Painting, Photography and the Tallgrass Prairie are passions of mine.
Finding time for all can be a challenge! Stop by from
time to time and join me in the process.
Although this month has half expired, I still think of it as new. I probably exhaust people with my lamentations of time slipping through our figurative fingers, but in my mind - August just arrived!
I just recently finished a small oil painting of a hay bale in a nearby county area planted to prairie. It brings about many thoughts to mind.
About 25 years ago I met a farmer down in Larabee, Iowa who had hayed the prairie ground on Steele prairie (Northern Cherokee County) every summer during his youth and younger years. He talked of the amazing flowers and grasses, the Prairie Skinks, and the grassland birds...the ground had never been plowed.
It must have been just like the early settlers trying to make due with life on this virgin earth...imagine the smell of the fresh cut prairie vegetation, the sight and sounds of bounty back then!
A small plot of county land a couple miles north of us holds nothing quite as dramatic, but when I discovered the prairie planting there had been mowed and baled, I couldn't resist taking some photos and trying an oil painting of one. (SE O'Brien County)
Although the haying of prairie 100+ years back would not resemble the round bales of modern farming by any stretch of the imagination - I cannot resist the temptation of images of hay bales in the landscape. The Black-eyed Susans (Rudbeckia hirta) flowering around in the recovering native grasses give that hint of those days hearkening back to the pioneer beginnings on the tallgrass.
As the painting sits on my easel drying, I contemplate another perhaps...time will tell.
I have been posting fairly regularly on my You Tube Account the past few weeks...one from this week featured Cup Plants while another this week featured Swamp Milkweed.
Feel free to check them out!
Consider subscribing to my You Tube Channel as well!
We seem to go from feast to famine here. The rain shut off in early July...little over an inch of rain through some very hot and windy weeks. Georgie has been having to hand water her two gardens, which never works as well as rain. She has now gone through all 8 rain barrels. We have no well here.
The pre-Christmas seeding I did on the south pasture has mostly dried up. I don't know if the heavy spring rain here brought them on too quickly? But they sprouted upward and had quite an impressive canopy of leaves - really surprised me. Then the sky turned off and the heat and high winds turned on...now most of the new growth is shriveled and dried up looking. But that pasture is mostly gravel slope...just drains too well. I'm of the thought that the early abundance of moisture may have handicapped new plants...hope I'm wrong.
A wet Red-headed Woodpecker appreciates any rain showers as well!
We are getting some light showers right now - about time! So appreciate any rain what-so-ever...
I hope everyone out there is doing well and having had a decent summer so far. We still have about 5 weeks of it left to enjoy out there - please do!
Be good to one another, we are all in this together!
Oops! I posted the plant of the week on my "A Tallgrass Journal" blog site last week but forgot my art site...well here it is -
Sneezeweed
- bless you! Well, not really! There's no pollen in the breeze and
sneezing affected as such with this prairie forb...I always wondered why
it got this name and the one place I found with a "story" behind the
name was in the book "Restoring the Tallgrass Prairie" by Shirley
Shirley, a University of Iowa Press publication...a book with some good
info on germination and seed I might add. Shirley Shirley mentions the
use of this plant's leaves - dried and made into snuff "cause sneezing
and supposedly ridding the body of evil spirits or clearing congestion.
Considered a good tonic by the pioneers." So there ya go!
This
forb is listed as most commonly found on moist prairies and sites...on
our property it exists on a hillside slope that isn't too terribly moist
so it may be found in a variety of conditions. It is one that needs
full sun for the most part so ours fits that condition.
Sneezeweed (Helenium autmnale) with native flies and bees
Sneezeweed
is a late summer/early fall forb here, usually showing up with the
flush of goldenrods and the beginning of asters. And it is a great
pollinator plant - attracting bees, wasps, butterflies and flies of all
kinds! It is said to cause "issues" with livestock grazing so that is
something to be aware of if it occurs in grazed pastures - this would
also make it a dominant forb in such a situation as livestock would tend
to avoid it.
Catch
the August bloomers while they're still with us - Sneezeweed, the
goldenrods and the asters will be with us well into September though!
I made this prairie forb the "print of the week" because it was peaking nicely here at the studio prairie pastures - so why not "plant of the week" too!?
As I mentioned before, this is a very common native prairie flower or forb (flowering herbacious plant). Most will recognize it a first glance but maybe by different names. I like to state the scientific name for a plant if I can - that way there is no argument what plant is being discussed! This plant (Ratibida pinnata) is commonly referred to as a "Gray-headed Coneflower" or a "Yellow Coneflower", and even some times a "Prairie Coneflower"
"Gray-headed Coneflower" refers to the light green or gray flowering head when it first appears - before filling out with small florets and turning brown.
This prairie flower will adapt readily in a flower garden but tends to be pretty tall at times (4-5 feet here in the pasture) so it needs support from other plants or will lie down from being top heavy.
There is not any odor or smell that I can detect from the flowers, but the bees and butterflies are non-the-less attracted to them...the bees can often be seen pollinating by going round and round the rim of florets. The smell of this plant's seed heads when they are dry and ready to pick - is "amazing"! Its a wonderful smell that has come to mean "prairie" in the autumn to me.
Thanks for stopping by - be sure and check out the prairie this summer - you do not want to miss it!
This small print is definitely relevant for this time of the year - the Dickcissels are singing non-stop around the pasture here and area prairies right now, actually have been since June. The fun thing I like to refer to Dickcissels is the nick-name that birders like to call it - the "barking dog"! They do go on and on all day long, even in the heat of the day!
But I like Dickcissels and hearing them lowers my blood pressure and makes me smile! I'll post a video of one here along our north pasture singing along the east fenceline -
The print "Dickcissel's Song" was done from the original color pencil drawing; this original drawing is now in the permanent collection of the Leigh Yawkey Woodson Art Museum in Wausau, Wisconsin.
"Dickcissel's Song" is a smaller print with ample borders - a signed open edition print and is available from the studio here or other galleries listed on my web site - www.morrisons-studio.com.
Next time you're out in the country, give a listen for the Dickcissels - singing out their name!
Its nice thinking about weather that isn't necessarily "winter" for a change! And the new exhibit at Arts on Grand in Spencer, Iowa is full of all kinds of weather - stormy weather, fair weather, warm weather, winter weather, rainfall, fog, snow..."Weather Permitting" an exhibition of "weather"!
I have 5 pieces of work juried into the "Weather Permitting" exhibit (the two here are a sampling of those) and was able to view the showing yesterday afternoon - it is an excellent mix of artists, mediums, and weather! A fun "must see" exhibit!
"Weather Permitting" runs from March 4 through April 5th, with a reception on March 13th (5 - 7 p.m.) at Arts on Grand in Spencer. If you're in the Spencer area during the next few weeks, be sure and stop in Arts on Grand for a fun day of "weather"!
Its trying to look and feel like winter here for a change...just a skiff of snow this morning but the temps are more winter-like. I'll admit I have "some" misgivings about the weather being so mild and unwinter-like lately - but not many!!!
Being just "brown" outside hasn't charmed a "current" landscape out of me yet, so I've been working on ideas from my image bank of last summer...if it can't be a gorgeous winter outside, I'll enjoy summer inside on the easel instead! (Or maybe make believe its winter on the easel sometime this winter yet?)
I just finished a small study along the Waterman in the valley here. This scene is actually only about a mile and a half downstream from the studio here. If you were to float the creek during decent water levels, you'd probably reach this spot in an easy 10 minutes. If you were to walk to it, it'd take about 45 minutes or more. But as the crow flies, this is just next door! What a beautiful little stream and valley here - don't pinch me please, I do not want to wake up!!!
I've been doing so many small studies the past 2-3 years; I wonder if I'll ever do some larger works from them?! Guess that's a fair question I'll ponder some more.
Hope your winter's been nice - enjoy the nice ones if you get 'em!
Its January...we all know that, but I think January doesn't (know it)! Yesterday afternoon Georgie and I went for our first prairie walk in our native pasture this year. We sat down on of the north pasture hillside benches and pondered all this. We closed our eyes and tried to describe what month it was; George said it was April and I thought it felt like October! This winter and past 6 months are breaking records here for lack of precipitation and unusually warm temperatures. And its 2012 on top of it...that's a bit freaky too!
I figured if the winter and the weather can make believe its some other time in space so can I!
The small color pencil study posted above is of the valley out in front of the house and studio. Its one of those subjects I find hard to resist (cloud formations), yet holds subject matter I'm not usually inclined to draw (Corn)! I do like the late day shadows as they're cast across the fields out front; couple that with the dramatic eastern sky on a humid summer evening and I can't stay away from it!
I'm diving back in to the work here now that the Holidays and all that work is behind us. A new solo exhibit coming up this spring...I think I must be crazy!!? More on that (the show - not my sanity) later.
Who says you have to go south for nice winter weather? You can just stay in Iowa this year and simply make believe! Enjoy it!
July has been busy and like I remembered it as a kid - Hot! Well it may not seem hot to my friends in Arizona or California, but we have some fairly messy dewpoint levels here (humidity)! I can always take the heat but add a 75 degree dewpoint to it and I think climate change means we are the new Panama!! :)
I have my first solo exhibit in decades coming up next month and I am really hustling to get everything ready for it. The exhibit will be at Arts on Grand in Spencer, Iowa. The show opens on August 16th and runs through September 24th. There will be an opening evening event (I think they call it a "gallery talk") on August 25th, a Thursday evening...it begins around 5:30 p.m. This is a good time to talk with me about anything and have refreshments and hors d'oeuvres. And it would be a really great time getting to meet some of my blog friends if we haven't already done so!
When preparing for something like this, a great deal of time is spent matting and framing, varnishing, and even reworking paintings. Any artist will tell you that sometimes knowing when something is really finished isn't s easy as you'd think! The above painting was presented in this blog earlier (Here), but there was something about it that did not look "finished" to me...something was missing and I was fairly sure from the moment I had the thought, as to what it was needing! A visual threshold; you know, like when you enter a room or space and "step" into it. This painting was too flat for a visual "entrance"...had no weight to its foundation...I could think of several more metaphors but you may get the drift. I think it now has that foundation and a threshold to enter over and into the space.
Late July Mid Afternoon (unfinished version)
(You can compare with the previous version here and see what I mean.)
I am also still at the easel and working in the field each day I can manage. The early morning hikes with the camera equipment have been invigorating and I'm finding I'll be a long while editing through all the material I come up with! Is that what "winters" around here are for??
Here is a small study I did just recently...the plums and spring are long past but we had some freakish weather here during the Wild Plum bloom...it got very hot and windy for a couple days straight and the bloom was on and over in just 2-3 days. Pretty disappointing because I look forward to it each year! I did this study from some photos of past blooms here in the valley, to make up for missing them this year.
Well, back to work here in the studio. I do hope I'll get to see you at my exhibit opening evening in August! I'll be posting about it some more in the coming weeks.
I'm still here plugging away in the studio! I finally finished a piece that is about the third attempt to an idea I first got 6-7 years ago. The "star" of the show is a male Dickcissel belting out it's name, in song form, among the Tallgrass Prairie in bloom. The bird is taken from a study I did, which is now in the permanent "drawing collection" of the Leigh Yawkey Woodson Art Museum in Wausau, Wisconsin. I have been trying to find a "home" for my study and this is my first "finished" attempt to see if I have! The foreground is a mix of forbs in a prairie remnant near us that Georgie and I often explore. The Echinacea (purple coneflowers) are of our county's true native population - Echinacea angustifolia, or "Narrow-leaved Purple Coneflower". The male Dickcissel is proudly belting out it's name, the call from which the bird was named (virtually sounds like Dick, Dick, cissel). This is a larger piece for me with color pencil...I find the medium can be exasperating at times and generally stick with small studies instead...but I persevered and finished it this week.
Another work finished earlier, was an oil painting that was "kind of" different for me; it was a commissioned work done for a client commemorating (if-you-will) her trips to the grain elevator with her father, back when she was a child. The elevator is one I'm very familiar with, have driven past and around it for 30+ years. What I didn't know were some of the history and stories behind the "Ritter Elevator" - was fun to research and depict the elevator during the early 1950's! The red IH box truck was my client's father's truck. I took the rest of the vehicles from the area and other sources...the red tractor is my neighbor's father's Farmall "M" and their flarebox wagon (did repaint that a different color though). I do like doing work depicting the agricultural environment/landscape and felt this was actually a good fit. I've said it before and will likely again - the Tallgrass Prairie made this state what it is today and without that natural heritage, we would not have that "black gold" the prairie gave us - the soil. After handing the painting over to it's new owner, I asked her if I could have permission to share it with you here - she was very happy to!
My first "Morrison's Studio Newsletter" (Vol.1, No.1) went out today! If you'd like to sign up for it, there's a link to the form right along the sidebar to this blog...if you get this blog via e-mail you can go directly to the form by way of this link -
I've mentioned the Prairie Heritage Center before...it is a gem in the extreme SE corner of our county (O'Brien). There is an exhibit of the tallgrass prairie at the center, running now and through January 6, 2011. The exhibit is a state traveling exhibit entitled "Tallgrass Prairie - Past, Present, and Future", and is a great exhibit for all ages to see, enjoy and walk through!
With this exhibit, the host organization is responsible for putting on a program in conjunction with the exhibit theme. I was asked if I'd be willing to do so and agreed...prairie is near and very dear to my heart and I'm always happy to speak on this subject!
The Prairie Heritage Center is calling the program "Colors of the Prairie". I've put together a short media program which will be followed by "colors of the prairie" and a discussion of my experiences and personal viewpoint of the Tallgrass Prairie. The program will take place at the Prairie Heritage Center on December 2nd at 7 p.m - that's this coming Thursday night, so if you have an opportunity to get away for a short evening event - be sure and stop by!
For those of you who may not have been to the Prairie Heritage Center, directions are "east" of Sutherland, Iowa on HY 10, or "west" of Peterson, Iowa on Hwy 10...or 4931 Yellow Avenue, Peterson, Iowa. You can also call for more information at (712) 295-7200!
It's been a time of digging back in here at the studio; the hours being spent printing up jobs and framing for clients is winding down from the aftermath of the Artisans Road Trip in early October. Now it's November! (How does that happen so quickly - someone please explain it to me!!!)
Now I am mustering up the mental stage to get back into creating new work. This is the time (that comes along almost any time all year long) for me to go through my jointed and disjointed thoughts and begin new pieces. How this comes about varies wildly here! It either hits me like a 2x4, or I go back through recent and past "studies", like the small color pencil image under this blog's title...or I spend hours perusing through image files on the hard drives or the film file drawers until something talks back to me.
I'll be frank...this can be a frustrating process!
In the meantime we're at no loss for work around Prairie Hill Farm; we just finished patching cedar shingles in the barn roof, picking seed on the farm's native pasture, trimming down broken trees from the year's storms, and putting gardens to bed for the coming winter. Never a dull moment!
Bald Eagle along the valley here below the Prairie Hill Farm Studio
The wildlife around the farm has been changing from summer to winter residents also...this makes things more interesting. Certain yard birds become more numerous and our winter residents return; like the Bald Eagles in the valley here. We've now had eagles for the past couple weeks. It's pretty cool when a bird flies over your head when you're out and about the place, or when one passes by the living room window when your going about business in the house!
It can be pretty inspiring stuff! Guess I should get busy!
Winter is a time I find I speed up in "multitasking"...a word I never grew to feel akin to. It is not an endearing thing watching jobs speed by without satisfying reflection, but when winter forces more work be undertaken indoors - you take advantage of the opportunity and charge ahead as best you can.
Widow Skimmer - Libellula luctuosa (female dorsal) Taken at Center Lake, Dickinson County, Iowa (from the Watchable Wildlife Project)
I've been forging on with the expansion of the Watchable Wildlife in northwest Iowa website work. I've only just recently completed editing 70+ short site videos and now am in the process of putting together over 70 page templates and processing images for them. These updated changes will not be reflected in the web site until later this spring and has been enjoyable working through. I'm finding myself thinking of all the sites I need to revisit again for more prolonged time and exploration. Another side adventure going through this process is rediscovering things we came across during the summer and some of the video footage and photographs taken. When going back through months later I also see images I'd like to paint from, images that trigger ideas I had not been aware of at the time.
In February a public workshop titled "Midwinter Thaw", is being sponsored by Iowa Lakes Resource Conservation & Development (RC&D), Palo Alto County Conservation Board, O'Brien County Conservation Board and Clay County Conservation Board. This is a workshop open to the public and it's goal is to encourage more people to get outside and become involved in nature during the winter.
The announcement for this winter photography workshop reads in-part that there is a dramatic upswing in wildlife and nature viewing locally and throughout the country, and that nature photography is often the next step for many people as they become interested in our natural resources.
The number of people interested in learning about taking good nature photos is growing. Topics like picking out the right camera equipment and its proper use; and marketing and selling your work will all be covered in the Nature Photography Workshop.
There will be four professional photographers presenting at the workshop:
Don Poggensee of Ida Grove, Stan Buman from Carroll, Dan Ruf from Spririt Lake, and myself - Bruce Morrison from rural Hartley. All are from the northwest Iowa area and each have had much experience in this field. These photographers will provide insight into how they achieve success in nature photography.
The program is also highlighting the Watchable Wildlife website and project that will eventually include 13 counties in NW Iowa.
The workshop will be held at the Emmetsburg Iowa Lakes Community College campus on Saturday, February 20th. There will be a $20 registration fee to cover presenter expenses and lunch. Registration is required so plans can be made for food and materials.
To register or ask questions about the workshop contact the Iowa Lakes RC&D office at 712-262-2083.
My part in the workshop will be to emphasize the beginning aspects, equipment and field techniques. Something to think about or check out in February!
Georgie and I were able to get out yesterday morning and do a little trekking around the hills and river valley south of us. The frost was beautiful and the sky was clear...an amazing combination for winter landscapes and photography. The Bluebird Creek area photo at the top of this blog is a great example of Little Sioux River valley landscapes in the winter.
It's actually very nice out there this weekend with temps in the 20's and 30's instead of 30+ below zero! You might need some skis or snow shoes if you wander off the roads though - either way enjoy and get out there!
