Mdina and Valletta, Malta

In Mdina, the colour of the buildings, wrought iron details, Christian iconography and the lovely architecture made it an especially pretty place to visit.


In Valletta I visited the most elaborately ornate cathedral I've ever seen - St. John's Co-Cathedral, where over 400 Knights of Malta are buried beneath the floor's colourful marble inlays. The carved stone statuary are amongst the most intricate I've seen, and the whole place sparkles with an abundance of gold leaf over carved wood detail. Treasures of the Co-Cathedral include two large paintings by Caravaggio, including The Beheading of St. John the Baptist. The Co-Cathedral is a definite 'must-see' if you ever have the good fortune to visit Malta.

Henry the Navigator

This is one of my favourite images from Lisbon - this monument at the water's edge dedicated to Henry the Navigator. Born at the end of the 14th century, Prince Henrique was the third son of the King of Portugal; he established a school for navigation that led to the creation of the caravel, a lighter vessel that could travel faster and further. He is most famous for organizing and financing voyages of discovery that included the rounding of Africa and establishment of sea routes to the Indies.

I can only imagine how exciting it must have been to be a participant in the discovery of new lands and cultures and all the possibilities engendered.

Bermuda Pic

Bermuda

The last beach of my trip before I disembark in New York and fly home. It was a lovely day in a lovely place.

This time next week, I hope to have begun some new works to share with you. I'm thrilled to have had the opportunity to see many sights, to have had many enjoyable adventures and to have met the lovely folks I have over this past month. The positive energy I've basked in will surely inspire a new period of creativity for me.

Ciao

Madiera

A beautiful place to visit all year around, but lucky me - when I was there a few days ago, the Jacaranda trees were blooming.


Had a delightful day soaking up the ambiance of the island; strolling through flower strewn Funchal, enjoying a meal at a lovely outdoor cafe, and partaking of the famous basket ride that sends one (or two in our case) down a steep two kilometre road in a wicker settee with crude skis attached; two straw hat-clad Madierians run behind, pushing this unlikely vehicle until it achieves quite a clip before jumping on the back of the skis to steer, and brake (by dragging their feet and leaning waaaaaay back) - an unusual thrill ride made even more so by the odour of burning wood (the friction against the skis!) and the cars and buses sharing the same road and zipping along cross streets!


An enchanting end to the day was seeing a replica of Christopher Columbus' Santa Maria sail across the harbour.

Lisbon Pic

Lisbon

I've had trouble posting from the ship, so I'm several countries behind. Here's a wee castle in Lisbon, where I was yesterday. Lisbon, Sintra, and Cascais, Portugal - all beautiful in yesterday's glorious sunny weather and warm temperature. The views, the architecture, the food, cleanliness, and the charm of it all beckons me back - I'll definitely be back.

Sochi, Russia

The site of the upcoming 2014 Winter Olympics - they have a ways to go to prepare for the world visiting their City. 1200 tourists from our ship flooded the city in search of adventure, postcards, and 2014 T-shirts; sadly, none of the above were to be found. The museums and other sights were locked up tighter than a monkey's you-know-what, despite it being a Monday; long waits to get in while guides used their cellphones to contact officials and interpreters with keys. Quite a bit of grumbling amongst passengers who were looking forward to the port.

Here's the hot sulfur spring at Sochi's most famous resort - the Matsesta, where Stalin used to come for therapeutic treatments. The locals believe these sulfur waters are capable of near miraculous cures for many ailments.

Kapadokya, Turkey

I am fortunate enough to be on an adventure that began a few days ago in Ankara, Turkey. Last night I arrived at my hotel in Kapadokya in the dark of night and when I opened the curtains of my room this morning, the view of this other-worldly landscape took my breathe away. The tufa hills on the left were carved into dwellings by the people of Kapadokya nearly two thousand years ago - they must be the world's first condominiums.

If you look closely, you can see a hot air balloon in the distance, up to watch the sunrise.

No more images this week

OK, I didn't quite manage to get any more work done on Circumnavigate, but that's only because I had a date with the Easter Bunny and now I'm sitting at an airport waiting for my next flights that will eventually get me to Turkey. I'm going to see if my clever cousin Craig will be able to help me post images of my adventure once I board the ship. So stay tuned ...

A little progress

After I've done the ho-hum work on the underpainting, these dry-brush layers are my favourite to apply as they bring out a time-worn sense of depth to the images. The wee houses begin to take on personalities and I get a sense of the character of the occupants as they lean upon and support one another. Another layer of colour for the rooftops and some outlining is left to be done before I begin the next cut wood layer to fill the gaping circle. Hopefully I'll get a bit more done and post an image before my upcoming month-long hiatus. Cheers!

New on the easel - Circumnavigate

I had an idea for the word "Circumnavigate" for Leap's Play on Words show last month, but didn't have time to get started on it until after the show was over. I started the new work last week, sketching out the 28 houses around the edge of the piece, cutting the wood with a box cutter, priming, and then outlining the house shapes.
Here's today's progress.

A Visual Language

Last week I was the featured artist for First Thursday Artist Talk at the Surrey Art Gallery. The topic was my symbolic use of colour, pattern, numbers and archetypes in my series With Sturdy Shoes. Thanks to the timely advice of an acquaintance who is a keynote speaker involved with Toastmasters, I was able to overcome my abject fear of public speaking and spoke with ease about my work in front of the audience - thank you David Bayley!

For nearly 10 years now I've incorporated the symbolic elements mentioned above in my works and over time they've evolved into a visual language that expresses the deeper meanings behind my images. For the benefit of interested folks attending my exhibitions, I have a binder filled with images of my works together with the interpretation of the symbolism I've used; when I sell a work or print I give a copy to the purchaser. Collectors and viewers have expressed a great appreciation for my interpretations - I hope you enjoy this one for Mask:
This work is a celebration of diversity within community: there are seven houses in a row - they represent the seven days of the week and therefore every day - they refer to every day in the community they form, leaning against one another for support; the many leaves behind the houses represent growth - emotional, intellectual, and spiritual growth that paves the way for understanding and tolerance; the leaves are all the colours of the rainbow, representing the diverse members of the community living together in harmony despite differences of ethnicity, religion, culture, politics, socio-economic situations, and physical and mental abilities. The foundation layer is covered in gold leaf as an homage to the mask traditions of Venice. The similarity of the houses mask the underlying diversity.

Angled View

Here's Mask at an angle showing a better view of the grommets and copper wire; this shot also shows the richness of the gold leaf.

Completed Mask

Here's an update from several posts ago (early-mid-January). The completed Mask with 3 separate layers of visible surface, grommets, and copper wire. I used gold leaf for the background foundation layer; it appears much richer in indoor lighting than it does here in natural light. With the reflective qualities of the gold leaf, the intensity of the gold colour changes according to the light cast upon it at different times of the day.

Eagles in the City

The media launch for the BC Lions Society project Eagles in the City was yesterday morning. Native blessings, Mayor Sam Sullivan, President of the Board of Trade, President of the BC Lions Society, unveiling the eagle, native artist Jody Broomfield begins painting his eagle, dozens of media people are there filming, photographing, interviewing. Here's a link to the Province newspaper's article from this morning.

Stay tuned ... my A&A Contract Customs Broker sponsored eagle won't arrive at my studio door for a few months yet, but here I am standing next to the first one off the production line.

Finished the 6 works for Play on Words

I was in a bit of a tizzy on the weekend, finishing touches and 2 clear topcoats on all 6 works - in all the chaos I forgot to take photos before hanging them in the gallery Monday. I'll take and post photos later in the week; if you'd like to see them in person, contact me for information about this weekend's opening reception.

Cheers!

Back from Cabo

I'm back in the studio now that I've had a lovely sunny break from the rain, snow, rain, snow, more rain and more snow and rain weather pattern we've had lately in Vancouver. I'm refreshed enough to conquer the challenges of finishing and varnishing 6 works for hanging in the gallery this Monday(!!!).

See ya later!

I'll be out of the loop for the next 10 days. I'll have new images for you after that.

Cheers!

Concentric - finished!

Sorry about the slightly blurry and keyholed image. I've added more detail and contrast to the wings, removed the row of houses from the dress of the smallest figure, as it drew the eye downward further than I'd like, and distracted from the leaf. The full title is Concentric: Maternal Generations With Sturdy Shoes.

Concentric - progress continues

Today it was all about the wings.

Concentric - progress continues

I know it doesn't look like much progress, however I've added another two coats of pale colour to the women's arms, cross-hatching of cerulean blue over four coats of cobalt blue over three coats of ultramarine blue; an orange glaze over the red background, two glaze coats over the wings and two more coats of sienna/burnt umber to the hair. The size of the canvas makes this a slow process, but I'm pleased with how it's coming along.

Concentric (detail)

And now the fun part begins - bringing some life in the way of colour and movement to the image.

The weekend's progress

Concentric update

Here's today's progress. The image illustrates 7 generations of women; the arms of the previous generation forms the ribs of the current generation and their feet, stacked atop one another, form a beehive.

The underpainting for "Concentric"

Here's the underpainting so far - it's 60" x 48". I find it difficult to evaluate the image when I'm standing before such a large canvas in my small studio, however, looking at it here, on my blog, it's instantly apparent where corrections need to be made. I'll sort out the corrections tomorrow and next week I'll start painting in earnest.

Back to the drawing board

I've set Mask aside for a bit and am figuring out the math for Concentric. I'm sure there's some geometric equation that would make this all so much easier - perhaps I should have paid more attention last century when I was in math class ... groan.

Mask, middle layer part 2

Whew ... this was a task: cutting around the edges with a scroll saw; sanding the edges, attacking the nooks and crannies with a box cutter and Exacto blade, more sanding, more exacto cleanup, and sand again. Next I'll be priming the edges, painting them with acrylic, and cleaning up the surface before adding a clear topcoat to the leaves - the centre must be kept free of dust and topcoat to allow for proper adhesion when I add a spacer layer and then the top layer.

Mask, middle layer

Here's the second layer in progress: first, the outline incorporating all the colours of the rainbow (7 - you know how attached I am to the number 7); second, the outline filled in with 3-4 layers of paint to produce a dark base (so many layers because most of the colours I employ are translucent); third, the veins of the leaves are painted in and then layers of gradually lightened colours are applied to give a 3-d look to the leaves; fourth, a detail of the gradual lightening, the red and green leaves are nearly finished while the orange and yellow leaves are not.

Mask/Rant

Today was the first all day studio day of the year, and by gosh and by golly it felt good to be in the midst of creation all day! Here are the stages I completed for the top layer of MASK. I must admit my brain struggled to control my right arm so that I didn't overwork the piece; I thought back to my second semester painting class in college, more than 15 years loooooong ago: I can still hear the instructor, Isabel McAslan, a fiery redhead with an even more fiery temper, yelling at me, "Oh for God's sake, Barbara, LOOSEN UP!" By the time I had finished my fourth semester I had learned to paint loosely but it bored me and lacked a distinctive style. I don't care much for the generic paintings visible on walls of numerous galleries throughout BC - all those atmospheric landscapes in shades of gray and muted earth tones; trees in the mist, etc. YAWN. They could have been painted by any of the dozens of painters attempting to emulate each other's style to create gallery-dictated works for commercial success - you know, those paintings that match the couch. The ancient Egyptians come to mind: their artists' paintings were created in the exact same style for more than 2,000 years, and where did it get them? Mummified into obscurity. Anyway, back to my original story... By my final term in college I had accepted my colourful palette and angular style and had created a body of work that caused my scupture instructor, Kent, (I painted my sculptures and sculpted my paintings) to refer to my style as "Barbarafication". I don't think he necessarily meant it as a positive thing (if you check the link above, you'll see his beautiful works are sleek, minimal, and lacking in colour), however, I was delighted to have my works assessed as bearing an original sstyle. Today I happily embrace "Barbarafication" and all the art-related deviations that created it. Indeed, I often maniacally laugh aloud, ah-ha-ha-ha, and rub my hands together a la Igor of Frankenstein fame, as I irreverently break the "art rules" taught to me in various courses and imagine the disturbed looks upon my instructors' faces. Breaking and twisting those rules allowed me to develop artistically in a way adherence to convention would never allow. Nothing flatters me more than when someone tells me my work is instantly recognizable (actually, I'm more flattered when someone buys my work).

Stay tuned tomorrow for another update.

Mask

Mentally, I've been working on this painting for the Leap Collective exhibition word "MASK" for 2 months. I started it on a smaller board, scrapped it (too small), and now that I've improved the concept and mapped out the process, I'm optimistically starting over again. Here's the wood panel I've drawn my image upon, cut, sanded, gessoed, sanded again, gessoed, sanded again, and finally brushed lines upon. The second image shows the undercoat with the image showing through. This panel will be the top layer of the three panels stacked atop one another to complete the piece.

Segue nearly completed

Here's the painting about 85% complete and a side view showing the wraparound.

Segue continued

Stages 3 and 4