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Young Cedar in Snow

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  "Young Cedar in Snow" oil on birch panel 6x6 in. 26 December 2024  found me at our place in Bishops Mills on my 74th birthday, and my goal for the day was to accomplish another in the series of annual "birthday paintings." Last year this time, it was raining on the snow, and I was sheltering in a friend's car to paint a wetland scene with heavy sunset clouds. This year I was happy to be free to trudge out in the snow along the path "out back" at -7C with no precipitation, pulling a sled loaded with my painting gear and blankets, and reminiscing of the years when I boasted to Fred that any temperature above -20C was not cold enough for winter outdoor painting.   I have learned over many years of painting "en plein air," that I lose much less body heat when wrapped in a blanket to sit on the snow, than I would, standing at an easel - no matter how many clothes I have on. This is the first time I've used our sturdy high-sided "Pelican...
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Bissett Creek Waterslide

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      August 4, 2023 finds me on the bank of Bissett Creek, 16.2 km west of Stonecliffe Ontario, painting the alternate ribbons of white foam and silky dark water of a sloped waterfall. This is the week of DRAW (Dumoine River Artists for Wilderness) camp. John McDonnell of Canadian Parks & Wilderness Society - Ottawa Valley, writes:  "Only 18 km separate the Ottawa Valley's two largest protected areas, Algonquin Park in Ontario and the Dumoine River Aquatic Reserve in Quebec. CPAWS-OV is working to fill this 'gap' in protection to ensure that species like moose, bear and wolves can continue to thrive and migrate across this landscape. Almost all this area is publicly owned Crown Land, where there is currently little to no development. CPAWS-OV hopes to see this area protected before development forecloses the opportunity. Bissett and Grant Creeks, on the south side of the Ottawa River, embrace an area rich in forests and wetlands, and offer a direct connection...
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Outfall at Nuclear Beach

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Outfall at Nuclear Beach (oil on birch panel 11x14 in.) 24 January 2024 finds me starting a plein air painting on the icy shore of Lake Ontario, near Pulaski, New York, looking east across Mexico Bay toward the cooling stack of the Nine Mile Point nuclear power station.  I have set myself up to paint on a low ice shelf close to the water, near a bank of amazing ice cobbles tumbled smooth in the waves of a recent storm. At my feet a creek is running free from beneath its silent sheets of ice, along a high barrier of storm-piled frozen wave-spray mixed with ice cobbles. The gentle swells moving in from Lake Ontario splash against ice covered boulders where it finally meets the lake. After I took my initial reference photos, cousin Delos who had guided me here to his favourite spot for photographing sunsets, departed to prepare supper.  By the time I had decided on a painting spot and arranged my plein air studio, the dark clouds on the horizon had lightened, spreading across Me...
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