Terrill Welch by herself - issue #9 WAYS OF BEING
As life shapes us with its events, our ways of being shift and change over time. Morning runs have long since vanished from my weekly routine. I have shifted to long walks instead or sometimes even shorter ones. Dragging 24 or so painting off to a show several hours away that require overnight stays and then going back a month later to pick them up holds little appeal - and is it not really very practical. Mostly, out of necessity, I have learned how to get the world to come to me instead. With this has come a deepened intimate sense of place from being at home more and also a reluctance to even take in local events where there are larger crowds of people milling around. I like people and do not mind gatherings. It is just that home is so much more pleasant than anywhere else. Several times a day during these past weeks I have brought total strangers into our house to see paintings after they have been to the gallery pod. I enjoy these exchanges and it doesn’t seem to be a challenge to “host” others for these brief visits into our personal space. I asked David if it was hard for him because, after all, we do share our home. His response was that he enjoyed the visits because he wasn’t required to interact and could observe with a bit of distance from his office or on the side deck. In fact, most times, visitors do not even know he is here and if they do, they kind of whisper “oh, he is working in there.”
Our new life balance is shifting our ways of being in the world that are more mentally spacious and generous in their quiet and alone time. I sense that this will be good for creativity and my painting practice. But we shall see. First, we will continue adjusting to these changes in the daily flow of activities. Then assess again. I have often fantasized about what it would be like to live in a monastery and spend much of my day meditating in solitude. We are now getting really close to this. 😉 How about you? Do you notice persistent changes in your patterns and ways of being over time?
ECLECTICALLY PLEASURABLE
Our complex world encourages us to categorize, limit and define more than ever before. It is like a thin shaving of the-whole-of-things is all we can manage at one time without being confused or falling into a puddle of overwhelmed despair. We have a tendency towards being that toddler who will only consume peanut butter with strawberry jam sandwiches for weeks or even months while ignoring all the other sustenance possibilities. The ruling criteria are familiarity and predictability in that one aspect of our lives so we can explore the rest with gusto!
In art and painting, we tend to put these same types of peanut butter sandwich limitations on ourselves, such as only creating representational or abstract paintings. Or only working in water colours or oils. Or maybe painting only large or small. There are no reasons for these kinds of restrictions other than the preference of the creator. However, there are frequently observations by viewers that seems to highlight these tensions.
I often get comments like “Oh you are doing something new now - this one is quite different” or “have you ever done anything like this before?”
I have to pause and gather myself up to respond to such comments and questions because, after more than 50 years since I was in my first adult painting class, I have experimented with a fast range of material and approaches to a surface. Most often I decide that responses like this have little to do with me and more to do with the viewer trying to decide where to catalogue a work in their own mental reference files. So I will answer vaguely like “it is a little different I suppose” or “yes, I have done this kind of work before but it has been a while.” Then, if they truly seem interested, I go on and share how the artwork fits into my whole and current body of work and why I have painted it. If they have already found that label in their mental filing cabinet and seem satisfied with my first response, I leave the conversation with just my cursory reply.
Not many first time viewers consider that the process of painting just might be my most prominent way of being in the world. This isn’t the case with you though, is it? You know differently from years of reading my artist notes, social media posts, newsletters and studying my work up close, if you happen to have an original in your collection. The engagement of my brush on a surface is another way of breathing for me. Painting nature one brushstroke at a time is essential and offers much more sustenance than peanut butter and strawberry jam sandwiches on white bread.
How did I ever come to develop such an insatiable appetite for observing and being within nature? I can attribute some of this to a rural childhood of course but I think that my time within nature is a self-sustaining loop. Nature consistently gives back more than I need. This replenishing feeds my wellbeing and creative drive like nothing else. My paintings are a continuation of this exchange. These paintings are conversations without technical borders or restrictions of palette, surface or method. After many years of practice, I just happen to have my favourite means to render a subject. Yet sometimes, a specific and less used approach is perfect and creates an outlier from my more common renderings. But these diverse eclectic approaches come from the same place. They are the same intention - to hold a conversation that contributes towards clarity in our complex world.
WHAT I HAVE BEEN PAINTING AND DRY GRASSES
I have a new painting that came about after the large Eagle Bluff wildfire and before the devastating Maui Island wildfire…
On Saturday July 29, 2023 west of Oroville Washington on Eagles Bluff Road a wildfire was reported that became what is called the “Eagle Bluff Wildfire” which eventually devoured over 16,000 acres and spread north from Oroville, Washington and crossed the U.S.A. border into Canada near the town of Osoyoos. I get a call from my son the next morning at just before noon. He and his partner were in Oroville on their way back from a neighbouring state and had planned to stay at their 20 acre property on Eagles Bluff Road only to see flames rolling over the bluff as they came in from the other side of town. Their property actually includes Eagles Bluff (the “S” got dropped when the wildfire was named). They had stayed on the property the night before and their first thought was about whether they had done something that could have started the fire. They hadn’t. In fact, their property was one of the few with very little fire damage at the time of writing this newsletter.
The wild fire had started a little farther down the road and though there is some damage most of the trees will likely survive and the trailer on the property was untouched. Not everyone was so lucky.
The last time I was at the property was the summer of 2010 and even so I had no trouble locating it on the wildfire map. Here is a blog post a out what it was like then:
Terrill Welch
So when I started the “Summer Evening Izabella Point” painting it had followed this event and one of our walks out to Izabella Point and our startling assessment about how dry we were. Under these conditions wildfires come up and take over so fast!
This painting is waiting for its final photograph before I release it next Friday. But it is ready to go. If you are interested just let me know.
“Summer Evening Izabella Point” by Terrill Welch, 16 x 20 inch walnut oil on canvas.
Artist notes: The grasses are dry around the Arbutus trees and have an odd slightly pink hue in the early evening light due to wildfire smoke. Still, the beauty comes through and rests on the shoulders of possibility and if only.
The canvas is raw with scrapped mark making and vigorous brushstrokes that temper what would have otherwise been too pretty a work. Arbutus trees curl around the aged sandstone rocks with roots filtered behind long grasses. The dryness tinges our senses and makes us wish for rain.
Thankfully we have had a tiny bit of rain and a rise in the humidity that now helps create some buffer but it still isn’t much or enough.
Then the wildfire with high winds on Maui happened. Being that Lahaina is a large tourist destination, the loss is felt far and wide beyond the 11,000 people who were evacuated and grieving families and friends for those that lost their lives, homes and businesses.
All this is a reminder that our climate change challenges are not in the future. They are happening now and unfortunately the extreme weather events will get worse because the damage is already baked into the weather patterns due to our previous human choices. Scientists have been warning about these impacts going back to at least 1950. We, as a whole species, with our governing bodies mostly didn’t listen and if we did listen we didn’t act. Now what!?
This is what I was thinking about as I painting this latest painting and paused in the beauty of the moment with the evening light offer its warm glow.
Mayne Island is only just under 5,200 acres and our population of 1,300 balloons to between 3,000-5,000 during the summer where forest and dwellings are integrated. We use to have less risk of forest fires because of being a northern rain forest but lower winter rain fall and repeated summer droughts for several years in a row are having a grave impact on forest moisture and our water table levels. Therefore, we are heavily reliant on everyone’s diligence and fire safety practices. We are collectively vigilant while pausing before the beauty of our landscapes.
The other painting that is now finished and released also has that dry summer feeling to it. I just had it blocked in when I posted in our last issue. It is now completed and released.
“Summer Trail at Saint John Point” by Terrill Welch, 24 x 30 inch oil on canvas.
Artist notes: Dry conditions have turned the wild grasses into faded yellow wisps and the breeze shakes loose Arbutus tree leaves that crackle underfoot along the trail. The summer light is as bleached out as the earth. Yet, with an earthy dust puffing skyward with each step, there is peace and comfort next to this pungent sea.
WHAT I AM WATCHING
I have a couple of go-to YouTube channels that are purely for learning and pleasure. Both give me glimpses into other parts of the world and other cultures. Let me share one video link from each series and, if you like it, then you can subscribe and explore further.
The first is a channel by a long distance motorbike rider called Noraly with the nickname “Itchy Boots”. Noraly is is a Dutch geologist who, in 2018, sold everything and began traveling by motorbike for months at a time. She has ridden over 140,000 km solo so far and travelled through more than 40 countries including up through South America and North America. Right now she is going from North to South Africa and is publishing the most amazing tightly edited videos on Wednesday and Sunday. I love watching her because she often travels in rural locations and spends very little time in cities. She shares the history and current challenges and natural highlights of wherever she is with a smattering of sweet connections with local people. Because of her training as a geologist, there are often something about the terrain and rock formations or lakes and rivers that interests her and so she shares these finds with us. I will share the video link from last Sunday that I had just watched before writing this review…
My second find is a show we often watch while eating our dinner. Philippe Simay is a French philosopher who studies the history of humanity and social sciences and hosts a documentary series “Show me where you live” that I love and was able to find as part of another YouTube channel called TRACKS. This channel has many other offerings so you have to look for the often double episodes by Philippe identifiable by the second part of the video titles “Show me where you live”. I am having a hard time choosing just one video to link for you because they are all amazing and you will understand why once you have watched a few. But let’s go with this one…
Be warned: with both of these YouTube offerings, once I started watching and following newly released content, I was hooked!
WHAT I AM READING
The truth is that I haven’t been reading much except news articles and content to answer specific questions. I do not have a new book beside the bed and only tend to read a few pages of the ones that have been gathering dust since winter. So if you have been reading a particularly excellent novel I would love hear.
WHAT HAS SOLD
Paintings continue to find homes, not necessarily because of my birthday special offering but it has made decisions easier I am sure. During this past month since the last issue, four more paintings have sold. I had so much fun doing the digital room visual representation last time, that I thought I would do it again.
As wonderful as these recent sales are, the revenue, beyond business operational expenses, has been earmarked for our new septic system that is getting closer to be scheduled. I am just grateful that the paintings sales have the capacity to cover more than half of the whopping expense up front. Once done, with proper maintenance, the system should last for another 35 and 40 years before needing to be replaced. I am deeply thankful for this considering the many other heartbreaking hardships in the world today.
UNTIL NEXT TIME
In a little more than a week it will be my birthday. Because of the yet undefined timeline for the septic install, I am reluctant to plan anything specific.
Friends are taking me to lunch ahead of time to celebrate. Some of our family is stopping in for day visits. But for the actual day, I think I will just wait until it arrives and then decide.
The birthday special lasts until September 9, 2023 to complete its 65 day length. The final ISLAND TIME ART show closed on August 14th and we took it down on the 15th. As usual, I have created a buffer for myself to get everything out and ready for the next tenants before the beginning of September.
In between now and our next issue, I will either visit with you online or in the gallery pod. Or we will catch up here when I post again on September 15, 2023.
We are entering into a new rhythm and a shifting adventure with my semi-retirement. My goal is to reduce my creation of paintings to 20-30 new artworks a year. We shall see how this goes. I am at 19 new painting releases for 2023 and I have sold 18 paintings from my overall inventory… and there is still more than three months to go to the end of the year. I am starting to say to myself - “well, this is a transition year!” 😉
I hope you are also rolling along with life’s demands with your sense of humour and curiosity securely intact.
Warm thoughts and best wishes until next time!
Terrill 👩🎨🎨❤️
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