Will this wind be so mighty?

Sean's Garden

(work in progress)

Acrylic on canvas

8 x 8 inches

Barbara Muir © 2010

Windy doesn't quite cut it when you're talking about
this day.  It was windyyyyyyyyy.  And in between my front
doors blew some delightful mail from a friend far
away that cheered me mightily in a long day of
teaching, marking and more marking.  I was inspired
to paint by images of a great art show south of the
border.  In the midst of a whirlwind
of activity, after nearly being blown away up to
the seagulls and their insane aerobatics high up
in the clouds, I was  buoyed psychologically
by this real mail,  delivered by the mail carrier,
(who ever since my appearance on Oprah always calls
me movie star).

Did I say there was candy in the package too?
There was, and I have not eaten all
of it.  But how perfect for the day -- the end of term,
several shows pending, work to do, commissions to
complete -- and an unexpected treat.  Today a letter
with candy in it, could not be any closer to nirvana.

Two more gigantic piles of marking and I escaped
to work on my painting.  I think I've been greatly
influenced by a delightful show Steven and I saw a
week ago at the Art Gallery of Ontario called Maharajah.
The work in the show is wonderfully intricate -- not
always my thing, but in this case, captivating.

Have an enjoying-the-intricacies-of-nature day.
P.S. about two years ago I learned that my sons' great,
great, great grandmother was a Maharani in Indonesia.  I know
very little about her, except that my mother-in-law, her
descendant has a black and white photo showing her on
her throne dressed in highly ornamented, ceremonial
attire.

Thank you Alex Colville

 Sean's Garden

(Work in progress)

Acrylic on canvas

Barbara Muir © 2010

(This is a little painting of

the garden under our apple tree

this summer.  I'm calling it

Sean's garden because  it was

lush and flourishing because of

Sean Gallagher's incredible work.)

Do you ever worry that you're not blogging enough?
Not producing enough? Not showing enough work
to the blog world.  You know you do.  It's the current
mania for artists to produce paintings as quickly as
cars and toasters are produced in a slick manufacturing
plant.  But some artists don't work that way.

One of Canada's biggest national newspapers
The Globe and Mail is featuring an article on
Alex Colville today. Colville is one of the greats in current
Canadian art who is celebrating his 90th birthday.
His work is both straightforward and deep.
Some of it is cold and frightening, and some chronicles
the warm relationship he has with his wife.  In fact it's
impossible to pigeon hole him as any one thing, and
that's good.

But he turns out three paintings a year.  He spends endless
time in preparation, doing sketches and planning.  Isn't this
a good thing?  I was talking to an artist last week,  caught
in the conflict of doing the work she needs to do for money,
and dreaming of the work she wants to do, that needs time.

Apparently a full-time artist in Canada earns on average
$11,000.00 per year, and I know many full time artists who
would be happy to get that much.  So artists do need other work
just to support their passion, until they are famous like Alex
Colville.  But this article gives us permission to take our time,
to work slowly and thoughtfully in the way he does.

Okay, it's back to the studio -- but could you just relax for a
moment, and realize -- no you're not crazy.  Art takes time.

One caveat.  That is that art can take time, and it can take no
time.  There is no magic formula, and the art produced in hours,
is no better or worse than that produced in months.  So time
is no measure of success.  What I'm saying is that if it does  take
time, and some of my work takes a long, long time -- that's okay.
It takes our artistic heroes time too.

Another Maritime artist who I'm sure works in a slow and careful
manner is Mary Pratt, and I love her high realism too. I'm adding her
in because some of the artists in the south western United States
have requested that I mention more women.  Balance.  All is balance.

Have a taking-it-slow-and-easy day.

Ode on a garden flower

 

 For the love of pansies

Charcoal on bond paper

8 1/2 x 11 inches

Barbara Muir © 2010

I am, and I think always will be crazy about John
Keats, the British romantic (as in literary period)
who died of tuberculosis at 25, and had written
a lifetime of memorable poetry at the time of his
death.  He was one for the Ode.  And the Pansie
is worthy of that kind of treatment.

Have I said that I love pansies?  I won't be writing
an ode here, simply because I don't know how.
But if I were John Keats those girls (I call them
girls and they could well be boys) would get their
due, just like Ode to Autumn, and Ode on a Grecian
Urn.  They are simply the sweetest, bravest, most
enduring, plucky little flowers in the garden.  In
northern climates like this one, we have to appreciate
that strength and beauty.

I've been marking papers today, but I took a break
to walk Zoey with one of her favorite male dog
friends.  And it was cold.  So cold that some little
dogs were begging their owners to cut the darn walk
short please.  Still we enjoyed ourselves.  Back home
just as I was heading inside, I saw these small miracles
and picked them. 

My drawing tonight is a quick ode to the pansies.
And that's all folks, more marking and working on
a commission tomorrow.  And perhaps more drawing.
That will be fun too.

Have a reading-Keats-and-writing-an-ode day.

Creating a world of friends

 Friday night with Flora

Charcoal on bond paper

10 x 12 inches

Barbara Muir © 2010

I am still constantly amazed at the power of the
Internet for good.  I know that isn't always the
case by any means, but it's been my experience
big time, and I am always delighted that this
forum for kind support exists.

 Barbara drawing

Charcoal on bond paper

8 1/2 x 11 inches

Flora Doehler © 2010

Flora Doehler has been that kind of artist friend
for me since our first meeting at the Don Valley
Art Club in Toronto.  She was taking part in a community
art walk in her neighbourhood across town
the weekend after I first talked to her
about her powerful bright coloured watercolors
of flowers, fruit and landscapes.  She invited
me to come over, and I saw a house devoted to
art.  The walls were all painted beautiful, bright
colours, and Flora was extremely organized
with her paints in labeled bins, special lights and
tables.

I felt  right at home, and so impressed with
her professionalism.  After that we presented
some art workshops together, and showed
with one another and a few other artists.
I was always in awe of the energy, vitality
and brave experimentation in Flora's work.
For a few years she's painted with liquid acrylics,
and this year has been experimenting with oil
sticks and making more of her gorgeous paintings.
Plus she and her husband Larry are good, warm,
wonderful people, passionate about the environment
and their own rural community in Nova Scotia where
they now live full time.

The drawings tonight are from our brief
sketching session in my kitchen last night.
We sat at opposite ends of the kitchen table
and drew with charcoal on bond paper.
Flora said that she'd been channeling a
friend she hadn't seen for years in her portrait
of me, so I look quite serious as that friend
must have been.  I've drawn Flora so many times
on Skype, and even had one of my drawings
of her featured almost size as in The Globe and
Mail in 2009, so it was wonderful to draw her
in person.

 Have a loving-your-friends-in-person day.

Popping out of the blog into my kitchen

 After dinner, and a long night of talking, Flora and I
drew each other.  Larry snapped this shot of us together.
I'll show you close-ups of the work tomorrow.  

Flora Doehler was in town tonight, passing
through from her trip out west to visit her
daughter, Emily, and now she and Larry are
visiting their son Jessie in Toronto.  Flora and I
read each other's blogs avidly.  And though we
became friends when we were both members
of the art club here that I still belong to, I know
that our feeling of keeping in touch has been
greatly enhanced by the blog communication
-- both in our posts and comments.

Some of you have mentioned how nice it
would be to meet in person, and I certainly
felt that way tonight.  There are simply not
enough hours in the day, and certainly not
enough hours in a short visit to say all the
things you've been saving up without
knowing it for months.

It was so nice to see Flora's reaction to my
work that she'd only seen through the blog
photos.  And I know I felt the same way
when I visited her in Nova Scotia this summer.
At the end of the night we settled down to
draw.  I'll show you close-ups of the work
tomorrow, but for now here are two tired
friends and blogger friends very late in the
evening holding up their drawings of one
another.

Have a loving-your-blog-friends day.
P.S.  Incidentally Flora and I met in a similar
way to the blog friendships.  We liked
each other's paintings, before we ever
were introduced to one another.  And
we wanted to meet because of the work.
Of course as soon as we  started talking
to one another we were friends.

Colour theory and me

 Jubilant spring flowers

Watercolour on watercolour paper

24  x 36 inches

© Barbara Muir (date unknown)

Looking back I feel so much empathy for the poor teacher
who had the job of teaching colour theory to
students who thought you picked up great colour
combinations by magic, not by trial and error.  I can see
him perfectly in my mind's eye, but don't remember
his name.  He was painfully thin, with thinning brown
hair, deeply tanned skin, and wire-rimmed glasses.
A tall man I sometimes saw him walking in the streets
near the school, in a long, loose black coat,
and a black beret.  He was French from France and
I felt sorry for him living in a town so void of French
language and culture.  I thought he would have been
much happier teaching in Ottawa, Montreal or
Quebec where French is spoken everywhere.  But the thing
I forgot to include writing this late last night was that
our sweet, kind teacher never wore colour.  I think he
flashed into my memory because one of my students
complained to me yesterday that I always wear black
in her class.  It's true that my uniform over time has
become a white shirt, black sweater, black pants,
black boots.  It never occurred to me before that I might
have picked up my colourless fashion tips from
my former colour theory prof.  Merci Monsieur.

 Colour study #6

Acrylic on canvas

24 x 36 inches

© Barbara Muir (date unknown)

I was sixteen when I studied colour theory, and it seemed
too much like charts to me.  I found the wheel
easier to absorb, than a colour chart, but I was
definitely not interested in the subject.  Still there
was something so understanding about the teacher that I
tried against my better judgement to please him
with badly executed abstract, hard edged paintings
(assignments) that played with colour theory.


Tonight I'm showing you a watercolour from my
selling watercolour while managing my young son
stage, and a very early abstract work done in my
colour theory studies phase.  It's hanging proudly
in my mother's house, but my photo does not do
it justice, because it is in fact all perfectly straight
rectangles.  The painting is supposed to explore the
movement from cold to warm colour and it does do
that.

Have an enjoying-exciting-theories-day.

More from Dad

 

 Into the woods at Mazinaw

Oil on board
24 x 36 inches

© W.W. Muir (date unknown).

I wish my father could see me here thinking about
his painting, something he really loved to do.  My
Dad was an elegant man.  He certainly seemed to
rule the house (his military training), but he painted
on a portable card table, first in a spare bedroom in
Toronto, and in Ottawa in the den -- a room that has never
really recovered from his presence. He painted in viyella
shirts, corduroy trousers, cashmere sweaters and highly
polished loafers.

In Toronto when he started painting, he found an art
store that would talk to him about painting, and I think
bought every colour in the store.  He took me along
because I had been designated as "artistic."  Imagine
this elegant but nervous man, in a hand-tailored three
piece suit, gorgeous trench coat, highly polished shoes
going in to buy paint. He bought a couple of very simple
books on painting and some palette knives.  He soon
discovered that he enjoyed working with a palette knife
and thick paint more than with brushes.

My dad could not have even imagined this world,
where I can publicize his work without any
approval process.  He didn't even name his paintings,
because he just painted them and gave them away.
So I'm naming them for him.  Looking back I don't
know where he mustered the courage to continue.
My mother tolerated his work, and allowed him to
hang it around her house, but for the most part she
was indifferent.  This was his bizarre "hobby", a
word I'm violently allergic to now.

Because it wasn't a hobby, it was a passion.  So
much so that when he was dying of lung cancer,
and I didn't want to admit it, I asked him on the
phone if he could still paint.  He was a business
man,  a hard worker, a wonderful writer, an excellent
speaker, an amazing photographer, but his big
love was painting.  I get it.

So here's another one.  It has warmed up the
large grey stone fireplace in my parents' home
ever since my father hung it there. I know my
mother cherishes it today.

Have a loving-your-parents'-talents day.