The Works

I define landscapes as the scenery of a rural area with its visible features, often considered in terms of aesthetics.  Its physical elements are the defined landforms  --  the fields, rivers, ponds, hills, the living elements such as indigenous vegetation, and the manmade components, the buildings, roads and railway tracks.   Landscapes pay particular attention to how natural features are integrated and as an artist this putting-together is fascinating.  Southern Manitoba has an abundance of magnificent landscapes in its prairies.  There is no shortage of subject matter for the artist. The richness of the scenery in southern Manitoba provides myriad opportunities for creative ideas.  

Until recently, my work focused on portraiture.  But as a passionate naturalist and gardener I found myself increasingly involved with environmental and ecological issues.  Constructing landscapes through my paintings was a natural transition that allowed me to examine my attraction with the natural world through both realism and abstraction.  

My progression into landscapes started by studying the work of established landscape artists and photographers.  I gathered the nuances of landscape elements to integrate my own experiences with those of other artists. Borrowing from the work of others was an integration process using patterns to learn component parts as I examined the wonderful natural sense of balance and colour about the rural landscape and how to construct them.  Artists need mastery of the medium before loosening up to produce soft, unrestrained brushwork with a sense of spontaneity.

Unarguably what dominates the prairies is the sky with its everchanging cloud formations and colours. With countless configurations, they shift, drift, form wispy curling strokes, swirl, and leave whispering trails.  They are untouchable, impermanent and overpowering.  Paintings of clouds can adapt to whatever the artist wants.  Cloudscape is the term used to depict a view of clouds in a work of art.  Typically, a cloudscape will include only enough land to suggest scale, orientation, weather conditions and distance.  Complex cloudscapes reproduced in a realistic manner often appear as abstract, particularly when gestural force is applied.  And, clouds present myriad colour arrangements.  They can range from soft blue on hot, dry days, to greys and black during unsettled weather; pink, crimson and purples at dawn and sunrise; and sunlit with yellow tones during warm days or the threat of a storm.  

The mix of colours and textures of the prairies are mesmerizing.  In my work, I try to describe the nuances of the colours and textures from foreground to distance.  The rich colours, golds, greens, blues and greys all inform the setting.  The landscape often appears as bands of colour giving the artist the leeway to describe linear elements in myriad directions.  All the elements of the landscape are components parts to be isolated and defined in delivering a variety of messages.  

I began working on landscapes from a literal interpretation in a precise, detailed and accurate mimesis of the scene.  Once I understood the component parts, I began to work more abstractly.  The abstracted views describe the landscape as did the literal depictions.  Neither the painter nor the viewer has to see everything.  It is still there.  Abstracting the scene allows me licence to take all the pieces and make whatever out of them that tells the story.  I may see it very differently from the viewer, but the viewer is always allowed their interpretation. I want there to be an evolution to my work.