A Brush with Life - Issue #8 Falling on Golden Light

September, with its golden light, breaks into dashes of warm hues that come cascading down through my imagination onto large canvases. I cannot stop them - even if I wanted to try which, of course, I do not! I will start teaching oil painting classes next week. The students are more than ready to begin working in their intimate group where souls are laid bare onto their unfinished canvases. We have a mutual drive as teacher and students - to paint and to paint the very best that we can. To even begin to be familiar with the oil painting process takes about 2.5 years. But a painter never stops learn - never. Many painters, Cezanne for one, get to the end of their lives and feel like they are just beginning their best work. The golden light of fall and early winter always reminds, even more than the other seasons, that time waits for no one. So my files of reference material, plein air painting sketches and painting studies for the fall to spring studio work is waiting no more. I shall begin!

Work-in-progress on the easel

We have come to an uneasy truce this canvas and I. We both agree that the painting has progressed far enough to avoid the scrapping of a large palette knife but it still has a small painting problem to resolve. Neither of us will confess to which wee problem it is and we suspect you will likely not notice unless we spill the paint. And that’s NOT going to happen! Is it canvas?

References from the Studio Folder

Some place between here...

And here...

there is a large painting just waiting to be revealed.

There is also this refence, captured during a much need hike after three days of having to stay in doors because of the bad air quality. I have been angling up to a perfect composition for a larger painting of this view for several years. This one just might do it!

These are just a couple of ideas. There are more of course. But we have months ahead to anticipate what else might find its way to my easel. However, here is a process and completed work from another year.

Saturna Island and rendering overlapping memories | Creative Potager

Mid-August brings blackberries, hanging fruit and puffs of dust as our sandal clad feet catch the spots where grass has given way to daily meanderings. The farm geese play watch dog and the cows search for shade under a large maple. As we find our way up on the large porch, floor planks register the…

This will be one of the works in the solo exhibition “Between Islands and the Salish Sea” at the Galiano Library opening September 12, 2018on Galiano Island.

The selected works can be previewed now in an online collection …

Art by Terrill Welch  | Artwork Archive

View the full portfolio of artwork from Terrill Welch

Opinion Piece

There is a question that I get asked repeatedly. In fact, so often that I have written an article about the topic - how do you come up with a price for your work?

I can tell you the details of comparative market research on an international art market. I can tell you the details of bracketing sizes and square inch pricing so that there are standard prices across media, materials and size ranges. But, even over the internet, I can see your eyes starting to glaze over. So, since my body of work recently had an increase in price, here are the best bits to understanding the pricing of my work...

Terrill Welch paintings – they ain’t cheap are they? | Creative Potager

This morning as I was painting the edges on two new paintings that are now released on my website at Terrill Welch Artist, I thought of a recent comment I accidentally heard being proclaimed in front of my display at our local Mayne Island Farmers' Market a few weeks ago - they ain't cheap are…

What I’m Reading

For the second time, THE BREAK OF DAY by Sidonie-Gabrielle Colette, first published in 1928 as La Naissance du Jour in France. I am reading a 2001 English translation with an introduction by Judith Thurman. What has me reading this book again is Colette’s ability to get us to understand the signficance of a moment with just a few impressionistic lines...

“The open windows let in the smell of the melon rinds floating on the water of the port; between two parts of a tango, a long sigh announced that a wave, born far out at sea, had just died within a paces of us.”

Prose such a this should definitely be given more than one sitting!

I did write a more complete review of THE BREAK OF DAY which I will provide. But if you intend on reading it soon yourself, maybe wait to read my thoughts when you have finished.

The Crone’s Passion  | Creative Potager

The Crone’s Passion – a woman’s story (a longer than usual read) I read an invitation I received from Hystersisters to participate in the Bloom study: “The primary purpose of this study is to determine the safety and effectiveness of LibiGel®, an investigational medication for Hypoactive Sexual Desire Disorder (HSDD).” Today, I savoured the last…

Do whatever you do with freedom and joy!

Until Next Time!

Canadian Contemporary Artist Terrill Welch | Landscapes and more by impressionist painter Terrill Welch

Landscapes and more by impressionist painter Terrill Welch