Private Mural - 6 (Complete!)

It's finished!

~Geoff

Private Mural - 5

The ship is complete...

 

~Geoff

Private Mural - 4

Another update... the sky and ground are nearing completion...

~Geoff

Private Mural - 3

The sky, water and ground are almost complete. Next I will be adding a ship in the water...

~Geoff

Private Mural - 2

Some more photos of the in-progess private mural.

~Geoff

Private mural

I've put housebuilding on the back burner for a while so I can concentrate on some art-related projects. The first of these is a mural in a private home.

The mural is in on the side wall of a stairwell so I've set up staging to work from.

Here are the first photos with more to follow in the days to come.

~Geoff

Art, Music and the Sounds of Construction

It's been a while since I've posted. Building a house will do that to a guy.

We began construction of our new home in November. Today, just over three and a half months later, we are at the stage where we can almost move in. It's been a marathon with zero hours left in the day for artmaking.

However, over the holidays I was able to take some time off to design an image for the East Tennessee State University Department of Music's Spring Concert Brochure.

Here's how it turned out...

Front Cover

Inside -- Page 9

Inside back cover

The full program will soon be posted online at the ETSU website: http://www.etsu.edu/cas/music/

That's all for now. Short, but sweet.

~Geoff

Big Balls

For a long time I've had the idea to do something sculptural with one of the giant steel buoys that I've seen around from time to time, washed up on the beach. I put the word out to some friends, and it wasn't long before Mike Leblanc (welder, fabricator, all around great guy) had located two of them for use.

I entered a plan for one of them in the National Sculpture Competition at Kingsbrae Gardens, and was picked as an entry. All of a sudden, I had to get this thing done! So, despite the crappy May weather, under tent and tarp, it began to take shape.

These old buoys have a cool history. They were origionally created in WWII to moor convoy ships to, before they carried supplies to Britain. They also held up the submarine nets that protected our harbours. More recently, they were used by the aquaculture industry to anchor cage sites.

I wanted to pay homage to the past, while giving a buoy a new life. So I painted the buoy to look as though it had a big tear in it, and painted my 2 year old daughter inside looking out, holding flowers.

Everyone seems to like it!

The Kingsbrae staff helped wrestle it up to the garden to put in its place for the competition. They placed it in the pond at the bottom of the garden, a spot that I think suits the sculpture well.



 I look forward to the response from the public.

~Geoff

Art Show Opening this Friday

My new show - inspiRED, Charlotte County, opens on Friday July 2nd, 2010 at Sunbury Shores Arts & Nature Centre, 139 Water Street, St. Andrews, NB. The exhibit continues until August 4th.


For a sneak peak, click on the photo below...

InspiRED by St. Andrews

I just completed one of the large graphite works for my upcoming show in July. It is called The Red Rail, and depicts a large wooden sardine carrier on a marine rail lift, waiting for the tide to come in.



This boat does not represent any one boat. It is a boat that I have made up, based on the reading of the book Masts and Masters by John D. Gilman. A friend gave me the book on loan to read, and it has inspired a few images for this show.



This boat was originally a sailing vessel, but has just been fitted out with its first engine. Because early engines were largely unreliable, and their masters didn't trust them, all sails and rigging were left in place. I would say that this image fits in around 1910, a few years before WWI. It wasn't for another 20 years that the centre mast was removed, and a pilot house was placed on the back part of the boat.

This boat is about 75 feet long, and would carry 80 hogsheads of fish. When not in use for hauling fish, the vessel would be used to haul freight up and down the coast of this area. Sitting in a cradle, on the marine rail lift, really shoes off the graceful lines of these vessels. They were very elegant ships, and I'm sure their Masters and crews took great pride in them.

Peace,
Geoff

Acrylic

I started the day up at the High School, working with some of the students on some creative options for a festival they are planning. I did a presentation to them on the planning process I go through to create murals. They seem eager to start... I can't wait to see some of the ideas they come up with.

In the afternoon, I went outside to paint. It was warm enough to do some work with acrylics, so I headed down to the point to do a painting of Passamaquoddy Bay. I set up looking east, behind a stand of evergreens. Sometimes I find it nice to paint through a screen of trees with the tangled branches and needles partially blocking the view of the main subject matter. It can make for a much more interesting painting, if you don't overdo it.

It was a clear sunny day, and the colours were really "popping". I painted from under the shelter of my truck's topper, so I could observe the colours, without the sun directly in my face.

It will take me a couple of paintings to get dialed in again to working outside with acrylics (it always does) but overall I'm pleased with the results.

Geoff

Sunshine!!

Here are a couple of paintings from one of the nicest March days that I have ever seen in these parts. It must have been 10 degrees out there today!

The first painting is from the point in town, looking across Passamaquoddy Bay to the south. Campobello Island is the nearest landform, with the coast of Maine trailing off in the distance.
It is low tide.

The second painting, done in the afternoon close to high tide, was painted at Chamcook Harbour.

The view is to the east, with the North tip of Ministers Island, with its large sandbar, just peeking out on the right side of the composition.

Tomorrow will be just as nice out, so I hope to get in some riding with my painting.

Geoff

Another Grey Day

Well, at least it is warm out!


I took advantage of the warm temperatures this morning to install the Groom Insurance Mural. With my buddy Kurt's help, we popped the topper off my truck, and wrestled the mural from my home, to its place downtown. We took down the old fence, and put up the new muralized one in no time at all. Thanks Kurt!




With that done, it was time to paint! I went right down to Market Square at high tide, and set up with the view looking out at the wharf, to the south-west. Another grey sky made for some muted light conditions. In the distance, the coast of Maine can be seen peeking out from behind Navy Island, which dominates the middle-ground of this composition.



Afterwards, I grabbed the single speed to test my fitness on Greenlaw Mountain for the first time this year. This is by far the earliest that I have ever been able to bike up the mountain, and it felt great to do some hard climbing on my favorite ride. The skiing I did this winter served me well, and I would say my fitness is up, compared to most springs. I suffered, but you always suffer on a single speed... and made it up without stepping off. Coming back down the mountain was, as always, awesome!

I hope to get out for a ride in the morning, we'll see what the weather holds in store.

Geoff

A Touch Of Red

The last couple of days have been spent indoors working on some graphites for an upcoming show. "InspiRED, St Andrews" will be opening at Sunbury Shores in July, a date that is fast approaching!

"Red Wave with Buoy "was inspired by the many buoys that wash up on shore in these parts. This one is made of wood. I like to find the wooden ones; they have become harder to find since modern floats are made from styrofoam and plastic. I find this to be a successful piece for a couple of reasons...

The angle of the buoy allows for it to sit dead centre without looking overpowering to the rest of the composition. The rope tied to the buoy goes off the page, at an angle, and is tied to something unknown, creating tension.

The second work is called "Red Dulce" and is a view of the land and sea to the north of the end of Bar Road. At low tide some interesting rock formations are exposed to explore, and some are covered in dulce. I chose to highlight the dulce as a compositional balance to the three mountains(Greenlaw, Chamcook, Grimmers), that are so dominant in the background.

If tomorrow is nice, I'll be back outside to paint.

Geoff

After One...Canada 1, USA 0

I have a few minutes after the first, so here it goes!

I did a painting from the boat launch at 1:30, just as the tide was on the way out. The visibility was about 300 metres, and so Maine was invisible today. It continues to be crazy-warm, and freezing paint is not a problem.




There were a few boats in the harbour today as it was too foggy to be out dragging for scallops.


Actually, everyone is watching the Good ol' Hockey Game... and so am I!!!


Later
Geoff

Nor'easter

So I started the day with a trip out to the point to check out the waves. A strong wind was blowing from the northeast, and that makes for some cool surf, especially at high tide. I found that I could shelter myself from the wind and spray with the van tailgate up, so I stood there and did a painting.



Looking at it this evening, I think it captures the feeling of the storm this morning quite well!

Afterwards, I went to the gym at the Algonquin for my physical fix, then lunch, and back out to paint some more in the early afternoon.

This time, I set up in the same area at the point, but facing the other way... towards Maine.
The rain had stopped at this point, and the tide was on the way out. A thin grey mist was hanging out over the water, making the coastlines of Maine and Canada both appear, and then disappear. I chose the show them faintly, as that is the way they were most of the time. A lot of water had fallen from the sky, and was washed up on shore with the winds at high tide. I stood in salty puddles to do the painting. I love the colours in this painting; all in all, quite effective.



It started to snow at about 5pm. The good news is that if it sticks, I can go skiing; the bad news is that the snow makes the satellite ineffective, so no Canada hockey game.


I'd rather ski anyway... :)

Geoff