Balmy temperatures on New Year's Day with no snow falling - so tookoff into the Don Valley Ravine outback and painted this 8" x 10" pleine aire there. A small piece of land down right by the river where the sun seldom gets to - so the snow looked pristene and good. I call it " A Hush of Snow ", since the valley was still asleep and you could hear a pine cone drop.

Maybe make it a full size in the studio - but I'll wait until I'm snowbound.

WILF

The Goblin Forest

This is from my sketchbook - a fast and loose impressionistic watercolour

painted at the Haliburton Wildlife Centre and Wolf Forest. I managed to capture

the feel and mood at about 3.00 p.m. when the shadows were getting

longer, yet there was still a hint of a sunshine from the afternoon.

I imagined goblins and wraiths playing here.

WILF

Jenny Anydots, my studio cat - will make friends with just about anybody

who strolls past. She has no concept of danger or the fact that she might

well be seen as a tasty meal by larger forest folk.

So, here she is making out with an errant moose. I know it's not

got a lot to do with art and painting - but it is just as heart warming as

a Monet, Degas or some such. Mayhap I'll simply have to paint it one day myself

" Eagle Lake Falls" 22" x 15" watercolour on Arches 140 Rough

Did this 22" x 15" watercolour pleine aire, on-site at Eagle Falls.

It was still late Summer, so I used my imagination and turned it into a Fall/Autumn

scene ( artists can do this ). Liked the rush of water and the small falls where logging

took place in the older days and pines and hemlocks floated their way

down to the mills at Minden. Had fun painting it - hope you enjoy

looking at it.

The Trunk

I found this old humpback steamer travel trunk in a New Mexico auction - it was for sale and a little the worse for wear - so I bought it and loaded it into my van. It took a few weeks to refurbish and banish the the spiders and dampness - but eventually it looked ok to start the decorating. Lots of acrylic paints, collages and lo! and behold! it turned out like this. I lined it with cedar strips and tiddlied up the hardware. These old trunks are getting rarer and rarer.

The hump had two purposes. One, to make sure that the shippers couldn't pile one on top of the other in a hold or warehouse and damage the bottom one. And, two, the hump was where you packed your lady's fancy go-to-meeting bonnet. Couldn't crush it there. This one;s a keeper.

And by way of another one. This is an old carpenter chest that once belonged to an immigrant German family in Texas in or around 1880. It was in poor condition - but I got it done. And it took almost a year to match the original paint and to collect old carpenter tools from many, many garage sales and auctions. A big bonus was the fact that I had a photograph of the original owner and used it too...along with a tintype of good odl Annie Oakley. This one sold to the owner of a chain of lumber yards.

OK - I paint watercolours --- but once in a while I do make SouthWest pieces and when I find a trunk I like to breathe new life into it.

Unk
Boothill

By The Lake

Just a quick, pleine aire sketch painting from the lake.

Dealing in values and shapes, rather than in actualities.

Size 10 1/2" x 12 1/2" on Arches Rough brightwhite paper.

Perhaps to become a larger painting in studio.

Location - Haliburton Highlands.

" Spring Thaw "

Have just finished this 15" x 22" vignetted watercolour of an Ontario farm in winter, turning to spring.... snow still there,.... but warm clear skies are beginning to herald a new season. The edges are vignetted so that the painting may be framed inside a mat and appear to float. Maybe now I can start drawing greens and yellows from my palette as warmer weather approaches - and get doing more pleine aire work in the great ouitdoors.

See more of my work on the Fineartamerica web site. Find it on Google, then click my name.

Thanks for taking the time to peek at this.