Thursday, August 27, 2015

Artist in Residence during Cornwall Foodfest!

Hi there! Good to see you. What'cha been up to? Me? Well, as soon as you fill your coffee mug and grab a virtual treat, I'll tell you about my day as a Cornwall FoodFest volunteer this past Saturday!


I was an 'Artist in Residence' at Schulman's Mens & Ladies Wear on Pitt St. Steve and Patty were very gracious hosts. They set me up in the store in an area just behind one of the front windows and were kind enough to provide a dropsheet (artists have been known to slop paint around), two easels to display a couple of my recent creations and a table on which I ran a slide show of some of my 900 + digital images. I brought my own easel on which to do some creating.

They also set up a table for me to display some of my art cards (based on my paintings). I was all set up and ready to go in time for the 11:00 am opening.

Lots of people came through and Steve and Patty were on the run right from the start. During the day, I talked with lots of people including our lawyer and a Thai friend who happened to drop in (without knowing that I was there). 


Here is the painting I did in the morning... though actually there is no paint involved. Instead, I used Gesso, which is a primer. I had already prepared the canvas, covering it completely with black Gesso and letting it dry. I then used white Gesso and a paper towel to create the white focus areas. Once that dried, I went back to the black Gesso to add the Great Tree...and if you look closely, you can see a couple of gray trees on either side. These were done by mixing black and white Gesso. 

I got people involved by asking them if they thought I should leave it in black and white or add colour. Everyone suggested I leave it as is...so I did. However, out of artistic curiosity, I may do a similar one and see what it looks like in colour...
perhaps a purple wash. We'll see... and I'll keep you posted, of course.

In the afternoon, I went to acrylics. This started out to be something entirely different but I wasn't happy with the way it was turning out so I completely reworked it. As Bob Ross was fond of saying, "Artists don't make mistakes. They have 'happy accidents!' and that is what I had. Here is the finished work. 

I showed it to one of the staff and asked her what she might call the picture. She suggested Burbot (a fish I had not heard of before). I said I was thinking of calling it Flying Fish and she said well how about Flying Burbot...so that's what it is named. I looked up Burbot and, in case you are as unfamiliar with the fish species as I was, here's a picture - long and sleek...and does kind of look like the one in my painting.


Although I didn't sell anything, it was an opportunity to introduce a lot more people to my art and I was happy to be able to add two more paintings to my growing portfolio.

I am in the process of outfitting part of our new basement as my "Art Cave". More on that later...

See ya, eh!

Bob

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