure the site not just around the sonnets, or paintings, but around three themes, which — in one or another way — play a crucial role in everyone’s life: “Self and Consciousness”, “Love”, and “Time and Mortality” (with sub-headings to be added as the site grows).

I hope you enjoy reading her writing and viewing her paintings as much as I do.

Now, while I gather the tea items and carry them back to the inside kitchen…

What is one of your creative secrets?

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 Ordinary and the Painter

January 20, 2015 / Terrill Welch / 6 Comments

Our attention is called to focused on the grand, the absurd and the unbelievable while our everyday ordinary life is often trivialized and overlooked. I mean who hasn’t seen a clip about the predator who lovingly cared for dinner that was still a baby? Or a new discovery of a brilliant someone who was overlooked or found in an unexpected place?

So what is a painter’s life about anyway? Is it stylishly waving a brush across canvases in the studio? Or is it acquiring art collectors, collecting fans, preparing for solo exhibits, wishing for galleries shows and meandering museums? Is it dreaming of having work recognized and valued enough to make a thriving living? Well maybe, in a small part, it is these things. Mostly for this painter though, it is about tending to the ordinary. In my response to a long time blogging friend Laurie Buchanan’s post “A Twist on Impressionism” this morning, I said “I like to think that I am leaving an impression about the value of the ordinary – the things that we have the best chance of giving and receiving freely and in abundance like listening, laughing, kindness, caring, helping, sharing, observing, being present and being thoughtful.” But what does this really mean? As a painter how are these ideals expressed? What is it to tend to the ordinary?

Come for a walk or three with me and then we will come back to the studio and a current solo exhibit. We shall see if we can sort it out together.

First let’s ring the bell in the garden for attending to what is around us.

It could be the heavy mist hiding a view next to the trail.

Or a pair of reading glasses carefully hung in a tree for their owner to come back and find.

It might be a hand-knit mittens that warm small hands left on a picnic table.

Or it could simply be the winter light taking a sideways entrance into a Japanese garden.

Whatever it is that we attend to in our observation is occurring whether we notice or not. It is the ordinary everyday aspects of living. But we see them in fresh and frequently meaningful ways. The mitts reminded me of my childhood and the effort my mother put into making them for us. I desired to see them returned to their owner and placed the photograph above in a local private Facebook group. They were discovered on the post and retrieved by the owner. I have very poor eyesight without my glasses so a pair of reading glasses missing on an island where another pair can not be purchased sparked the inclusion of that image on the same post as the mittens. The image of the mist hiding a familiar view reminds me that no two days or moments are ever exactly the same and different does not mean less intriguing or valuable. This is reinforced by catching the lengths of low sun in the Japanese garden. Only for a very few minutes will it be there and then these tree too will slip into the background shadows.

But what do these experiences have to with being a painter of our natural environment?

Well, sometimes on a walk where this image was captured of the willow tree

I go back with my paints, paintbox and brushes to paint. But remember how I just noted that no two days are ever exactly the same?

Even though the fog is so thick that it settles in damp layers on my skin, I set up anyway and go to work.

In fact, it the humidity is so high that the acrylic paint won’t dry enough to allow me to layer it on painting sketch. So in the end, I know without a moments worry or hesitation that it may be less than an accurate translation of my ordinary everyday experience of the willow tree. But it is still the result we have isn’t it?

“Mayne Island willow tree in winter fog” still wet plein air acrylic sketch 8 x 10 inches

Back in the studio, I may visit the subject again. I will have my photography and my painting sketches for reference. Again, it may or may not lead to a successful final work but this we will both know – I have attended to an aspect of my everyday with observation, appreciation, curiosity and gratitude. It is a good day for this painter when this is so.

These collections of experience and memory are rendered in multiple layers using my full-sensory awareness of an ordinary day. This is what I wish to capture in my work. Here are three of the twenty-two paintings in my current solo exhibition at International Fine Art Collaborative – Zen Gallery curated by Sukhee Kwon that I feel are exemplary in this aspect.

Title: S t o r m . W a t c h i n g
Media: 30 x 40 inch oil on canvas

Title: T h e . R o a d .t o . t h e . W o r l d
Media: 12 x 16 inch oil on canvas

Title: B o w l . o f . W i n t e r . F r u i t
Media: 12 X 16 inch oil on canvas

Many of you know the stories between all of the 22 works in this collection but the sharing of these three here will do for now. My thanks to curator Sukhee Kwon for presenting my work so beautifully. Thank you for coming with me on an ordinary day, in an ordinary life of a painter.

What are you observing today in your ordinary life?

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 and Landscape connecting one brushstroke at a time

January 11, 2015January 11, 2015 / Terrill Welch / 7 Comments

Some days simply overflowing with humble gratitude. An unexpected belly laugh from your partner, child or a friend. The dampness of morning air on your cheek. Maybe it is the sounds of the tree frogs nearby that does it for you? Or an eagle hanging on a branch with a robust sea coming to shore?

What are those everyday experiences that remind you of your humanness and connection to nature?

Today my Art of Terrill Welch Facebook Page has 837 followers or “Likes.” Just so you know, when it reaches 1,000 I am going to auction off an 8 x 10 inch landscape painting sketch. It will be a new adventure for me though I have seen it done many times before. The bidding is done in the comments on the post and there is a small reserved bid to start. In order to comment one must have “Liked” the page. Do be careful though as it is easy to “unlike” a page you have already liked by accident

P.s. This is a snippet from WEST COAST EARLY EVENING WINTER SEA 16 x 20 inch which will be unveiled at my solo exhibition “West Coast Landscape as Home” April 3, 2015 at Camassia Café on Mayne Island, British Columbia Canada. If you are considering traveling to come to this opening, now is the time to make plans as it is the Saturday of Easter Weekend.

All the best of a fine Sunday to you!

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

Happy Fifth Birthday Creative Potager Blog

January 8, 2015 / Terrill Welch / 20 Comments

It has now been five years since the beginning of Creative Potager. Happy WordPress blog birthday to us!

What a journey we have had together!

(Open Studio is 24 x 30 inch oil on canvas and is a new work in the artist’s private collection)

This is the home of sharing this artist’s creative process inspired from her everyday life.

The underbelly of paintings are displayed in all their naked glory.

The design ideas for the fabric that covers these bare-bone canvases is the substance that has graced many of the 538 posts.

Photographs have captured long walks at home,

the rise of a super-moon

and meandering international travel.

And you dear readers have been so much a unique contributor through your comments and shared links. In this way, I feel Creative Potager is a community as much as it is blog. Thank you for being you. Thank you for your support, sharing and collecting of my paintings and photographs. More than 50 paintings and many more photography prints are now in private collections around the world. So, as much as Creative Potager captures a process, it also delivers results. You are so very much a part of making this happen.

But how can we celebrate today? Five years are a survival milestone for a blog and for a small business as an independent artist. How might we honour and recognize this moment?

Well, just as this blog is about the everyday life and work of an artist who frequently invites you simply to sit with her – maybe to celebrate we should do just that?

Feel free to pour a cup of tea and dig into the cookie jar while we reflect. Thank you for pausing with me. Thank you for celebrating this milestone.

Do you have a special Creative Potager moment or memory you would like to share?

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

Mayne Island Christmas Arbutus Tree Visit

December 25, 2014 / Terrill Welch / 9 Comments

I have a large wonderful family. At the same time, Christmas day is often about taking a long walk and visiting with the arbutus trees. Like my family, they are quirky, intelligent, talented, fun and precious to me. Early in January and the first part of February I expect to be focusing my attention, canvas and brushes on these beauty. So today I set about doing a few photography sketches.

Notice how they have found enough support to secure themselves over the bare sandstone rocks.

In this soft warm south exposure winter sunlight my eyes scale their length.

I walk along the ridges on the backs of the large stone surfaces marveling at how they have made space for each other.

The leaning and reaching for the sun is so pronounced in the character of an arbutus tree grove.

I sense that these beautiful trees understand belonging in a most comfortable and companionable way.

These are my Christmas Trees, naturally decorated and lightly lit with sunshine.

What is putting a glow on your Christmas Day?

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

Best of the Holidays to You

December 24, 2014 / Terrill Welch / 2 Comments

Each year is uniquely its own adventure. This year has been filled with travel, family, painting, photography, long walks and simple abundance in the most contented combination. Thank you for being part of my 2014!

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

All the Canvases are Taken but One

December 3, 2014 / Terrill Welch / 6 Comments

I woke this morning to do a review of my art supplies. I am down to one blank square canvas and I am out of lemon yellow paint and seriously low on a few other pigments. All the other canvases are taken and stacked several layers deep around the rooms – a few more than sixty of them in total.

You see, yesterday I finalized my commitment to a two month solo exhibition during the months of April and May at the Camassia Café on Mayne Island, British Columbia Canada. The relatively new venue is quickly becoming popular for its art and music shows as well as tasty, carefully prepared foods. The theme of my exhibition is “West Coast Landscapes as Home” and though I have plenty of work available for this adventure, I want to do a few specific and surprise pieces. I have at least six or so in mind. But these lack of supplies in the studio has me pacing the floor and trying to decide if I want to catch a ferry tomorrow and go to the city or see if I can find the canvases I need locally and manage with the pigments that I have. For a few brief moments I am frustrated with living on an island which feels like being stuck in the middle of nowhere when I haven’t carefully planned enough to keep my supplies well-stocked. I suppose this isn’t exactly true. What it really means is I have been putting off going to the city again for far too long.

But enough about this! I stopped my rant of private whining immediately following my reading of this letter sent from Vétheuil on the 17th of August 1879 to the doctor and art collector Georges De Bellio:

For a long time I have been hoping for better days ahead, but alas, I believe the time has come for me to abandon all hope. My poor wife is in increasing pain and I cannot imagine that she could be any weaker than she is now. Not only does she not have the strength to stand up or walk one step, but she cannot hold down the slightest bit of nourishment, although she has an appetite. One has to be at her bedside continually attending to her smallest wish, in the hope of relieving her suffering, and the saddest thing is that we cannot always satisfy these immediate needs for lack of money. For a month now I have not been able to paint because I lack the colours; but that is not important. Right now it is the sight of my wife’s life in jeopardy that terrifies me, and it is unbearable to see her suffering so much and not be able to provide relief… But I would ask another favour of you, dear M. de Bellio, which is to help us out from your own pocket. We have no resources whatsoever. I have a few canvases in the rue Vintimille; take them for whatever price you like; but please respond to my call for help and send us what you can. Two or three hundred francs now would save us from hardship and anxiety: with a hundred francs more I could procure the canvas and paints I need to work. Do what you can, in short; I told our landlady to let you in: so look at my paintings and buy them for whatever you like.

Awaiting your reply, I send you my best wishes.

Yours, Claude Monet

(reference: MONET by himself p.31 edited by Richard Kendall (1989)

A few short weeks later Claude Monet’s wife Camille died leaving Monet to care for their two sons and extended family members which included Alice Hoschedé and her six children. He was to turn forty years old on November 14th of the following year. By the end of this next decade Monet’s fortune did start to take a turn for the better and he was able to buy the house at Giverny and be free of financial worries. We also see his paintings during this period take up the themes that will remain part of his work throughout the rest of his career.

On this hopeful note, with not a health, financial or career worry of any notable concern, I shall be off to see what our local Dragonfly Gallery – purveyors of fine art supplies, craft materials, quilting needs, cards, gifts and faerie glamour – has for canvases.

What letters from writers or painters or other artists do you read for perspective and inspiration?

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

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Painting the Canadian landscape as home

November 27, 2014September 25, 2016 / Terrill Welch / 11 Comments

I have been asking myself about what home means. The answer may or may not be surprising to you. When does a landscape become more like home than nearby dwellings and their inhabitants? My conclusion is that the landscape, along with the seasons that influence it, help us organize our daily rural life. This is when “home” is expressed most clearly by the land, water and sky. The landscape is my first home. Dwellings and their inhabitants must fit within the expanse. Let’s unpack what I mean by this through the painting process of two recent landscapes.

The first is a Mayne Island landscape and starts with this “Mount Parke Trail study” 10 x 8 inch oil on canvas

I was looking for the tension in the landscape and wondering if it would be enough to hold it together on a larger canvas. The conclusion was that it would so a 30 x 24 inch canvas was set up and the work began.

With the study for reference, it was during the beginnings of this painting process that I began to dwell on the fact that I was more at home within our natural landscape than anywhere else.

I didn’t have a satisfactory answer at the time but it was the puzzle I was working through as I continued to shape the scene.

The finished painting TRAIL ALONG THE RIDGE 30 x 24 inch oil on canvas has been released today on my website Canadian Contemporary Artist Terrill Welch and can be viewed HERE.

The second painting is from my childhood home and where my parents are still living on the Stuart River.

I pulled a face even in the very beginning as you can see in this photograph taken by photographer Josette DeBattista in my home studio.

It is not the landscape itself I find challenging. The work started out in the familiar process of a light yellow ground to keep the later greens lively and a few quick lines for reference.

Yet, I was overwhelmed with memories that crowded the physical elements I was meaning to render. I went outside and looked in to see if that would help to sort things out.

But it didn’t really as photographer Josette DeBattista aptly captures through my concentration…

But the photographer leaves and I move the painting back up into the loft studio to keep working.

The painting is starting to shape.

But I stop with nothing more than the rough shapes on the canvas.

My notes for the day are as follows:

The difficulty is with the overlapping shifting of time through memories and my latest experience of this place along the river. Nothing seems to want to stay fixed long enough in my mind to complete a singular reference point. I stopped work on it at this early stage today and went for a long walk. Tomorrow I will begin again. I have decided to allow, partially because I seem to be unable to do otherwise, the layering of experience to this one specific landscape. The time frame spans about 44 years – not everyday after the first five years but at least a few times a year. This is part of the issue I believe. I have made up this scene in my mind during my absences so that it competes successfully with my physical visits. I seem not to want to paint either but some blend of the two. So, if in the end I can get something to work we may have a painting. We will just have to wait and see.

The next day it is so dark because of heavy rain I had to quit painting because I didn’t even have enough light with the daylight lamp. But shiny, wet and still incomplete and much farther along it seems…

The following day is equally as dreary and I give painting a miss while fussing over the fact that I will likely have to do some dry brush work as it is taking so long to complete.

On day four of doing not much else except either painting or thinking about painting this landscape it is Done!

STUART RIVER KICKING LEAVES 24 x 36 inch oil on canvas

Information about detailed viewing and purchase information is available on my website by clicking the image or HERE.

And so is the story that goes with it which will not be released fully with the painting but seems appropriate to share with you here.

This is another of my mystery paintings in that its realism is mostly a deception. I have included two detail images so you can get a better idea about what is going on.

The first of the poplar trees…

and this second one of the water…

Truthfully though, it is the layering all the way back to the yellow ground that gives this painting its vitality.

I suppose it may appear to be a pretty picture but it isn’t to me. Winters are historically harsh in this area. Snow is not far off and a day of kicking leaves means there is a good stockpile of winter wood. The larder is full and the winter vegetables put down. If this was when I was young, it would soon be time to dress in layers knowing I would still be cold and take my 22 rife into my grandfather’s boat along with our little dog Charlie Brown. You see, my grandfather was a trapper. I was his sharpshooter for muskrats. If they were plentiful, we would take a few this way rather than trapping them. I had to line up a bead on the head of the small animal right at the waterline in the moving riverboat. As soon as I shot and gave the nod, the small dog would jump overboard and bring the dead muskrat back to us before it sank. My aim had to be good because if it wasn’t the little dog could get pulled under by the diving animal and drown. This risk was partly due to the fact that Charlie wouldn’t let go and give up easily. This was his favourite job and he was a determined to do it well.

I don’t remember what the muskrat hides were worth a piece once they were skinned, the hides stretched and then shipped to the fur buyers. I do know that my grandfather never really had a regular job for wages very often and trapping and guiding were the family livelihood. This cash bought necessities like flour, sugar, salt, boat motors, pickup trucks, snowmobiles, canned peaches, raisins, honey, nuts, rice, lamp gas and mantels, ammunition, maybe a new axe if it was needed or a skinning knife. Oh the shopping list could also include material to make work shirts, or brassieres or maybe even a blouse or new sheets. But you get the idea.

So kicking leaves was and is a luxury between the tasks necessary to survive another winter. Yes it is beautiful with the last heat of the sun on your back and cool northern breeze on your face. But I can hear my father say – the leaves are not real pretty yet. Next week they will be better. Mom will leave a hint of a smile between her shoulder shrug, squint slightly as if seeing a moose or bear across the water. I will look just in case she has. Then we will all turn and continue back towards the house appearing to be in no hurry but already mentally deciding what needs to be done next.

So there you have it – my understanding of how landscapes are home for me.

What are landscape to you?

P.S. Happy Thanksgiving to all my American friends and readers! May your day be filled with appreciation.

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Creative Potager – Visit with painter and photographer Terrill Welch

From Mayne Island, British Columbia, Canada

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