I'M HEADING OUT TO NEWFOUNDLAND THIS SUMMER TO TEACH! ARE YOU COMING?

If you want to learn the basics of how the old masters painted, how to paint in oils in a very health friendly way, and you have always wanted to come to Newfoundland...well, this is the course for you! This 5 day art retreat workshop is a condensed course. I will teach you the basics of Renaissance glazing processes utilizing my newest teaching methods designed to slam-dunk the learning curve on light structure quickly and effectively. You will fine-tune your skills in: colour perception and mixing, rendering, value perception, light structure, brushwork and depth illusion. It creates valuable skillsets for any artist and is suitable for rank beginners to artists with very advanced skills. 

To get to English Harbour, on the magnificent west shore of Trinity Bay, car rentals are available at St. John's airport.  Taxi service can be arranged to English Harbour for a nominal fee, if you are not going to be renting a vehicle. There is ample accommodation of all kinds and formats available within a short walk or drive of English Harbour Art Centre. Accommodation can be booked independently or it arranged for you to share facilities with other students.  Grocery stores are nearby, not to mention easy availability of lobster and untold variety of FRESH seafood! This is opportunity for an experience of a lifetime.

Please contact Deb Wickwire for general information on English Harbour, the Art Centre, taxi service information or for help locating the best local accommodation for your needs. Her number is:  860-558-0449.

Check out the English Harbour Art Centre facility at: http://englishharbourartsassociation.com

Please contact me via this website contact page to register or get more information about the course.

Hope to see you in July!

JUST FINISHED! "INTIMATE CANOPY, GULL RIVER"

I am glad to say that I am finished painting, "Intimate Canopy, Gull River". This has been a wonderful challenge, and is the quintessential subject-matter for glaze oils. I was able to have a field day with the colour qualities that can be so wonderfully manipulated with glazing. Some colours called for a rich and glowing hardness and others ever so subtle echelons of diffused softness.

I find shards of light within water a transfixing thing to watch. I could sit by the water and watch them all day (and, actually, I have - many times). I love their lightning rhythm, dancing light and incredibly diverse and beautiful morphing shapes. They fill my heart with awe, delight and a profound peace. I have wanted all my life to "catch" them both with my eyes and with paint.

If you are interested in purchasing "Intimate Canopy, Gull River", you can contact me here through my website. It is 36"x36", glaze oil on a gallery canvas.

SO THIS IS WHERE I SHARE MY WONDER

You might have guessed it – I am a Christian. I try not to be in people's face about it, but there it is. It is a fact. I attend Walton United Church in Oakville, ON.  My faith bubbles out throughout the minutes of each day, permeating the dough of my life. But, I do try not to be in people's face about it.  It is kind of a personal thing. But it is such a very quietly huge personal thing for me. It is my inner joy, calm, musing and direction. It is also that which I just cannot contain - my WONDER.  My awe of this world, universe and the Maker of it all, spills out into my art-making, writing, musing and activities. 

 When I sit in the sanctuary during one of the amazingly poignant services at Walton, the wonder of faith ricochets around in my mind and soul.  I cannot believe my good fortune in having this relationship, this life, this certain path – this unfathomable friendship with God.  So, Walton United Church is where I share my wonder. That is, when I am not somewhere making art or expressing my faith in any number of other ways.

On March 9, somewhere between 7:30 - 9:30, my very quietly huge personal thing will do a bit of spilling out at: “The Shack” – an artists’ coffee house event at Walton. And the other artists that will be there will be quite literally "wonderful". You won’t have to be Christian to enjoy it or relate to it; we won’t be in your face. If you would like a wonderful experience, please come. Last time, it was awesome.

THE SPIRIT OF CHRISTMAS

Tonight we put up our Christmas tree. And I got to thinking about the spirit of Christmas  - at least one of them. I think spirit should be plural.

 I know the BIG Spirit of Christmas, the one that fills my heart with joy at each Christmas Carol and  at each quiet moment spent with my Maker, thinking about Him during this awe inspiring season.

Then there is the generic spirit of Christmas. This is the festive mood, the general infectious feeling of generosity and joy that perpetrates every soul, those Christian or of Christian heritage - and often those of completely other religions.

Then there are the MANY spirits of Christmas that unfold seamlessly into my heart as we unpack the boxes of tree ornaments.  Christmas tree decorating in our house is like a party for our personal saints. Their spirits fill the room with love and history of cherished days gone. There is my husband’s grandma’s frail old glass house and her kitchy plastic nativity, and my Grandma’s glass hanging beads, my other Grandmas frail glass bobble, the silver Santa Claus my dad bought me, the sweet rustic treasures crafted by my children’s hands and the endless quantity of Christmas ornaments from my mom and my husband’s mom – both unique personifications of Christmas itself. Then there are ornaments from happier times from people of relationships lost. These are all good too. Even these speak to happy times of giving and good will.  Our Christmas tree, with its star of Bethlehem at the top and the stars of the universe dancing upon it, not only speaks of that oh so holy night, it speaks of our personal communion of saints – all those we love and have loved, through a rich and complex family history.

So, when it is all done, I sit here tonight with my next of kin – all of them. And together, we celebrate the season, once again.

I'VE BEEN PLUNKED UPON

The Shack Coffee House. Now, here is an event that “ just suits me to a tee” because I cannot really separate my artwork from my faith on any day. 

My church, Walton United, has invited me (and other artists) to show and tell about how faith and the everyday collide to make art. To me, art and faith are really the same thing. The art is just a manifestation and celebration of the wonder of it all and the everyday simply provides me with the setting for all the wonder I could use in a lifetime. Who provides the wonder? You know Who!  I cannot help the artwork and I cannot help the faith. It is just an ongoing circle. Wonder-faith-awe-wonder-art-thanksgiving-inspiration-wonder-faith-art….on it goes. They bubble around, bubble within and bubble-over into all aspects of my life. I cannot say how they are one and the same. However, I know in the deepest part of my soul that they are. Funny - I have rarely met an artist without a deep seeded internal faith. They might not talk about it much, but it seems it is usually there.  It would be hard not to have faith when these creative “miracles” flow from your hands and your mind. Beyond the wonders of the everyday that I feel so compelled to “discuss” with my artmaking, there is the very humble wonder of how in the world do I do this artmaking? This is really the addictive part of making art.  It is like God moving your hand for you. God plunking that idea right in the middle of your forehead for you.  Any Christian knows this feeling whether he is an artmaker or not. God plunks things down in places all day long, in every person’s life. The plunkings are just God’s workings, the Holy Spirit moving like shifting sand, mysteriously making continual deliveries exactly where they are needed. 

I can hardly wait for this event. I think I’ve been plunked upon.

FOUNDATIONAL KNOWLEDGE

I am a big advocate of not compromising health for art's sake, simply because there is no need to.  As a matter of fact, aside from the serious health reasons, there is need NOT to use turps or mineral spirits in the foundation of an oil painting.

There is all this mystique around the cutting in of turpentine or mineral spirits with your oil paints and mediums to first prime and then build the foundation for a painting. Artists do this not because there is any benefit or logic to it, but simply because it has been done that way before.

Think about it. Turps and mineral spirits are solvents. When building the bottom structure of anything, do you want something that erodes? It would be like building a foundation of a house with blocks, battery acid and no mortar.

Google about cutting in solvents; warnings are everywhere about damaging the binding quality of the paint and mediums. You are ruining the structural integrity of your painting and risking adhesion failure at the very bottom, between the gessoed canvas and the paint.  Some advocates of turps will tout “fat over lean” (“fat refers to oil content). Turps in the mix will certainly make your paint “leaner”, but not the kind of “lean” that you want.  A very thin coat of oil binder or paint (paint has a oil binder within it already) will initially add to adhesion of paint to a canvas. This is the "lean" that you want! However, once it gets to the point where the oil or the diluted oily paint is applied more thickly, it will pool up, create a really shiny surface and lose its “tooth” (ability to attach to something else). It now resists adhesion – above and below. What you want is the tight adhesion in the foundational layers that a thinly applied, SMALL amount of oil gives – thus the adage: “Fat over lean”. Any oiliness should be reserved for the very last, when you don’t have to worry about things sticking to your surface anymore. What you DON’T want is LACK of adhesion. That is what solvents create in the foundational layers or in any layers, for that matter. This kind of “lean” is exceeding bad for both your painting and you.

My advice: For colour priming, cut to as low a pigmentation as you wish, using either a completely non-toxic cold-pressed linseed oil like Williamburg, Graham’s Walnut Oil, or my hands-down favourite: Graham’s Walnut Alkyd Medium. Then, using a rag or a very stiff brush create a high paint-spread by using lots of “elbow grease” – that is, PUSH the blend of binding medium and paint so that you achieve a sheen, NOT a shine. This will give you any dilution of pigment that you want and still keep an excellent adhesion to your gessoed canvas.  When blocking an under-painting either on this or a fresh  gessoed canvas, use the same principles.

Don’t forget to thoroughly air-dry your rag if you are using one. We don’t want any fires.

Paint lots and paint well! 

Finding Calm

So – I was driving down towards the end of Burloak Drive in Burlington this morning, to where the road joins Lakeshore Rd. and Lake Ontario is straight ahead.  While driving, I was busy - mulling worry and sadness, with thoughts bantering around about our beloved Canada and the awful incidents that occurred yesterday, thinking about this possible outcome, that possible outcome, when – right in front of me – my eyes and thoughts were jolted into arrest - splendor jumped off the water surface ahead of my car. The millions of sun-diamonds dancing there, plus the incredibly beautiful music on my car radio, made my sorry old head do a double back flip and land squarely into a feeling of a warm melting pot, with this phrase popping out like a neon sign into my consciousness: “Gifts from God”. The transformation of my state of mind was remarkable. I was so grateful. These gifts of beauty were gifts of Grace.

We must always look issues, conflicts and things that need to be resolved square in the eye. But, if at the same time, we keep “open” enough to “see”, remarkable gifts of all kinds of grace await us that help us to cope and work our way through the nasty stuff. Beauty is a gift that is rarely hard to find if looking, and sometimes squares you even when you aren’t (like today).

I don’t know what is awaiting us in our future as Canadians, and how these issues will play out. But, I have found, at all times, that beauty is a great comforter - or more accurately – a gift from the Great Comforter and a gift available pretty much always. I know that if I make myself available to “multitask” and notice it, it keeps me level within turbulence and I can therefore be a much more effective, can help somehow and be a part of the solution. I am connected, calmed and grounded.

Can you find grace and beauty in the nooks and crevices of your day? In a smile, a phrase, someone’s kindness or idiosyncrasy, a joke, a song, or a brush with nature?  Bless all Canadians with balanced vision to see beauty, truth and light at the same time as being confronted with this darkness. It is so helpful. It sure helped my perspective on such a very difficult day as today. I think looking for and getting balanced vision is something Canadians do quite well.

NEW GALLERY REPRESENTATION, MAJOR WORK – RIDING THE WAVE, OLD PERLICAN HARBOUR – SOLD AT AUCTION

Riding the Wave, Old Perlican Harbour, 24"x48", Glaze Oil on Canvas, SOLD AT AUCTION, ST. JOHN'S NL

I went to Newfoundland and came home with more than cod – I came home with a new gallery home in St. John’s. The Christina Parker Gallery, at 50 Water Street, has taken me into their roster, and already has a major piece sold at a fundraising auction last week for the Neonatal Unit of the Janeway Centre. Bidding on “Riding the Wave, Old Perlican Harbour” went very well, raising a considerable amount of money for the hospital. 

Another major piece, “Main Wharf, Old Perlican Harbour “ will now be offered for sale at the gallery.  Christina Parker gallery is an awesome space, with enormous rooms, overlooking St. John’s Harbour, featuring excellent, serious artwork, with a common denominator of having high cultural relevance to Newfoundland and Labrador.

I have always hoped my Old Perlican Harbour work could be sold in Newfoundland. I am delighted that Christina has taken me on, and I really look forward to incubating many more major works about this place that resides so deeply in my heart. 

"Main Wharf, Old Perlican Harbour, 36"x48", Glaze Oil On Canvas, FOR SALE AT CHRISTINA PARKER GALLERY, ST. JOHN'S NL

HOME AGAIN

I am home again, from being “home” again. Just spent 12 days of grunt work, fun and wonderful reconnecting with friends in Old Perlican, Newfoundland. I ate fish until I looked like it, and with some help, finally got our little house hammered home. It is not fully renovated yet, but it is now in working-cottage-mode, complete with makeshift, fairly civilized kitchen and dresser drawers for clothing. The tools and sawdust have been removed from living areas and there are even knick-knacks hanging on some walls. Soon, there might even be a couch!

It is a 1939 house, restored. I am happy to say that our old windows salvaged by it’s builder, Selby Burt in 1939, from the old manse of the Old Perlican United Church, are looking somewhat….new (at least the putty and the paint are). She is a beautiful little house. Her architecture is just popping with the fresh coat of paint as she looks over Trinity Bay and the harbour. I am loving this place and this little house. I feel roots growing into my very old roots here - the same roots as my grandfather’s, from so very long ago (three centuries long ago!).  I love his people and I love his place, this Old Perlican, NL. 

AND I got some fabulous material to paint. That will root my spirit here all winter long, as I mull it all over during the many wonderful hours of painting ahead.

I always look at September as the real New Year. Happy New Year! May it be filled with joy, peace, purpose and beauty, new beginnings and meaningful connections to the past, to the future and within the present.

“KATHY’S BLOGANDORARCHIVE”

Hello to the world!

This is my very first EVER blog.  Welcome to the launching of this website! If this is my most recent blog, then you are one of my very first viewers! Hope you enjoy looking at my website. I had a lot of fun putting it together. Blogs and websites, I think, kind of suit artists. We love expressing ourselves to the world. A blog is yet another vehicle to do this.  I love creating art, showing art, teaching art and just LOVE talking art. That much I can say for sure! So, let's see where this goes!

I am envisioning this space to be pretty free-formed. When the Spirit moves me, I will dash off something that is exclusively blog-fare. But, since blogging and artist’s statements, and commentary on artwork, or a teacher’s explanations on technique are all so similar, I am thinking I will use this part of my website to archive things I write or have written on other pages or at different times for different things. Thus: “Kathy’s Blogandorarchive” is born. Welcome to my world, world! Hope you enjoy every stay!

 Kathy