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| Portrait of My Grandson Ethan That I Painted |
When a person is young, one tends to think that they have all the time in the world and I was no different. Procrastination was my middle name. My intention, when I was in my early twenties, was to become a great artist like Picasso, Rembrandt or Monet but I opted out to become a commercial artist forever telling my self, "As soon as I earn enough money to become a fine artist, I'll start painting seriously and maybe put on an exhibition of my art." But that never happened, I never became a fine artist, at least not the kind my peers would consider a fine artist, I have always been considered an illustrator. And there is a lot of truth in that statement because I've never taken my talent that seriously and I have always liked that my artwork was priced reasonably so it was affordable to most people and not just to those who are rather affluent. Over the years, people have commissioned me to paint portraits of themselves, loved ones, pets, landscapes, murals, why hell I even painted a scene in a bathroom with a vine wandering around the bathtub. I've never really cared what the subject was that they wanted painted, I just tried to reproduce the pictures they had envisioned in their minds or worked from their photos. I have to admit I really don't like painting buildings, machinery, boats and cars, etc. as much as I do natural subjects - too many straight lines - I can do it but I'm not fond of it. I have painted pictorials on floors and I supposed the easiest and strangest one I ever painted was for an automobile enthusiast that raced hot-rods. I painted his garage floor with large black and white squares, which was supposed to represent the checkered flag that's used during car races. It was hardly a work of art and I thought it was foolish of him to insist that I sign the floor. But hey, I needed the money and wanted to get paid for the job.
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| Our "Hippie Hangout" |
Now that I'm old, I find myself painting more often than usual but then, since I'm not that well, and my energy level is quite low, I'm not surprised. My wife, Sarah and I had been planning to drive across Canada in our "Hippie Hangout" this summer, hopefully even get to Haida Gwaii until cancer came a knocking at my door. We're hoping that all goes well and we'll be able to set off next year. I started to let my hair grow long for our journey as a couple of hippies and we planned to dress the part too, stopping along the way at different places trying to sell some of our creations to help pay for the trip - can't imagine what the cost of fuel may be by then. When some friends learned we would be returning to Nanaimo on Vancouver Island, they wanted to commission me to paint a couple of murals and I actually had a possible exhibition of my art regarding my arctic sailing voyage in '95. A FBook photographer friend of mine who travels around the world for different photo-shoots and I were going to exhibit our artistic talents of the arctic since we had been to many of the same places. I'm still hoping that I'll be up to that exhibition and he will still want to make it happen next year. Time will tell I guess.
Since I'm about to have the shit kicked out of me literally very shortly, one and possibly one more operation to reverse the first one, I'm hoping to get a lot more paintings done to sell and help pay for the road trip in 2019. Sarah's braiding small floor mats, drawing mandalas and will soon start making jewelry with a hippie-flavor, should be interesting. And of course, since we'll be spreadin' the love across Canada, I've been hand lettering vinyl hearts at five bucks a pop to put on our trailer, which I've already painted and lettered, an ongoing and unfinished canvas. Some people are buying the hearts because they want to help us fund our trip and others because it's also their dream of driving across Canada one day as well and it's there way of being a part of our journey. Last summer, although I wasn't feeling particularly great, had to park the trailer as close to a washroom as possible, we managed to visit Newfoundland and Labrador, which were on my bucket list. I've now been to every province and territory including Yukon and Nunavut and I can tell you this, Canada is one beautiful country and it deeply saddens me that it's resources are being raped needlessly and in a seriously foolish and destructive manner.
Now that I'm not so physically active, if there's anyone out there that has been thinking about getting a painting or some other work of art, I certainly have the time to produce something. And, something to think about, they say a work of art is more valuable once the artist is dead and I'm an old guy now (hint, hint, chuckle, chuckle)...peace, eh - Trip
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