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I am pleased to report that my large landscape painting went splendidly (or maybe I just wanted to use that word?) and it is now pretty much complete. Unfortunately it is evening now and too dark to take a good quality picture, so I have scrounged up something else for you.
I know there are many many people out there pining over the last days of summer, wishing they could do just one more cannonball into the lake… so here is a sketch I did from my last lake visit:
Surface of the Lake, marker on paper, 9 x 12"
Yesterday my husband and I went for a bike ride in the morning and came across a meter-long snake a little thicker than my wrist coiled up on the road. Fortunately a truck was driving down the road at the same time and pulled over to inspect the reptile. The driver, clearly knowing what he was doing and what species he was looking at, picked it up by its tail and flung it gently to safety in the ditch. His twelve year old son was right next to him wide-eyed. “It’s a bullsnake!” he yelled cheerfully after us.
Later that day we made a picnic to eat in a state park. We pulled into a site and I made my way towards the picnic table. Then I spotted a note scrawled on legal paper held down by rocks. It read, “Black widow nesting under table comes out at night. Consider moving away rather than killing? Thanks”… It was night. Perfect time for a dinner picnic… and letting black widows crawl on your knees. We ate in the car and enjoyed the brilliance of colour through the windshield.
In this land of tough, rough, wild creatures it’s nice once in a while to focus on the gentle, non-poisonous kinds. Here are some ducks I sketched at Oasis State Park the day I spotted “Snakey“.
Ducks, watercolour on paper, 5 x 7"
Here is another painting in my new body of work on the theme of merging with the natural world. It is a lot more subdued and calming in person but I needed to photograph it with more light to catch the detail.
On the Pond, oil on canvas, 16 x 20"
On the Pond, detail
Zzzzzzzzzzzzz…
Sleeping Willow, oil on canvas, 16 x 20"
Here is the another painting along the same theme and narrative as the last.
Lake Blanket, oil on canvas, 16 x 20"
I’m working on a group of paintings (well, at least a pair of paintings): sleep-walkers, sleep-swimmers, sleep-paddlers caught in the middle of their dreaming when you wander out with a flashlight to see just where they’ve floated off to. To me these paintings are strongly connected with the paintings Cedar Falling and Desert Girl from yesterday’s post.
Today’s painting is a thank-you to artist Peter Doig, whose canvases fill my dreams on a regular basis. Who has painted many canoes, star-flecked skies and pudgy, dancing pine trees.
Thanks is also due to Canadian musician and poet Gordon Downie whose music and lyrics filter into my mind (and heart) on a near-daily basis. The songs Starpainters and Lofty Pines were particularly influential in the making of this painting, and the next painting that I will aim to post tomorrow.
Thanks also to my brothers who pasted the constellations with tiny glow-in-the-dark stickers on their bedroom ceilings growing up. And who continue to dream big, lofty dreams with white paddles flashing with silver…
Under Star Stickers, oil on canvas, 16 x 20"
And here is a detail:
Under Star Stickers detail
Today I needed cheering up, so I painted myself a picnic. A picnic on a lily pad, because that’s the way life should be some days. With the sun streaming down and flickering off the surface of the water, you crunch a dill pickle between your teeth and listen to the sound of water lapping up around your little luncheon raft.
Luncheon on the Lily Pad, oil on board, 10 x 10"
I’ve been busy touching up some paintings in my bear series (and making some miniatures to include!) in preparation for October’s show and haven’t had much new to post.
But summer continues, and enjoying summer on benches continues, and the lakes are still present and alluring… and I’m sure I’ll never run out of lake paintings to share with you.
Seniors on Lake, watercolour and ink on paper, 9.5 x 12"
Docked, watercolour on paper, 4 x 6"
Stormy stormy rain rain. It is not the best day for swimming… but sketching is another story!
Lake Sketch, Watercolour and ink on paper, 6 x 9"
