INTRODUCTION TO MY STUDIO

 My Studio Located at the Corner of the Garage and Me After Shoveling a Walkway to the Woodpile

Today is February 12, 2011 and outside my studio it is icy cold - the temperature some where in the -20's - the snow is slightly falling.  However, after splitting some kindle and toting in an armful  of frozen wood, the inside of my studio is beginning to feel quite balmy.  At times, because the wood stove is larger than necessary to heat my studio, I sometimes take my shirt off, kick back and have a cold beer.  If I shut my eyes, I can almost imagine I'm lying on a faraway beach, the raucous calls of gulls circling, the lap of the frothy waves bursting along the shore overheard and feel the sun bathing my body with luxuriant warmth.  Such a dreamer am I or so I've been told many times.

Over the years, I've had many a studio and often times I've thought this will be the last - I'll never move again; just spend my time creating objets d'art.  Somewhere in my bloodline must have lived a gypsy or a Serengeti nomad because my feet have always itched and they seem to be continually on the move.  I've painted in basements with no windows; only my imagination to brighten the small rooms, stables with dirt floors, the nickering of horses to keep me company and perhaps the smallest studio (5'x5'x5'8" high) and my favourite was aboard my sailboat Dreamer II, which was constantly moving; the smell of the sea forever beckoning.  And now I'm here on 50 acres surrounded by wilderness; wild bear, moose, deer, coyote, fox and skunk to mention a few, are often seen crossing the meadow at the back of our big old house, where I live with my wife Sarah and her two daughters Rachel (16) and Jessica (10).  At 69 years of age and 70 just approaching over the sunlit horizon, I can't help but wonder if this will be last studio - my feet unable to roam any more.  Don't get me wrong, I love it here in Fosterville, New Brunswick - where the first of my skinny white-legged forefathers landed hundreds of years ago.

As I look about my studio walls, many of the paintings hanging there are of a nautical nature and as I gaze at a watercolor of Dreamer II, which I painted while she lay at anchor in Desolation Sound on the west coast of BC, I can remember saying to someone, "One day, all I'll have left of Dreamer is this painting and my memories."  Looks like that day, after living on her for 25 years, has finally arrived.  The painting hangs alongside another sailboat (Dove III) that I crewed aboard for 7 1/2 months, when she sailed from Nanaimo, BC to Pangnirtung on Baffin Island through the legendary Northwest Passage.  I believe I drew about 70 pen and ink sketches of that voyage, which were used to illustrate a book I wrote called Arctic Odyssey; most of the drawings coming to life (from photos) in my "smallest studio" aboard Dreamer II.

One thing I've learned over the years, it's not the size of a studio, the abundance of materials available or being broke because whatever exists within me, whether it be through pencil, pen and ink scratches, a brush splashing across a canvas or words written upon a piece of paper, it always seems to discover a way for me to bring it to a life of its own.  I love the magic when it occurs; studio walls no longer confining me; lost in the abyss of my imagination and creativity, like blood it courses through my veins.

Time for a little magic - cheers - eh!

 

My "Smallest Studio"

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