Since writing this post on 10/26/14 my painting Two-Tree Island was awarded 3rd place painting in the North Country Arts Council 66th Annual Fall Art Show (Nov. 7-22nd), perhaps the largest regional art show in northern New York State.
A couple of years ago I took an evening ecological nature cruise on a flat bottomed boat with a bunch of other artists out of Clayton NY, which is ten miles up river from my home on Wellesley Island. It was nice to let someone else do the driving while the wine and snacks flowed. We cruised around the River and islands near the shoreline and observed Osprey, Loons, Herons, Mink, and a variety of birds and waterfowl doing their evening thing. The boat was very stable and allowed for a lot of photos including well know island landmarks, islands, and shoals and great sunset shots. I have created a number of paintings from the photos. The latest one is called "Two Tree Island" and is a combination of a sunset and an uninhabited island. There are over 1800 Islands in a thirty-five mile stretch of the St Lawrence River know as "The 1000 Islands". To qualify as an island there must have least one tree, otherwise it is called a shoal. This particular island had two trees, thus the name of the painting. The trees on the most of the small islands are exposed to prevailing winds which causes a slanted growth as there is not much depth of soil for the roots to take a firm hold. This painting was on my easel a long time as I waited seven days for layers to dry before drybrushing or glazing multiple times. The painting is a combination of two separate photos, one for the island, and one of the sunset I best thought suited the silhouette of the trees. It is 24 by 36 inches, oil on canvas.
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Two Tree Island
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| Calumet Island First Light |
A few other paintings were inspired by my photos on that boat ride. They are "Osprey Perch", 11 x 14 inches, oil on linen, "Calumet Island First Light", 12 x 22 oil, in which I changed the atmosphere to a morning glow, and "Hunkered Down for Weather", 16 x 20 inches, oil on linen. In the latter painting the Comerants were settled in on a shoal for the night, which I combined with two earlier photos not taken on the cruise. The morning light was trying to burst through a stormy set of clouds on the River in front of our home one morning and on a different day the River was roiling from 50 mile per hour winds. I drove up to the west end of Wellesley Island where the wind and wave action is the worst to get some photos. One of these became the water action in the painting. So these photo events were several years apart but some how all gelled into my imagination for the composition. All these paintings may leave one peering into the dark and wondering what else might be there that you can't see. So, they are all just in time for Halloween.
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Osprey Perch
Speaking of Halloween! |
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| Hunkered Down for Weather |
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| Crow Woman's Watch- Pen and Ink |
