It's a long summer weekend here in many provinces of Canada. We call it Civic Holiday in Ontario. My sister has been visiting for the past week and just returned home today, so I am getting to the blog post about my time in Haliburton (to take a class and to teach a class at
Haliburton School of Art + Design). The last three weeks have not afforded much time for blogging. While I was away I stayed in the woods near a lake, and the wifi connection was spotty. It was often difficult to upload photos.
I took this photo four years ago, when I stayed at the little blue cabin that I stayed at again in the first week of my time in Haliburton. It's the view of the lake out the cabin windows.
The cabin is close to the home of the owners who live down a one km gravel lane way through the woods. It's a beautiful place far off the beaten track. For exercise, when it wasn't too hot, I walked out the lane and back. The big problem was mosquitoes and other buzzy beings. There would often be a halo of them around my head while I walked.
The view was always best first thing in the morning IMHO. Now you have to understand that I am seldom up at this hour of the morning. If you look closely, you can see the mist burning off the lake.
My first week was spent taking a class called "Travelling with a Sketchbook" with
Nancy Newman. What a warm and fantastic instructor she is! I did not create any masterpieces at all in this class. I am often not a good student. The whole idea of a travel sketchbook is to do very quick studies and sketches on location that you can build on or develop when you get home. Taking a photo helps with that. You may remember that I have done some
pen and ink drawing in the past. Nancy's class was more about quick drawings on location and using watercolour. I have not formally studied watercolour before, so I learned a lot.
Contour drawing, the idea to never lift your pen.
An exercise in two point perspective so our structures will look more convincing.
And then we actually did a small painting using two point perspective.
We learned an interesting method for doing rocks, that involved a white crayon resist at the top. Mine look a little like frosty cupcakes ;-) These things take practice like most skills one learns in life.
We enjoyed the good weather on several field trips for sketching and painting.
On the first farm we sketched and painted at, we had the pleasure of this charming garden shed
with a well-dressed scarecrow.
Nancy urged us to push the colour envelope, which apparently I did on this one.
Later in the afternoon many of us did a rendition of these birch trees.
This is Nancy Newman doing one of her oh so helpful demos.
On another day we sketched at a different farm. This ruined shed attracted many of us.
My sketch/painting.
I started a second sketch because, of course, this red canoe drew my attention. I did not have time to add the watercolour though, and my canoe looks like an unidentified mysterious object.
This kitty came to check out what I was doing and demanded a few pets.
This mosaic method was a lot of fun.
Week 2 came quickly! At our instructors lunch on Day 1 we all posed for a photograph. It was a booming week at Haliburton School of Art + Design! Registrations were up, and I don't think I've ever seen a larger group of instructors in any previous year (this was my ninth).
I enjoyed more views of mist burning off the lake at the start of the week, but the weather grew rather inclement later in the week. It was very hot and humid with frequent rain storms, and once a power outage of 4-5 hours.
Teaching my Flowers & Foliage class (with the addition of Trees this year) caused me to pull out this work that I started two years ago. I thought I might demo with it, and I had high expectations that I might even finish it in the evenings while there.
I didn't want another red and yellow flower because it is too close to the colour of my poppies, so I adjusted it to push the red closer to purple. I had thought I might publish this as a pattern.
Two years later I was not happy with the numbering and lettering of my pattern so I redid it and also added a couple of colour and value changes to it that I had not picked up on before. It was a challenge choosing the fabrics, but I was determined to use some of the beautiful purple/red multi-coloured fabrics I dyed a few weeks ago. And then I used some multi-coloured yellow/orange/pink fabric. I stopped there. I realize that when I publish this pattern people are going to want kits, and I have made it far too difficult to produce kits by including complex multi-coloured fabrics. When I use these fabrics in my work, I cherry-pick the areas I want. To sell a kit I have to very closely be able to reproduce fabrics again and again or I will drive myself crazy. So if, and when, I finish this tulip, I will have to make it again in fabrics that can be reproduced easily. And it may just not be as interesting then.
Here is my class with their work on the last day. They were really keen and worked very hard all week. Thank you Kathy, Carole, Anne, Carole, Ila, Judy, Anne and Cheryl for joining me and inspiring me with your work. Now I realize I did not get a photo of Anne's hosta leaves, probably because the photo she planned to work from had some challenges, so she decided to work with one of my patterns. But she is there in the back row, third from left.
Here are some photos of the works a bit closer up. Not all of them are finished in these photos and most of them still need to be placed on a background.
Kathy
Carole
Cheryl
Carole
Anne
Judy
Ila
If this piece looks a bit familiar, it is because Ila used one of my photographs as her inspiration (one that I have used for inspiration in the past). However, Ila made her own pattern and interpreted it in her own way.
So after the last three weeks (the most recent a visit from my sister, wherein I had the opportunity to be a tourist in my own region) I now need to get back to work. In my next blog post I will share some exciting things coming up.
Enjoy your long weekend, and keep cool! We are in a heat wave again, so I am staying in air-conditioned comfort.
