Blog

A bit of insight into my travels and the places that continue to inspire me as an artist.

Yukon 2008

I spent most of the summer in northern BC and Yukon, going between Atlin, BC , Whitehorse for check ups, for this was the summer I was pregnant.

The landscape was breathtaking, especially of Kluane National Park in september with yellow ochre dominating the landscape. I painted a lot of plein air paintings under the influence of Domink Modlinski, which was a first for me, and so also quite challenging. I wanted to paint bigger and to produce studio paintings I set up a mosquito tent behind the cabin where I could have an outdoor fume free studio. It worked quite well and was the first that I was able to paint the subject matter of my immediate surroundings on a large scale. I subsequently brought back with me a whole body of work based on the expansive vistas of fall colors.

Alaska 2008

I explored the shore of Alaska in the summer of 2008; a two week trip on a motor boat, with two other artists. We started in Juneau and travelled to through various inlets and bays, eventually out along the south coast of Alaska stopping in small communities along the way, mostly to gas up and shower from time to time.

Being on a wildlife photographer’s boat we spent a lot of time seeking out various animals in the moody misty landscape. We  watched and listened to the unbelievably beautiful music of humpback whales while bubble feeding, off the bow of the boat at Couverdan Island. We followed them along their feeding path, at one point moving the boat just in time to witness their surfacing right in the wake of our boat, about 5 meters away. I could literally see the baleen in their open mouths.

In Taylor Bay I experienced a sea otter’s day from an inflatable boat. In Freshwater bay I spotted two grizzlies salmon fishing in the mouth of a river. Later on we got way too close for comfort to a grizzly with her cub and watched her weaning. In fact one spot we landed on was covered with bear footprints and bear scat, lots of it everywhere!

 

Patagonia

One of the most unbelievably dreamy, windy and everchanging landscapes I had experienced to date was this year in Patagonia while camping at Torres del Paine National Park, in Argentina. The colors at sunrise as the sun hit the peaks were unreal.

From Usuaia, the capital city of Tierra del Fuego Province (Argentina), commonly regarded as the southernmost city in the world, I saw glaciers in Beagle channel so blue they too seemed hard to believe. I trekked on Perito Moreno Glacier, one of the very few still advancing glaciers. I arrived in El Chalten, in Chile with my friend Dawn with our tent ready to camp just as almost a meter of snow covered the ground. We still hiked up to Mount Fitz Roy and just as we reached it’s foot the clouds momentarily revealed it’s which quickly disappeared again.

Quebec


This fall I discovered four beautiful parks in Quebec: Jacques-Cartier National Parc, Grands-Jardins National Park, Hautes-Gorges-de-la-Riviere-Mallbaie National Park and Parc Marin du Saguenay, and the controlled ZEC territories during hunting season.

Each one quite different and stunning; Jacques-Cartier with its winding rivers,  Grands-Jardins with its colorful expanses of burnt forest, Hautes-Gorges vistas from high up elevations and winds that almost blew me off the mountain, Saquenay with its gorgeous fjord. I did a number of small vista paintings based on this trip, in preparation for a larger format, along with a whole body of fall paintings which I exhibited at Canada House Gallery in 2008.

 

England, Ireland and Wales

I Spent a year in England in 2005; mostly in London but I also travelled all over England with my highschool friend Jenny whom I reconnected with after almost 20 years.

What made the biggest impression on me during that unforgettable trip were Anthony Gormley’s sculptures. The steel, 20 meter (66ft) tall Angel of the North in Gateshead and equally as impressive, the 100 tidal cast-iron men installation titled “Another Place” on Crosby beach near Liverpool.

Later on, I travelled through Wales and Ireland, and it was the skyscapes that struck me the most.These led to a series of my first horizontal large scale paintings; in line with the expansive skies of the Isles.


Morocco

Exploring Marrakeshs’ Medina and the famous Djemaa El-Fna filled with snake charmers, acrobats fortune tellers, musicians and food stalls, the Hassan II Mosque in Casablanca, overlooking the Atlantic, Fez el Bali – the UNESCO World Heritage site,  the Middle Atlas mountains, the Sahara on camelback, the highlights for me were definitely the tannery co-op in Fez, the Gnaoua music festival and the azure doors of Essaouira.

The medieval tanneries of Fez, produce much of the city’s renowned leather. The sight of dozens of men waist deep in vats full of dyes in an array of colors is really an unforgettable sight…and smell.

The camels are skinned in the narrow streets and the hides and remains lay scattered around, the hides are then thrown into the vats filled mostly with pigeon droppings, mixture of acids and cow urine then stomped on for hours to soften the leather so it can absorb the dye, then laid down flat to dry on nearby rooftops.

Nepal 2001

In 2001 I had an oportunity to return to the spot in Nepal that I had visited with my father as a 12 year old girl. It was from a car window that I was first struck with awe by the clouds enveloping the mountains and hills. I envied the people on foot and vowed to return to trek around the Himalayas and immerse myself in that landscape at some point in my life.

When I completed the 300km Annapurna circuit with Dan this year, trekking through the magnificent valleys and around the cloud enveloped peaks of the Annapurna Mountain range, I knew it would inspire me greatly but I didn’t realize it’s subtleties and would leave such a permanent mark on my work as a painter.

This trip inspired two bodies of work; a door series and a landscape cloud series which many is still evolving. In a few pieces I tried to marry the two in the form of a diptych.

Starting in Beksisahar we hiked for 21 days through the extraordinary landscape, crossing villages and interacting with the Nepalese people all along the way.

The orange colour dotted the green and blue/gray landscape.

Perhaps the most challenging part of the trip was the climb up to the snow covered Thorong-La Pass. At altitude 5,416m (17,769 ft) above sea level in the Damodar Himal, it is the highest point on the trek and the highest pass in the world. Connecting the village of Manang (3540 m), with the temple of Mukhtinat (3800 m) and the village of Ranipauwa (3700 m), it is still regularly used by local traders.

Starting out from Thorung Phedi (at 4420 m) it was a grueling 14 hour day dragging our feet up to the top and an easier descent in a snow flurry. When we go to the Buddist flag marking the top and the beginning of the descent I really felt like I was on top of the world.

At the descent we were met by maize-like villages, as the circuit headed downhill to Jomsom along the restricted Mustang region, leaving clouds behind. The trek ended at the Phewa Lake in Pokhara, after which we spent a few days in Kathmandu exploring the various temples. I was particularly drawn to their carved doors which inspired an ongoing series of portal based paintings.

 

East Africa

It was a cold, very cold New Year’s Eve that sealed the deal between my friend Simona and I, to make the dream of seeing the African continent come to fruition. Though we went through Egypt on the way, we truly arrived in Africa when we stepped off the plane in Nairobi on september 13th.

After spending my birthday under the Nairobi sky, while camping in Mama Roche’s yard, we set off on a 7 hour bus ride to Malindi. From there a boat ride to the unforgettable island of Lamu, where time stood still.

It’s Muslim background and the simplicity of people’s lives is what invoked a certain unique beauty I had never come across before.

But it was the beauty of the people that struck me the most in East Africa; the colourful clothing of the Masai, their calmness and what seemed to me like an eternal peace with their vast surroundings. It inspired me to do some figurative painting, something I had never tried before. The warm tones and stark contrast, led me to trying out an Old Master’s glazing technique which I use to this day.

And the trip wouldn’t be complete without the five day challenging climb up Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, which we arranged with a guide we met on the bus crossing from Kenya into Tanzanya.

Starting out on the savannah, we did the gradual trek through the rainforest up to 4000m and then a scramble up to Gillman’s point to find that we still had a two hour walk through the stalactites of glacial ice to the actual highest point; Uhuru peak at 5895m (19341 ft). That last part of the trek was basically a four hour crawl, often on our hands and knees, feeling extremely sick all the way to the top.