Still Waters - The Book

 

Pencil Study

Still Waters.      Etching

Coloured Etching

Book Cover

https://www.blurb.ca/books/10232219-still-waters

I've done but one drawing in the past couple of weeks. I actually went into retirement, but can't stay away from making the odd memory drawing to keep my hand in the art. The drawing was inspired by a ballpoint pen that I was gifted, and a piece of acid free drawing paper that was sitting on my bookcase. The drawing, of Katherine Cove up Lake Superior Provincial. Pk. way, turned out quite good. I've yet to scan or photograph it, so we'll save it for another posting, and another day. For the moment, I invite those of you that may have wandered into this site, the opportunity to visit my publisher, Blurb.ca, and preview a book that I wrote some time ago that contains some nature experiences, some art, as well as some personal stuff. There's no charge. You can preview the entire book for free if you wish. On the other hand should you wish a PDF copy to peruse at your own speed it's quite inexpensive, I believe only $5.00 U.S., or thereabouts to download. In case you get the impression that I'm trying to boost sales, and make a buck, have no fear, I declined any royalties leaving sales and distribution entirely to my publisher. 

It will be new year in a few days, so let me wish everyone all the best for the coming New Year. Let's hope that it's a better year, and that the angst that grips the world regarding wars and global economics softens, and world leaders enjoy a little common sense and bring some peace to the world.

Best wishes for everyone!

MOST ART SIMPLY FADES & DISAPPEARS

Tea Lake - Algonquin Park.                              Pencil Study. 2022

 I’ve  struggled for almost half my life to have my art recognized with the hopes that after I’ve departed, to where I do not know, it might survive, and that through it the message that I tried to convey would stay alive, perhaps not forever, but for a little while. Unfortunately, my wish, realistically speaking, isn’t about to become a reality. As I near my day of reckoning I’ve come to realize that the majority of all art, and the messages contained, disappear. Decorative art that speaks to human history sometimes lives on, but most art simply fades with its makers and owners, leaving future generations to wonder at its mystery. And so, as I prepare, time spent wondering the fate of the many drawings and paintings stored in folders and taking up space in our basement, I realize that its time to let go, and disperse much of it appreciating that the message has already be said.

Without a message I personally believe that most art is simply, for wont of other words, trash, worthy of only, one day being treated as trash. Some art evokes memories for the viewer, and some art is political in nature, but little art is worthy of finding its way into national archives, a means to preserving humanity’s history.  Somewhere in past postings I’ve mentioned that national art galleries are really not "art" galleries per se, but museums of the humanities.

Where does my art fit into this description of art, probably along with the majority destined for landfill. Am I concerned, saddened, that some would say that my time spent pursuing art was a waste of my time….not at all, as I do feel that somewhere ,out there, someone has taken my message to heart, and is spending their time appreciating our natural heritage, even helping to take steps to try to preserve bits and pieces here and there. 

I do believe that my time was well spent.

Beauty & The Beast.  Pencil Drawing

Mallards                    Hand-Coloured Etching

Canada Geese.            Hand-Coloured Etching

George Lake - Killarney Provincial Park.                  Pencil Drawing

Island - Oxtongue Lake.                       Pencil Drawing

ARTISTS ARE NEEDED

Frood Lake - Killarney.                            Pencil Sketch  2022

 Some years ago I read an article which, I believe, was written by the then director of the National Art Gallery Of Canada, to the effect that Canadian landscape painting was dead as the Group Of Seven had “said it all”. My response was to the effect that they may have brought international attention to a distinctive manner of painting the Canadian landscape, but their’s could not be the last word as the landscape itself was ever evolving. The Group of Seven painted what was then, not what is now, as it’s ever changing and will forever need artists to record these changes. Algonquin, and Killarney Provincial Parks are recovering from the devastation of extensive logging in the early 1900s. Artists are needed to record the change, and to promote and preserve our natural heritage….

Whitefish Island  Algonquin Park    Watercolour Sketch

Island Oxtongue Lake.                       Pencil Sketch

I was sitting in my studio thinking and doodling on a piece of scrap paper. My doodle turned into a landscape that reminded me of the long climb up the canoe portage from Lake Of Two Rivers in Algonquin Park, and finally arriving at the top looking out onto Provoking Lake. The doodle was set aside and I made a pencil drawing drawing upon memories made long ago....

Provoking Lake. Algonquin.  Pencil Drawing. 2022

MEMORIES ARE GOLDEN II

 Memories of having been there, and experienced the moment are important. Much better than relying upon photographs.

When  A. J. Casson, a member of the Group Of Seven, was aged, unable to clamber about the bush, or climb the hills, he and his wife would drive about the countryside, and enjoy a picnic while he would make loose pencil sketches of scenes to be painted during the long Canadian winters, relying upon memory to fill in the spaces.

Landscape Sketch.  A.J.Casson

A moment experienced is a memory stored, allowing for one to ponder and consider, often resulting in a painting or drawing years later. 

There was this time when we were camping at Rushing Rapids Provincial Park in Northern Ontario. The day had been perfect, and the sunset was unreal. We took to the canoe to get a different perspective, and were treated to a show when a couple of common loons splash landed in the water ahead and put on a bit of a show before disappearing in the lakes deep, dark waters. I stored the memory, and sometime later made some sketches and drawings that I turned into an intaglio (etching) print. I also wrote a poem to go with the print....

STILL WATERS
On a northern lake,
the twilightʼs quiet is broken by the haunting cry
of a Common loon.

Our canoe floats, between sky and water
in the twilightʼs reflection.

Paddling silently, we drift, anticipating.

The loon surfaces at our bow, aware,
undisturbed.

Its reflection fills the ripples of its forward motion.
It dips its head, dives, and disappears 

in the dark, 

deep, 

still waters.

Still Waters.        Pencil Study

Still Waters.  Coloured Etching

Still Waters. Etching

MORE DOODLING - MEMORIES ARE GOLDEN

 Ageing can be frustrating, no more hopping in the canoe, or hiking off into a wilderness, having to rely upon the odd photo, or ones fading memory. There is, however, a plus side, remembering good times, the wind in the willows and the sun on your face as you sit and sketched in some far off place. Memories are like gold, hard to come by, but a treasure to keep.

Islands Georgian Bay.  Pencil Sketch/Doodle

There are days when ideas are a struggle, so I simply doodle, then doodle some more.

 STILL DOODLING

A doodle often becomes a more serious doodle, some would call it a sketch, or a drawing. I prefer to keep it a doodle, maybe a sketch, as for me it's simply something to add to the pile, where it may outlive me.... Playing with the previous doodle we expanded things a bit and concentrated on the island and surrounding hills....

Island - Oxtongue Lake.    Graphite/Pencil Doodle/Sketch   10/2022

Photo - Old Man Doodling  2022

Used to be a time when cold, cloudy, no matter the weather, I'd be outside making a sketch. I've aged, cold is cold, rain is rain, warmer, drier, sitting by the window and simply thankful to be up north to be able to make a sketch. The years pass so quickly.....

DOODLES

 

DOODLES

I doodle, or that's what I call it. Doodles often become a more detailed sketch, sometimes the basis for a painting. Important to keep these doodles, as they're part of your history of your process in the making of your art. Actually, I've come late to realizing their importance having filled waste baskets with many doodles. Here's a recent doodle, something that came to mind, an island located in Oxtongue Lake in Muskoka. I'm thinking that I may expand the doodle into a proper sketch, or drawing. Perhaps, even a painting. I'll let you know.....

My doodle was made on an envelope while watching a video on my computer.

In looking through my files I discovered that I'd actually made a drawing of this area that included the island several years ago (2017). It's am early misty morning scene executed in graphite, or 2B pencil. 

TEA LAKE - TOM THOMSON

We’ve been up to Algonquin  many times, and although it’s nice to get away it’s difficult to get jump up and down excited….but it was nice to enjoy the quiet, and to chat face to face with (older) people. Not many children in the park at this time of the year. The weather, at the outset of our visit was very nice, but was interrupted by cold and rain on several days. Bird watching was troublesome. On one of the first days we saw only one wood warbler, and very, very few other birds. On the following days we saw even less. Now, we either missed the migration, or it’s indicative of what’s going on everywhere, songbirds/flycatchers are suffering and their numbers are down. Robins, and other familiar birds such as Chickadees, may be thriving as they’ve learned to adjust to our urbanization of natural spaces, but many of the migratory species may be going the way of the Dodo, and Passenger Pigeon. Sad the price that nature has to pay for our uncontrolled expansion(s).

We went here and there in the park enjoying picnic lunches. I made a small annual pencil sketch at Canisbay, and another at Tea Lake. Now, I’m sitting there sketching and I’m thinking that the scene looks familiar, and then I realize that it’s probably, maybe, the place where Tom Thomson made his sketch, which has been entitled “Black Spruce in Autumn…..

Thomson’s oil sketch was made, I believe in 1915, or 1920, so the landscape has changed/matured with time, but it sort of makes sense as it’s only minutes away from Canoe Lake where Thompson spent his few summers in the park, and not too far away from Tea Lake Dam where Thompson was last seen before, days later, being found dead. Anyway, a bit of spice to add to the memory.

While sitting watching the rain there was time to think, and scratch a poem voicing, in a manner of speaking, my views of Algonkin, as well as many other  once wild places that we are desperately attempting to reconstruct.....

AN ILLUSION

The other day we travelled to a place

not too far away

to the fringe of a,

sort of,

wild place,

a place called Algonkin, but

wild it can no longer be said, 

as much of what once was wild is 

now-dead.

Raven left some time ago, leaving what was left

to legion 

after legion,

of noises crows, crows that

pillage, rob, and steal, and

feast upon what once 

was real.

Sad, perhaps, but

we’re all to blame as,

sometime ago we accepted,

words defective,

believing it our duty to have dominion 

over all creatures large and small, forced now to accept

a reconstruction of our destruction,

an illusion to fool us all.

We struggle to imagine what used to be,

terraforming this and that,

but our efforts…

rushed for time,

fall short of what was fact, 

and so we settle for something less,

continuing to rob, pillage, and plunder,

and accept what now exists 

as norm.

We satisfy our need for solitude 

with timeless memories ,

a time that existed,

long before we were born.

~~~~

            " Algonquin will always be what we want it to be."

Tea Lake - Algonquin.    Pencil Sketch  2021

Canisbay Lake. ALG 2022 Pencil Sketch

Found Lake ALG 2022. Pen and Ink Sketch

 

As one ages, one spends a lot of time thinking about this and that, but mostly about death and dying, as well as questioning our purpose, our reason, for living. As, and this may be shocking for a few, as one ages one has fewer and fewer friends, or persons with whom to converse, so, to avoid being taken for crazy for talking to yourself, one tends to write poetry and prose to Me, Myself, and I, lifelong friends. The following are a couple of things that I've written....

          Dying And Death

Of dying and death,

Iʼve seen a few persons

die.

A sad ending,

to something wondrous.

Why do we have to die,

and die we must,

but,

why?

Is there a purpose for our coming and going,

or is it the whim of something unseen?

Life is a lottery at best,

a roll of the dice. Makes no matter

whether youʼve been naughty,

or nice. When

your time comes,

you simply go,

to where no one knows.

Of course you can whimper,

scream if you must, but

thereʼs no one to hear,

no one to care,

surrounded by persons

who fear that,

their time is near.

So hereʼs to dying and death,

familiar to all. A curse,

or a blessing,

a burden from birth.

Part of a process,

important it seems,

to something,

or someone, 

........unseen.

THE PRICE

I read about it every day,

the Four Horsemen at play,

wreaking havoc pain and sorrow, 

a price we pay for believing in tomorrow, and 

praying, 

hoping, 

for a better day, 

a life purposeful,

even meaningful, but

life with meaning 

is not possible, 

as life,

seemingly, 

has no meaning.

We invented Gods,

to give life purpose, but 

rules imposed,

and wars invented,

make mockery 

of a life with purpose.

Life has no purpose

no meaning, but

still we strive to give life purpose

with generation, 

after generation,

life prolonged,

endlessly searching,

for an answer.

With the answer no where in sight,

we search the darkness of the night 

for answers to our plea, and

hope that travel through the void 

will find an answer,

a meaning, 

for life.

           ~~~~~~

Thumbnail  Pencil Sketches

 

AS WE BECOME OLDER

As we become older, 

we tend to search and thrash about, 

wondering, 

the meaning, 

the purpose, 

of life. We question whether we did our best,  

and then pause to take a rest, 

and realize that it doesn’t matter, 

as life has no purpose that is our own, as 

we are but a tool, 

a means, 

for something beyond our being, 

perhaps,

a digital device, programmed 

to search for knowledge, 

to satisfy, what will 

forever, 

be unknown. 

~~~~~~~~ 

 

Probably not what you expected when you logged on to this blog site. I must tell you, however, the writing is also a part of what I've done over the years. In fact, I've published four books of poetry and ramblings, as well as a dozen art books. Should you have the time check out Blurb Publishing and search my name.

Should you find what I've written somewhat interesting then, stay tuned as in the coming weeks we'll post a few more of this and that poems and prose. In the meantime, here are a few pencil sketches that I've made over the years.