Bright Morning

I had the chance to paint outdoors the other day when the temperature was hovering around minus 5 Celcius in Wellington Park.  While down there I spotted what I think was a Sand Piper and a male and female Mallard duck. I think these birds missed the last plane south and hope they can manage through the winter, which hasn't got very cold yet.  I'm considering taking some bread crumbs and such down there to hopefully help them out as they seem to be moving a lot more slowly than usual.

The Magpie

I have a love/hate relationship with magpies.  On the one hand I find them annoying when it comes to attempting to attract songbirds to the yard because they tend to scare them all off.  A case in point is my determination to build a purple martin palace for my yard this past summer.  Well the magpie was not pleased and he pretty much told me so one summer morning when I came across him sitting on my wood pile.  We had a staring match for a good minute, which I found amazing because they are usually very shy of humans.  Looking at him I had a sense that he was telling me that he didn't appreciate being dive bombed by the purple martins who had taken over the yard.  Magpies are a very striking bird and I particularly enjoy seeing them in the winter, when their plumage really stands out. Had a hard time photographing this oil painting, I think the pearlescent paint was messing with my camera lense.

Going South

Here is the before mentioned picture with some colour added to it. Somehow the first picture got mirror imaged when the photo was taken, this is the true orientation. I plan on working on it more when I get back from Honduras, where I am going to do some volunteer work for a couple of weeks with an organization called Brighter Horizons Ministries. They have been trying to get the people back on their feet after suffering through Hurricane Mitch, which happened quite a while ago now.The organization wants me to work on some murals with the school children. I am going to enjoy that, for sure! It is going to be something else to experience, the people and their living conditions, the weather and other aspects of life that likely will be so different from where I live. Enjoy the picture.

Work in Progress

Being that the world is largely gray (at least in these parts lately), I decided to do a painting based on a gray scale initially. Once it is dry I will go back into it and refine it with colour, where needed. I quite like what has happened so far, although the photo I have taken does not do it justice. I will post additional photos to show the progress. I call the picture "Radiance in the Forest"