Returning home after three weeks in Berlin results in a real need to give my children some “daddy-time”; so, after letting my feet rest for a week, I was off again.
We decided to head up to Peterborough to enjoy a week visiting the local attractions: The Zoo, the Canoe Museum, and Petroglyphs Provincial Park (the park being my own, specific interest). My own work continues to explore the strength of primitive art-forms, and this park represents the largest collection of ancient First Nations rock carvings in Ontario. These rocks are called, Kinomagewapkong, meaning “the rocks that teach”.
The carvings themselves are really wonderful, and I spent hours drawing quietly from them. I was less impressed with the glass and steel shell that the government erected over them … to see these works within the woods as they had been created would have been amazing. But, there is always such tension between conservation/protection and artwork I suppose.
Before leaving the park we also stopped to admire McGinnis Lake, a rare meromictic lake where the layers of water do not intermix. This means that the lake has unique stratifications, with the lower levels receiving little oxygen from the atmosphere and being highly saline. But, for my interests, it was the colour of the lake that held my attention: It was the most beautiful, jade green colour!
While hiking around McGinnis Lake, I also found a vein of bright red earth on top of a large boulder. I collected a little and will try it as a pigment.