The Rebellious Curator

Poppy Field

I love the idea of looking through grass from this point of view with all of its colour, textures and shapes. It takes a lot of thin layering to achieve any kind of depth and even then it never seems enough. There are probably a thousand shades of green and brown in any one field of grass. 

Spring

This is a semi-abstract loosely depicting flowers coming up in the early Spring. I was looking to describe the way flowers start out kind of bent over and then begin to reach up toward the sun. Florals are typically not my go-to and I rarely paint them.

Tending Fire

There was a time a few years ago, when my friend and I hiked almost weekly in the Golden Ears back- country even during the cold Winter months. This painting was greatly inspired by the incredible views of thick forested areas and foggy Winter skies. We talked a lot about trying our hand at setting up a fire but never got around to it. So there in the foreground of the snowline, and at the edge of the forest, I placed a person tending a fire in the bright moonlight just the way I imagined it. 

Winter Trail

I was trying different things with this painting, not all worked out well. I wanted to pick up a few linear shapes within the trees and simplify as much as possible. The wintery trail lies in center of the painting and directs the viewer's eye down the snow-covered path to the midground where it seems to end. At this point, we don't know which way the path leads - left or right? That is up to the viewer to decide.

Red Barn

I wanted to focus on the large stormy sky and used a lot of solvent to create a watercolour effect. The small red barns in the distance brought it all to scale. I added a bit of green to the foreground still water to keep it from looking too similar to the sky. 

Haunted Treehouse

I wanted to depict a treehouse at night that felt whimsical, but also had a sense of mystery. I was going for semi-abstract using a combination of linear and organic shapes, along with various contrasts to create tension. A strong sense of out-of-frame moon-light, and bits of pink and purple are my favourite parts. Not everyone's cup of tea, but a fun exercise in colour and shapes.

When Yellow Leaves, or none, or few do Fall

This painting was stolen right off the wall of the studio stairwell in 2005. At the time, I was teaching in one room, and another instructor was teaching in another room. I think both our doors were closed. When I came out, the painting was gone. To this day, we have no idea who took it, and I never saw it again. It was one of my favourites, so I hope someone is enjoying it somewhere:)

Pond Reflections

This was one of those paintings where everything went right. I think I completed it within a couple of hours in one session of painting. I had a few colours in mind and then just let the blending and mark-making take over. I knew I wanted a strong sense of light and shadow, and the idea that it could be nightime or early morning/dusk. The small bits of pink were key and I felt added a little bit of magic.

I tried to replicate this painting using another colour palette and failed miserably. Interesting how the right combination of feeling and magic seems to happen very very rarely. At least for me it does.

I went through a phase of painting full moons in pastoral landscapes and overall, painted a large number of them on small or medium-sized canvases. Always the hilly landscape, with foreground long grass and a few stars. I'd love to know if there was meaning behind why I did these because to this day, I don't know why I felt the need to paint so many full moons and grass..

Cold Night, Baker

At one point, I discovered the black gessoed canvas, and I had so much fun building contrast. I wanted to capture a very cold night, and the moonlit mountain on a clear night was easy to achieve on black. Most, if not all of my Baker paintings were not painted from reference photos, so there may be imperfections on the mountainline because they were just based on my memory.