FULL CIRCLE

 I’ve come full circle, or so it seems, as I look down the channel leading out onto Whitefish Lake. Some 25 years, or so ago, although it seems like only yesterday, I sat here, at a picnic table, perhaps the same worn and weathered picnic table that I’m now sitting at, and made some tentative sketches of this scene. My landscape sketches back then were indeed tentative. I began my quest to work at becoming an artist by producing intaglio prints, mainly of wildlife, birds if I’m to be more precise, and seeking some quiet place to avoid being scrutinized by the general public, had come to Algonquin Park in the off season to begin learning to sketch and paint landscape. In a tiny sketchbook, with pencil, and watercolour brush in hand, I made some marks, then some more marks, and now many, many, marks later, I’m back where I started, about to stop making marks and retire to watch others, however ,and before doing so, I decided to make a few more marks on paper, so with pen and pencil in hand I begin making marks, and travel to a place of solitude with Raven to watch my back…

1966 Sketches.......

2023 Sketches.......

Not a lot of change in the landscape over the years. As for a comparison between my now and then sketching, it would seem that there's also not much of a change, a bit more confidence in my  making marks, and perhaps a bit more knowledgeable about what I'm sketching, but not a lot of change. In looking back, perhaps I needn't have been so tentative in my approach. Too late now, I suppose,  to be judgemental.

Later that week we also travelled to Tea Lake, one of Tom Thomson's sketching places and made a sketch while enjoying the solitude of the park, a zen moment so to speak, as with fewer people in the park following the Labour Day weekend, and the children back at school, our visit to the park was much more enjoyable.