It’s been cold here (getting down to -20°C some nights …) but the work on my permanent studio has continued unabated due to my upcoming move on January 1st, 2011. Today I put the wood burning stove in place (and lit the first fire of the season). No more numb fingers for me!
Time is very interesting to me: Whether it’s our perception of it’s passing, or technology’s general effect on our cultural need for immediacy, or perceiving it within the objects we create; time is intimately linked to our daily happiness and satisfaction. Today I decided to begin the creation of a pigment that will take a … Read more
Before considering my specularite ritual complete, I wanted to visibly record the experience and so I created this work. The two circles are filled with the 1 ounce of pigment created over the ritual and signify the weight change as the red colour developed.
After 10 hours of grinding the specularite specimen from Londonderry Nova Scotia, here’s a photograph of what I’ve revealed: The bright, fiery red inside it. This vermilion coloured pigment is so fine that when dry it will float away like smoke on the slightest movement of the air. The ritual around creating this colour went … Read more
Walking into the studio today I received inspiration from the birds (a little like St. Francis of Assisi, but the other way around!). The silhouetted shape of their bodies, and their position at the top of the barren tree, is exactly what I needed to see for some future work …
The questions around different forms of processing, those that reveal identity and those that change it, has been circling in my mind for the past month, so I’ve decided to work with a piece of specularite that I collected years ago in Londonderry, Nova Scotia. To begin with, I carefully weighed 1 ounce of this … Read more
Visiting Marmora was an amazing experience. Mining in this location goes back to the 1820s, and as one hikes around the site, the idea of all this rock being moved by men and horses is mind-boggling. A photograph simply can’t do justice to the size of the open pit (now half filled with water), or … Read more
Before the snows come, I’ve decided that I want to get out for a least a couple days of rock hounding. The connection with the earth is so important within my art that, as much as I love my studio, I need to head out up to the Canadian Shield and into the bush to … Read more
Last night my exhibition entitled, Saint of Cobalt: Barbara of Madoc, opened at the Minarovich Gallery in Elora, Ontario. This was my first Local Colour project, and it was well received by an engaged group of attendees. One of the highlights of the evening was an interview conducted by curator Phil Irish, in which we discussed the artistic benefits of limited means, personality and imperfections, and the spirit-bearing nature of matter.
It was a good evening; my thanks to everyone who attended for making it so.