Gett'n Close!

 

"McCormack Sunrise" - oil painting - © Bruce A. Morrison

 

 

It's finally March and we had our first Robin of the year this morning!  Things are looking up...well, sort of.  Next week we're to have another 2-3 days of snow...maybe not much but still...ugh.

Really I'm not feeling as grumpy as I make it sound.  We are finally in a zone of precipitation, something that just hasn't been the norm here the past 3 years.  Although the ground remains frozen, we still have hope that some of this winter's snow and rain will make it into the soil.  Maybe some of the seeding we did again in the north pasture will actually take this time???  One can certainly hope!

My easel has been hopeful this winter as well, I figure if you can't have warm weather - just paint it!

The image above is of a nice little conservation area maybe 7 or 8 miles south of us "as the crow flies".  The McCormack area was donated to O'Brien County about 30 years back by Francis McCormack.  Francis was a native to the area having grown up in the vicinity of this location.  He left the area to serve in the US Navy...spent many years in Philadelphia after his service - then returned home in 1986 and purchased this ground from his brother - ground they were all so familiar with.  Family say Francis would spend time there "for peace and quiet".

It is a very nice quiet spot, one my wife and I and even grand kids have visited...over the years it has been on my regular visit list.  Thanks to people like Francis McCormack for giving back to the people of this area - there are so few places in our county still left that aren't plowed under or built up with houses or confinements.  The McCormack Area is a treasure of our natural heritage.

In the meantime I'm keeping at it in the studio - watching the landscape gradually change in the valley out front.  Spring is gett'n close!!!

 

Out of the Deep Freeze and Loving It!

 

"Morning Glory" (framed)

oil painting - © Bruce A. Morrison 

 

It's good to get out of the freezer! Yes it has been a frigid one the last half of February...nothing to write about, besides my fingers have been too numb to type!  Ha!  

 

Well I did try to warm things up a bit in the studio...have been doing some small commissions for people and then decided to try something just for myself...I decided a "Sunrise" was in order.  Haven't really done a sunrise just for a sunrise's sake...had done a painting many years back that had a sunrise in it, but it was done more for the mood and color play in the landscape...that was a painting called "Daybreak - Southwest Corner Fence Line".

 

"Daybreak - Southwest Corner Fence Line"

oil painting - © Bruce A. Morrison

 

My latest depiction of a sunrise is "Morning Glory"...it was painted from a sunrise one morning this past August here across the valley from the house and studio.  I was a little unsure of this one as it was a very vivid sky with more color than I've ever thrown into a sky on the easel before!  But after I got into it, I was really enjoying the process!  In fact I've missed painting skies for the sake of it and do want to do more...doesn't need to be another sunrise but then again maybe so...whatever happens is fine by me.  I'll post a larger image below for more detail.

 

"Morning Glory"

oil painting - © Bruce A. Morrison

 

It's finally March and this first day is a fairly pleasant (albeit somewhat chilly) one...guess that means that March has come in like a Lamb...hopefully Spring doesn't throw too many hard balls at us! But regardless, we're finally out of the deep freeze and loving it!

 

Print of the Week - "Daybreak - Southwest Corner Fence Line"!

"Daybreak - Southwest Corner Fence Line"

open edition/signed print from the original oil painting - © Bruce A. Morrison

(click on image for a larger view)

 

The print of the week this go-round is a particular favorite of mine; published from the original oil painting of a location just a few miles southeast of us (as the crow flies). 

 

"Daybreak - Southwest Corner Fence Line"  was indicative of a typical August morning along an old abandoned dirt road...the Song Sparrows were still singing and greeting the rising sun.  The kind of morning that beckons one back again and again, to travel or walk the road down and around the corner, and see what treasures it holds. 

 

This print is available in different sizes and configurations - both paper and canvas - a beautiful print!  We do have a nicely framed and matted "Daybreak - Southwest Corner Fence Line" available at the studio now but can print to order for however you would like it done; just stop by or give us a call anytime!

 

Thanks again for stopping by - enjoy the rest of August while you can!

 

Trying to Keep Up!

"Little Sioux River Valley Sunrise"

photograph - © Bruce A. Morrison

(click on image for a larger view) 

Its been very hard keeping up with everything lately!  Life is more complicated than we give it at face value, isn't it!?  The work in the studio and around the acreage is keeping us on our toes lately...this is always a busy time of year.

 

I've also been trying to keep an eye on our pasture here because I often can use it as a gauge as to when things might be at their best on the prairies nearby.  I had been noticing our Dotted Liatris (Liatris punctata) and Rough Blazing Star (Liatris aspera) beginning to look pretty good, so I thought I'd run off to Waterman Prairie this morning where I know these things are in good number...see if I could catch them before they get past their prime.

 

When I got up everything was really socked in outside; I actually woke a few minutes before the alarm rang - a Coyote out front of our place woke me with its yowling; sounded like it was missing someone or feeling left out!

 

I procrastinated a bit, not sure if the fog would lift enough for some decent images, but eventually talked myself into getting in gear and heading down the road.  I went to the O'Brien No.1 site again; this is where I'd been watching some decent locations for late summer prairie blooms.

 

When I arrived it was so thick I decided to just walk to the ridges above the Little Sioux River, figuring I could scout some along the way.  There's a hanging valley there...I'm sure I've talked of it in the past.  The farmers who access fields down below the prairie there use it as an access road...its actually an ancient river bed left hanging along the edge of the hillside.

 

No sooner had I reached the ridge top the sun popped out of the fog and the curtains down below me were opening to expose the river below.  I scrambled and got a few shots before the river and valley below were gone again...if I'd been a couple minutes or more later I would have simply missed out!  It was truly a "WOW" moment! Serendipity?

 

I walked around checking for late summer liatris but the majority were still in tight bud...some years you get lucky and they all go at once - that would be nice!  But no such luck this morning. 

 

 "O'Brien No. 1 Sunflowers and Big Bluestem"

photograph - © Bruce A. Morrison

(click on image for a larger view)

 

I kind of did a mental inventory of plants as I slowly walked back to the road and did see some surprises; for one there was still Spiked Lobelia (Lobelia spicata) in bloom!  That's nearly always done by early August in my own pasture, and this year I couldn't find it; I suspected because of the drought we'd been experiencing again.

 

The Sunflowers were way ahead of our pasture here as well, but the stand I stopped to photograph is in a low lying wet area so that may be the reason.  I was seeing three varieties, may even have missed one.  there was Maximilian (Helianthus maximiliani), Sawtooth (Helianthus grosseserratus) and Showy Sunflower (Helianthus laetiflorus) in bloom intermixed with some good clumps of Big Bluestem (Andropogon gerardii) also in bloom!

 

A good morning for a wet walk, ya the air was 100% humidity - even my glasses kept fogging over trying to look through the camera's viewfinder.  But a beautiful morning on the prairie!

 

 

Father's Day Morning

Father's Day Sunrise

photograph © Bruce A. Morrison

(click on image for a larger view)

What a drop dead Father's Day morning it was!  Really beginning to actually feel like June now...about time - the month's half over!  

I originally went out to photograph the Little Sioux River Valley in the fog that lays over the river like a thick blanket this time of the year, but it stayed socked-in for a good 2 hours as the sun rose and I could not find openings for shooting.

After photographing the sun breaking through the horizon (image above), I walked over to the hilltop at the Prairie Heritage Center and checked out the small Bison herd there to see if there were any photo opportunities there.  The Bison were pretty obscured too but I kept waiting to see if they'd ever emerge.  

Breaking Sky On The Tallgrass

photograph © Bruce A. Morrison

(click on image for a larger view)

Eventually the sky did open above the Bison, and even though there was a patchy haze over the ground, I decided to give it a try and made  a series of images that worked fairly well...the Bison were still a bit hazed over but the feel of the ground and background fog with the great swirling sky cloud pattern had a nice feel to it.  I think the only thing that'd make this a "dream" image would have been about 50-60 more Bison!

A nicer day couldn't have been asked for...well, the mosquitoes were rather ravenous but nothing good bug netting and gloves and hooded sweatshirt couldn't cure :)   OK, things could always be better but I'm not complaining, looking back on the morning.

Hope your day was good...here's to our Fathers...still with us and departed.  God Bless 'em! 

Summer Solstice

"Sunrise on McCormack"

photograph © Bruce A. Morrison

(click on image for a larger view) 

Today, as I write this entry, is the Summer Solstice.  There is something about those words, "summer solstice" that I find almost mystical...mysterious...much like a bank of intangible emotions.  The evenings now have an air of insects and amphibians, carried aloft across the valley and into the yard windows.  It lulls you to sleep and brings pleasant dreams, but not really of this world.  

Does summer take on a more specific meaning or feeling to a person after many decades on this earth?  I have to believe so. The seasons have long been compared to our lives; maybe the summer solstice reminds me of younger days...I don't know.  But it does make me feel motivated somehow.  My motivation is "out there" certainly...out there, outside that yard window, that music in the valley that Georgie and I embrace each morning, afternoon and evening.

If I were to sit upon a twig and float down the creek outside our door, I would eventually pass this place I've photographed here.  It reminds me of the summer solstice...there is that same feeling of fleeting intangibles I'm so desperately trying to put into words.  And now that this moment has passed, the days will very slowly shorten once again, but I am grasping every encounter and savoring and caching them for the rest of the summer and into the final seasons.

Waning Days of Summer

This morning at Prairie Hill Farm

Sometimes we remember back fondly on things that stood out in some way...a place or time...a person. I'm going to remember this "summer" for it's amazing weather, the days of beautiful skies and slight/friendly breezes. Of our prairie remnant...the birds and butterflies...the morning, afternoon and night sounds.

Certainly I missed most of the summer, working inside on things that ultimately help keep us here...those chores of work; but a foot step away from the studio deck, 50 steps more to the prairie pasture, have all helped temper the incidental loss during any particular moment or day.

I'm going to remember this summer through the long cold of winter, the one to come and all others beyond it. I'll remember the misty haze along the valley as the morning sun begins to burn it's path through the tallgrass prairie on our hill.

Perhaps things happened to many of us this summer that we'd as soon forget; some things were annoyances and some hurtful. But this "event"...this "summer" of our lives, is worth all those chemical synapses that will replay the good parts through my mind till I am satiated with it!

Georgie and I hopefully still have a few weeks of pleasant evenings out on the studio deck this year, watching the light of that magic hour washing over the valley hillsides...listening to the early calls of Great Horned Owls, Coyotes rallying for the night hunts ahead...to the katydids, crickets and cicadas songs.

And we wish the same pleasures for you.