04 January, 2025 0 comments Leave a comment

Since I began my art career almost 40 years ago, I have been showing my artistic creations at studio tours, art festivals, open houses, fund raisers, juried shows, and art galleries.

Over that time, over 800 of my watercolour paintings have made their way, one by one, into the hearts and homes of people near and far. It warms my soul to know my creations bring peace and joy to the daily lives of so many people.

While the majority of my artworks reside with collectors in Canada and the USA, several of my paintings have become world travellers. So far, to my knowledge, my paintings are enjoyed in at least 24 countries. How cool is that!?

One of my recent travellers, A Winter Wonder (varnished watercolour on 12 x 6 inch panel), is shown here. It came about because of a rather contrary idea.

While touring the 1000 Islands region of the St. Lawrence River last summer, I chanced upon a beautiful white pine standing proudly above the forest.

I took this photo of it, thinking I would later include the iconic tree in a northern lake scene.

Back in the studio, I had another idea: I wondered what this statuesque tree would look like in a winter scene.

I drew the basic shape of the trunk, branches, and foliage masses with pencil onto watercolour paper. Then I sketched lumps of snow where snow would gather logically. I drew more snowy shapes in the smaller trees as well.

Before starting to paint the sky and distant forest, I masked out all the snow shapes on the central tree, and on the tops of the lower trees, to preserve the white of the paper in those areas. This allowed me to create a clear blue sky quickly, painting right over the snowy trees.

Once the sky dried, I removed the masking and added shadows to each white snow clump individually. Lastly, I painted the dark trunks, branches, and needles peeking out from under the snow.

I mounted the finished painting on a wood panel, varnished it, and set it in a black wood frame, shown here. (If you are interested in the details of this mounting process, see my article Framing Watercolours Without Glass.)

I posted the finished piece on Facebook in early December and caught the eye of a long time friend and former co-worker, who now lives and works in Cairo, Egypt. She sent me a message to acquire the painting and later picked it up at my studio while she was in Ontario visiting family for Christmas.

It makes me smile to think of this little snow scene residing in the Middle Eastern desert, bringing happy winter memories to a Canadian living abroad.

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