painted skies this morning, burnished with gold
a sunrise so beautiful it could only be met in silence
a slight shift to the right, away from the golden light, the colours were muted yet intense... a contradiction, but nature follows her own rules
later, a walk along the river
slanted sunlight sparkled across the open water and snowy ice creating shadows contrast that made the break-up ice stand out clearly from the rest
near the end was the "Klondike", one of the last sternwheelers to make the trip from whitehorse to dawson and back again
(interestingly, the freight on the very last run to dawson each year before freeze-up was 100% liquor!)
thinking ahead to work i'm planning had me looking closely at the architectural elements and converting the images to "noir" to highlight them further
(noir is a little more intense than black & white)
close-ups of the ship boards revealed interesting textures where the paint was peeling
another of the backgrounds that has been in the works - this one is long, thin strips of river map drawings taken from my yukon river book, glued down with matte medium
next up is watercolour paint and gesso, tomorrow i'll sand it and do another coat of gesso and then see how it looks - aiming for a background evocative of the sides of the boats
i'm enjoying working on these backgrounds though it's a bit of a slow, drawn out process so in the meanwhile i've been keeping on with some small collages - below is one where i put together two strips of torn watercolour paper for a sky, an off-cut from an image in the book for the land and a torn piece of scrim that had gesso and dark watercolour paint for snow
these little compositions don't come easily for me but once in a while i get a gem
three more weeks here before i head home and so much to see and do before then
3 comments:
It all looks beautifully connected, doesn't it!
Old ships are full of fascinating textures...
Using the strips of maps for the base to create the worn textures of a boat is a brilliant idea. I can see the resemblance even before you add anything else. And those little snowy collage scenes are delightful. Your creative mind seems to be in excellent working order! Another three weeks! You won't be home for your birthday then?
I know you're working with limited resources while you're in the Yukon and it's amazing what you've been able to create. Sometimes necessity makes us think outside the box more and you're living proof of that.
Such a beautiful sunrise! I don't know if you're seeing the northern lights where you are (I assume so?) but it seems there was a spectacle here last night. Of course I missed it (even though I doubt it could be seen in our town because of all the light...outside of town it was incredible apparently).
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