Karstad Biodiversity Paintings: adventures in the colour of Canada

Dumoine Interface (oil on canvas 14x18 in.) 4 August, 2017 found me at Red Pine Rapids, the south end of Robinson Lake on the Dumoine River, where Vic Dohar and I were taken by canoe in search of subjects to paint. Facing upstream from the landing spot, I was fascinated by the play of shapes in the rocks and water, along the shore. On 23 October, this painting will be part of a silent auction at the annual CPAWS gala , of the donated works of the  art camp participants.

oil on canvas 12x16 in. $960 July 22, 2016 found me just getting up for breakfast at our Bio-blitz camp on the shore of Robinson Lake on the Dumoine River, ZEC Dumoine, Quebec. The sun was breaking through the clouds to illuminate the last of the lake mist, just drifting off the trees and reflecting itself in the mirror-still lake - but soon our hopes for a sunny day would be dampened entirely by heavy cloud and intermittent drizzle. I photographed the lake, with Pickerel weed leaves making angled reflections near shore, and the floating lily pads of Water Shield farther out on its glass-smooth surface. The subtle mood of the scene, although enchanting, would change in only a few minutes - too ephemeral for me to get my gear out and set up to paint it - so I decided to photograph it to paint later, and hike off to explore La Grande Chute for potential painting spots. I took my painting umbrella in case of showers - at first it served well as a walking stick, on the narrow undu...

oil on canvas 8x8 in.       $400 19 March 2017 found me discovering a scene to paint, among the branches of White Cedar, south-east of our house in Bishops Mills, Ontario. This is a line of Cedars between a brushy old field and a natural clearing that Fred calls the "nutrient depletion glade". This is a project to preserve the historic character of our agriculture-impoverished, shallow-soil parkland - at least in one place - while elsewhere our land management activities gradually add nutrients.  The shallow soil over bedrock was thoroughly stripped of nutrients by grazing livestock.

"Musquash Bog" oil on canvas 36 x 24 in. 8 July 2013 found me wandering about, entranced, in the most beautiful bog I've ever seen - near Gooseberry Road, Musquash, New Brunswick. From the photos that I took that day, I painted the botanical detail,  "Cloudberry Kiss" , a portrait of a ripe "Bakeapple" berry, traditionally harvested here by local residents.

"Cardinalflower in Shade" (oil on canvas 10 x 20 in. framed) 6 August 2016 found me rejoicing over flaming spikes of Cardinalflowers in bloom on a steep creekbank thick with Buttonbush and Decadon , near its outlet into  Upper Rock Lake at Opinicon Road, 8 kilometres northwest of Battersea, Ontario. We had just come from helping staff and volunteers of Nature Conservancy Canada in a cleanup bee at the old cottage site on Fishing Lake, where we'd discovered the rare freshwater mussel Ligumia nasuta in 2015. Now, as Fred walked the shore of Upper Rock Lake for mussels and snails (finding a couple of Pyganodon grandis mussel shells, a couple of Brown Mystery snails,  Campeloma decisum , and a dozen adult Banded Mystery Snails, Viviparus georgianus - strangely "peeled" by a predator).... I photographed the Cardinalflowers for a painting. Photographing them in the direct sunlight did not work. The red was too bright for the camera, and glared out to or...

                                             oil on canvas 5 x 8 in  $275 1 February 2017 finds me sitting on my painting caddy in the snow, in front of the Sports Car Factory in Hallville, Ontario, working on the first painting in what I hope will be a series - of one of my favourite anthropogenic places in eastern Ontario.  Rather like a museum, both inside and out,  there are old cars and parts of cars leaning against walls, and parked and piled by the Ashes, Elms, and Apples around the perimeter of the yard. A monstrous ancient tractor parked in a sunny corner on the south side of the building, waits like a patient draft horse until it is wanted for pushing snow or rearranging old Jaguars, Austins, Mercedes, and Landrovers collected for parts. I love wandering about with my camera, capturing images of curved metal of various antiquity,...

"Sydenham Woods" oil on canvas 12 x 24 in. 22 September 2016  found me painting the slope of a forested ridge, southeast of Alvinston, Ontario. Yesterday we drove in to a waypoint we'd been given, thinking it was a rendezvous with the Ontario Nature field team, driving in along the narrow track through mature Carolinean forest to prospect for a painting site. We drove back out again to find the field party on the opposite side of the river, and there I painted the Sydenham Sycamore . So on this day we parked outside the woods and walked in to the site we'd selected for the second commissioned painting - the trunk of a majestic Burr Oak, the great smooth trunk forking above my head, and the scene looking down through the sun-splashed woods toward the unseen Sydenham River.