Scroll down to see all the examples on this page. To download a PDF of my 16 page Painting Portfolio (with more information about the paintings), click the cover image to the left.
Scroll down to see all the examples on this page. To download a PDF of my 16 page Painting Portfolio (with more information about the paintings), click the cover image to the left.
| Oceans of Grass September 2011, 20x16" Watercolour Here's a painting of an old boat and a Kestrel. I based the painting on a picture I took on my honeymoon in 2010 at West Point, Prince Edward Island. Come to think of it, if I sell just one print of it, then I can write off the whole honeymoon as a business expense can't I? |
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| James Family Paddling August 2010, 20x16" Watercolour I painted this family portrait of myself, my wife, daughter, and twin sons this summer. I worked from a number of different photographs to put it together exactly the way I wanted. Although some of the photos were of us in the canoe, I had to take the best elements from each. The biggest change was actually with the canoe - we don't have a wooden canoe. We posed for the pictures in my old beat-up whitewater royalex, and I painted us into Bill Mason's red Chestnut Prospector. I'm a big believer in visualizing what you want in order to get it (it's how I met my wife). I've been wanting a nice wooden canoe for a while now, so this is my way of making sure that it will happen. |
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| Kirk Wipper Paddles into Peterborough February 2010, 20x16" Watercolour This painting was an absolute pleasure to create. It started as an idea that I had in late 2009 in which I wanted to take the opportunity to paint the Peterborough liftlocks (arguably our most recognizable local landmark) with a person paddling out of them in a canoe. It occurred to me that, with Kirk Wipper's legacy of bringing the Canadian Canoe Museum to Peterborough, he was the ideal symbolic choice as paddler. I approached Kirk and his wife Ann with the idea, and they were kindly enthusiastic. They provided a number of pictures of Kirk for me to work from, and Kirk also chose his favourite birch bark canoe, his favourite mode of dress, and his favourite hat. I then went about getting an appropriate picture of the liftlocks. It should interest you to know that the picture of the liftlocks on which this painting was based was taken in the dead of winter. I was able to walk out on the ice at the base of the structure, and take it from the exact location, and from the exact angle that I wanted. I then set about the task of figuring out what the area would look like in summer with water in the canal, and leaves on the trees. The last detail was adding the reflective image of the pictograph (the logo of the Canoe Museum) in the wake behind Kirk as he paddles off of the painting into an unknown future. |
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| Fowler Paddling on the Sweetwater River January 2010, 14x11" Watercolour This is another painting from my fairy tale. It depicts Fowler the beaver paddling his canoe with his tail. |
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| Determination September 2006, 9x5" Watercolour This painting is a rarity for me—it was created on-site, and not later from photographs. I painted it in September of 2006 when I was enjoying a mid-Autumn whitewater canoe trip down the Dumoine River with some friends. We were ahead of schedule, and reached a particularly picturesque camp site around noon one day, and decided to spend the rest of the afternoon relaxing and enjoying the site. After setting up camp, I went for a walk by the water, and was struck by this scene. In the middle of the rapids, splitting the considerable current, was a large rock with an immense crack down its middle. Sprouting from this crack was a tiny maple tree, its leaves full of Autumn glory. I was immediately drawn to its isolated location: it was alone on a rock in the middle of a turbulent river, separated from its peers on the shore, yet still going through the motions of the seasons just the same. It really got me thinking about the ability of nature to exist firmly in the present moment, with no consideration for what the future held. This tiny tree had no idea that, in a few short months, this relative haven would be a maelstrom of Spring run-off, at which time this entire island would be completely submerged with fast moving water. This tree had determination! This tree wanted to survive! It seemed to know instinctively that life was a work in progress, and that you just had to try, no matter what your chances for success were. Trees. They're a metaphor for pretty much anything aren't they? So, I decided that I simply had to spend my afternoon painting it while my friends played in the rapids. I opted to leave part of it as unfinished pencil as a symbolic representation of the lesson this tiny tree had taught me that Autumn day. |
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Clock Tower Portage As luck would have it, a short time later, the Canoe Museum was planning the events of their upcoming National Canoe Day, and they wanted to do something that would attract a lot of attention, as well as hopefully produce a great photograph. It was decided to plan a downtown portage, and get a picture of a group of people carrying canoes in front of the clock tower. So, on June 26th, we converged on the downtown core with five canoes, a photographer (Mollie Cartmell), and a gaggle of support crew. We got plenty of pictures, but it was immediately obvious that there was no way that we could get the money shot because the clock tower was just too tall to fit in any of the pictures. We got some good shots, but nothing like we had been hoping for. This was exactly the opportunity I was looking for. The image that I wanted could only be created in a painting. I looked through all of Mollie’s pictures of the event, and found a bunch that would work. Then I took new pictures of the clock tower from the angle I wanted, and put everthing together in a composition that I thought would work. The result is shown below. Please note that this is purely a portfolio piece, I'm not selling prints of this painting.
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Icanoegraphic: The
Original March 2009, 22x16" Watercolour I've been told that one of the best ways to develop as an artist is to emulate a classic painting by one of the Masters. I decided to do that with the oldest, and certainly the most icanoegraphic, painting of canoeing known to exist. The canoe pictograph is one of dozens of faded rock-paintings located on the rocky shores of an undisturbed lake not far from Thunder Bay, Ontario. Although nobody is sure what indigenous culture is responsible for these prehistoric creations, we do know they are several hundred years old. The rock-art site first became prominent through the work of Selwyn Dewdney who, along with co-author Kenneth Kidd, featured it in their seminal 1967 book Indian Rock Paintings of the Great Lakes. In the late 80’s, the canoe pictograph gained an additional level of notoriety when it was adapted by Kirk Wipper into the logo for his ever-evolving museum for canoes that ultimately became the Canadian Canoe Museum. The image was then, as it remains now, an ideal choice for his logo. I recently became fascinated with the pictograph through the efforts of the Thunder Bay Field Naturalists to save the lake that it calls home from development. To draw attention to the cause, I wanted to use an image of the pictograph on the back cover the Canoe Museum's 2008 Annual Report, but discovered that it is a very difficult thing to photograph. Not only is the image marred by moss and modern graffiti, but the space is also crowded with other unrecognizable and smudged pictographs. So, with apologies to the ancient artists of those other images, I decided to try my hand at painting the whole rock face, and make the canoe pictograph singularly prominent. |
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| Water Violet December 2009, 11x14" Watercolour This painting is my first attempt at a full face portrait (I started it back in 2007). It's based on a picture of my daughter Violet swimming. I'm very happy with the results. |
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| Helen
on the Rocks of the Dumoine December, 2007. 21x11" Watercolour This is the latest in my "Helen on the Rocks" series. This is based on a photograph of Helen taken on the rocks of the Dumoine river in September of 2006. I tried something different with this painting, and sketched the borders in pencil and painted just a box in the middle of it. I also used ink to highlight and shade the painted area. |
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| Icanoegraphic:
Bill Mason March, 2007. 17x20 Watercolour I based this painting on a picture of Bill Mason paddling his canoe in Old Woman's Bay on Lake Superior. The image was classic Bill. Red cedar canoe, checkered shirt, red bandana, canvas packs and big white beard. The original photo was slightly out of focus because it was a wide-angle shot, so I worked with it to sharpen it up a little. Also, I removed some large rocks that jutted up out of the water so that the canoe, and the ripples that it carves in the water are the focus. Lastly, I added the only thing that was, in my mind, missing: his beat-up old hat. I also thought I'd try and experiment, and add some text to the actual painting. This is a big painting (for me anyhow). To give you an idea of the scale, the canoe is exactly 16 inches long. |
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| Scampers:
Dog of the Wild December, 2006. 11x14 Watercolour. This is a painting that I did as an Xmas gift for my brother of his dog Scampers. I based it on a photograph that I took on a camping trip to Bentshoe lake in August of 2006. I followed Scampers around for the better part of a day, and took several dozen shots. When I looked at them later in preparation for the painting, I discovered that the best one was the first one I took. |
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| Icanoegraphy:
The Dumoine November, 2006. 11x14 Watercolour. This is the first in what I hope to be a series of paintings entitled Icanoegraphy. Don't get it? Take a closer look at the word, I'm sure you'll figure it out. :) What's more iconographic of the Canadian wilderness than the canoe? Hence the new term. This particular painting is a compilation of several different photographs that I took while on a trip down the Dumoine river in September of 2006. None of the pictures were exactly what I wanted, so I tried, for the first time, combining elements from each. Finally! A compelling reason to actually paint something like this rather than just blowing up a photograph! Copies of this painting are
available at the Canadian Canoe
Museum in Peterborough. All proceeds from its sale go directly to
support the museum. |
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| Violet
at play in the Glade October 2006, 11x14 Watercolour. This painting is based on a photograph I took of Violet in the summer of 2006. I modified the background a little to make it look more like a dream I had a few years ago. In the dream, Violet and I were playing in a large field with trees all around us. The horizon disappeared off in the distance as if there were a large lake or a large drop off. I called this dreamscape "the Glade", and this comes very close to the feel of it. |
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| Helen
on the Rocks of the Coulonge August 2006. 8x10 Watercolour. This painting is based on another photograph taken of Helen sitting on rocks, this time on the shores of the Coulonge river in Quebec in the summer of 2006. |
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| Etheria's
wand This simple watercolour shows Etheria's magic wand - a gnarled stick of wood. |
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| Helen
on the Rocks December 2005, 8x10 Watercolour. This painting is based on a photograph taken of Helen on the shores of the French River in summer of 2005. |
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| Dusk
on the Petawawa 8x10 Watercolour. This was my first 8x10 watercolour. It is a scene based on a photograph taken in summer of 2005 of the last set of rapids on the lower Petawawa river. |
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| Peep
and the Gang Watercolour. I painted these for an Xmas card for Violet in 2005. |
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Frog Pen & Ink and Watercolour. |
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Kite Pen & Ink and Watercolour. |
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Calvin and Hobbes Pen & Ink and Watercolour, with apologies to Bill Watterson.o |
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Violet the Fairy Pen & Ink and Watercolour of my daughter dressed in her favourite fairy dress. Of course Bunny is never far away. |
Dwayne James, Web Portfolio
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