Calvin

Calvin
12" x 12"  acrylic on canvas 
SOLD

This is Calvin, a 15 year old weimaraner. He is wintering in Florida with his human's father John. This is the third dog portrait our friend John has commissioned - it will eventually be hung with  those of Hobbes and McGwire on a wall back in Minnesota. As you probably know weimaraners are a light taupe-brown - but I thought the inner Calvin was a little more colourful.

Fauvist Tendencies

Fauve Trees at les Bassacs
24" x 20"  - acrylic on canvas  - SOLD

This painting is based on a photo I took last summer when I stayed at les Bassacs in Provence. At the time I spent one hot afternoon behind the house, in the shade, listening to the buzzing cicadas and painting this view - so I have very happy visceral memories of the time and place.

This is the second painting inspired by this photo reference, and probably not the last. As I was trying to come up with a title for the painting I recalled that Andre Derain, one of the early 20th century fauves, painted red trees. That's how I decided on the title.

Thinking about Summer

Mystic Marsh
22" x 28"  acrylic on canvas

Summer means sunshine, colour, warm days and for me - living in a cabin on a big island on a lake in Ontario, in a cottage area known as the Haliburton Highlands. When traveling to and from the cottage I take photos from the passenger seat of the car and have used some of these as the basis for many of my landscape paintings (posted elsewhere on this blog). Scrolling through my photos the other day I found one that spoke to me - and I had to answer. I really enjoyed painting this one - the separate brushstrokes of colour are quite visible in the foreground marsh area, but become more mushy in the background trees. It was a very satisfying painterly experience.

Lavender Fields Forever

Lavender Fields Forever
10" x 10"  acrylic on canvas  SOLD

Another in my Petits Paysages series of small landscapes based on photos, drawings and memories of Provence.

Reflections on a Summer Day

Reflections on a Summer Day
diptych - each panel 30" x 10"
acrylic on canvas
This is for sale - contact me for price if interested.

In the middle of winter I always like to look at my photos from the previous summer. This painting, done as a diptych, is based on a detail from a photo I took in Head Lake Park in the Village of Haliburton. Unfortunately it was a dull day with flat light.

What else could I do but play with colour and form. I really like painting and the abstract quality of the shapes of the trees and their reflection in the water - and the expressive colourful palette. 

Blue Car in Saignon

Blue Car in Saignon
18" x 14" -  acrylic on canvas
This is for sale - contact me for price if interested.

I spent a morning in the delightful Provencal village of Saignon last summer - mostly walking around in the sunshine and enjoying the quiet streets and magnificent views overlooking the valley. I was looking for the perfect view to paint when I came upon this scene. I did a small water colour for fun, but resolved to paint it again once home. Many months later this is the result. I particularly like the contrast between straight (vertical and horizontal) lines and those curved ones of the car, windows and doors, and the freeform lines of the vegetation and cast shadow. 

The Light in June

The Light in June
24" x 20"  -  acrylic on canvas
SOLD

I (finally) finished the painting I have been working on! 'June' posed for our painting group one morning and as I drew her she talked about when she was her twenties and first met and then married her husband (during WWII). She was a wonderful model and radiated positive energy and light as she reminisced.