Still Bucking It!

"Low water Morning"

oil painting - 6X12" - © Bruce A. Morrison

(click on image for a larger view) 
SOLD
 

 Still bucking this summer heat and drought...even in my work.  This painting was done as a study of the creek here in the valley below the studio.  I often use the term "study" and I often find it can confuse people.  "Studies" are a long held tradition or practice in art.  They are works which serve many purposes.  I use them as a spring board to another painting or work in a larger format...often giving the "study" time to gel in my mind - whether or not I really want to do a larger and more detailed piece or if its really something I'd like to leave "as is" for now.

This painting was inspired in part by the dry summer we are struggling through this year.  I suppose if I were to go to this same spot today, it'd be even lower!  I do like the gravel embankments as an element of this painting - as well as the drama of the early morning light and the longer shadows.  I'm not sure if I'd feel the same about it as the water levels drop even more...but maybe treating the composition and light differently would make an engaging image as well.

We've only had 2 tenths of an inch so far in July here...after less than an inch in June and with weeks of being in the high 90's - some in the low 100's, adding in some days of dehydrating winds, and things are getting nasty!  This isn't on a par of the droughts in other areas though...especially what Texas experienced last year.  Its just affecting more of the continent this year than has been seen in quite some time!

I'm grateful I'm not farming here this summer!  But if I were, the crop insurance would be the only blessing available!

Our native pasture is often my stronghold of inspiration...I'm sorry to say it is not the inspiration of past summers...at least not after about 3 weeks back.  The prairie will certainly get through the drought just fine, but the plants are now going dormant as they literally dry up before our eyes!  Another aspect of this is that we'll get little viable seed from the summer drought and heat.  The grasses and flowers are drying up as they go from the flowering stage to fruiting and maturation...many of the warm season grasses are simply losing flowers as they form...all drying up for the season.

Still bucking it here...waiting for some good showers to come our way!  Wishing you a drenching this summer if you need it!!!

Drawn to the Water

"July Morning, Waterman Creek"

photograph - © Bruce A. Morrison

(click on image for a larger view) 

Gathering more material and first hand experiences is very important for any artist...particularly the "first hand experience" part! And lately I really seem drawn to "water"!  

It really doesn't matter what a person chooses to walk, wade, paint, photograph or even immerse themselves into; it is what it should be if it is emotionally or intrinsically satisfying or important to that person's life and/or work!  Don't you think?!!

The past 2-3 weeks have found me "in the drink" so-to-speak..in Waterman Creek here in the valley, to be more specific.  And loving it!  Why, with the rotten high temps and humidity again in the forecast, I can't think of a better place to be with leaky boots and my tripod and camera...and maybe paint brushes too.  In fact, I think the creek has got me for the easel and drawing board for a good part of my summer yet.

Drawn to water in more ways than one.

Stay cool and happy out there!

Cool Walk on a Hot Day

I'm always looking for excuses to get out into the landscape, but its more of a matter of necessity than simply for a break.  I have to refresh the "idea" pile!

I've told Georgie more than once that I have more ideas than I have time for, but a strange thing happens to many of these Ideas...they don't keep!  Its kind of like putting a perfectly fine loaf of bread in the fridge...only to let it sit way too long; weeks later its only good for raising penicillin!  The same thing (well, sort of) happens to all those great ideas too...they get lost in the "mold" of life!  Sometimes (rarely) the mold can be scrapped of and the idea is salvageable, but usually the idea is far from pleasing any longer and it is expelled into the abyss of the back of my mind somewhere.  

But last Saturday - the last day of June (MG what happens with this "time thing" any more!!?????), I got up before the sun and headed out to a private hillside prairie and after photographing some nice prairie forbs (flowers) I headed down to the creek below.  

This was Waterman Creek, the same little stream across the road from the studio...my favorite little prairie "creek" of the neighborhood.  The sky turned out to be too bland for landscape "photography" this mornning however, it was hazed over by smoke from the fires out west (Our prayers go out to everyone affected!).  But the creek was a good alternative..the landscape is "down" in among the banks and trees, leaving the sky as a more secondary element.  I still didn't see very good opportunities for a "photographic" landscape but have to admit I have more ideas for paintings and drawings now!  Have to do something with them though so they don't get all moldy somewhere sitting in the back of my mind before I can use them!

I like walking streams...usually a good deal of wading is in order though, but on a "close" humid summer morning, when the breeze is hard to find, a walk in the water cools the spirit as much as the feet.  Oh, I do wear my hip boots, but they both leak...I don't mind when its hot, kind of like a built in cooling system.  

I often plant my tripod in the stream bed and video tape the scenery...I love the birds singing nearby, along with the water; its incredibly pleasant...I feel my blood pressure ease and the troubles of the world fade away.  I thought I'd share just a few minutes of that with you through the video above.  It may help you see where my head is, and maybe understand how I approach my work.  If you subscribe to this blog via email, you can go directly to the video via the following link - http://youtu.be/6f8oqe68WJw 

Keep cool this summer and don't miss the music!

Breaking Out

"September Dawn, Little Sioux River"

12X16" oil painting - © Bruce A. Morrison

(click on image for a larger view) 
SOLD

Time to bust outta this place!  The "studio" I mean!  Been working on all sorts of things a person must, but the prairie, birds and the landscape in general are shouting at me out the windows surrounding my chair and I need to start focusing out there!

The last piece I just finished up this afternoon is actually from a plein air study I did not too terribly far from the studio about 3 years back.  The piece was started outside on the site, but had to be finished that day in the studio because the conditions changed so quickly.  The study can be seen here (below) and can be read about from that original blog from September 17, 2009 - http://prairiepainter.blogspot.com/2009/09/summer-still.html

 The original plein air study

"September Dawn, Little Sioux River"
Oil on mounted canvas - 6X8"

(click on image for a larger view)

Plein air studies are a natural step for a painter...first you do small color studies (paintings) on location, and these serve as guides for further work in a larger "finished" painting - done later in the studio.

I sold the original plein air study of this painting just a couple months after I did it in 2009 so I had to work from an image file I scanned of the original 6X8" plein air study.  That still worked just fine...I wasn't trying to laboriously duplicate the small original, but instead work off of the "impression" the original piece offered as far as lighting, color and composition.  The finished piece is unmistakably done from the original, yet is more refined to reflect my interpretation of that morning...the fog or haze rising off of the river as the early morning, late summer sun, breaks through the atmosphere upstream.

I'm spending what time the Good Lord is granting me, celebrating the landscape surrounding our valley and area of the tallgrass prairie here...celebrating in my paintings, drawings and photography - but its high time to break out of here and get into the summer outside!

Hope you can get out and enjoy this summer!

Still Here!

Golden Alexander (Zizia aurea)

photograph  © Bruce A. Morrison

I'm still here!  Its the spring season in high gear and I'm getting run over by it at each turn!

 Prairie Smoke (Geum triflorum)

photograph  © Bruce A. Morrison

The prairie pasture here is no exception - everything is weeks ahead...ahead of itself and ahead of me as well.

 

Large-flowered Beardtongue (Penstemon grandiflorus)

photograph  © Bruce A. Morrison

The 2012 Artisan Road Trip is gearing up for its 2012 traveling exhibits for the season...the first show will be at the Witter...being that I just exhibited there last month - I need to find some things that weren't just there!  Easier said than done!

 Porcupine Grass (Heterostipa spartea)

photograph  © Bruce A. Morrison

Been trying to keep up with the inspiration the native pasture here has to give too, but its ahead of me as well as its usual self.

 False Gromwell (Onosmodium molle)

photograph  © Bruce A. Morrison

This year is different from any I've ever witnessed...I'm sure it has been for most of us out there.  The prairie pasture here has plants whose blossoms fried in the late frosts, after the unusually warm weather.  Those plants are probably going to bounce back but the weather has eliminated some of the early "stars" of the pasture...or made them very spotty this year.  The unusually dry late summer/fall and winter didn't help matters much though either.

 Prairie Phlox (Phlox pilosa)

photograph  © Bruce A. Morrison

But I'm still here!  I haven't forgotten the blog! :)  I'm just trying to catch up - just like the pasture here at Prairie Hill Farm! I hope you'll enjoy some of the plants that I photographed here this week!

 

A Little Early...or Too Late?

Iowa Wetland Study No.1

photograph - silver halide print - © Bruce A. Morrison

I'm going to celebrate Earth day a little early, although it isn't until this Sunday.  This will be its 42nd year and its now observed in 175 countries.  The thing that saddens me about our attempts to celebrate our planet is that we are truly in need of observing this day 24/7/365...did I get that right?  I mean every day we draw breath - all year long.  

In my life time I've seen promise...more restrictions on industrial pollution, attempts to restore habitat and set aside more for our great grandchildren.  Many success stories of bringing species back from the brink.  Other issues too numerous to go into here.  

But there is overwhelming opposition to these issues as well.  Cries of removing government restrictions on industry...regulations, etc.  I always try to be upbeat, even when I don't feel that way, but this is too important...its our lives...our legacy to our children's children's children!  

The photograph at the top of the blog was the first 4X5 large format photograph I ever took of a prairie wetland - almost 40 years ago.  Its one of many images now on exhibit at the Witter Gallery in Storm Lake, Iowa in my solo exhibit titled "From the Tallgrass".  The photograph is a sad reminder to me - its of a wetland that is "no more".  Its now covered in asphalt...it was a beautiful working ecosystem...now the ground no longer breathes there...no conversion of CO2, no cooling the summer air nor filtering runoff and pollutants.  Wetland Choruses no longer sung.  Asphalt.

Recently there was a bill in the Iowa legislature to sell a thousand acres of Iowa public land.  The gist of this bill was to sell 1000 acres of public land that could still be farmed.  Now I don't know what the legislator(s) who put this language into the bill were thinking of using the money for that would come out of a sale of public land, but this was our land - your land , your grand kid's land.  Iowa is "the" state in this union known as "being the most changed" as far as its resources...its natural heritage.  AND someone "still" feels we've gone over the top and need to sell parts of a park, or preserve, or prairie ground to return to what it was rescued from!  You'll hear arguments of a need for more corn to feed livestock, for more income opportunity for some individual(s), for more land to give back to the state's coffers in taxes.  There's always a reason to go back, to not look forward to what our future is potentially holding for us if we only think in the "Now".  Thank goodness there were enough voices raised with this bill (mine included) that the language was dropped. 

So I'm starting to celebrate the official Earth Day a tad early and plan to keep celebrating, being concerned, loving and embracing this amazing rock we're circling that close star with. 

 White-throated Sparrow - male

photograph - © Bruce A. Morrison

(click on image for a larger view)

I'll celebrate with the little things - this morning the White-throated Sparrows returned!  They'll be around now for a few weeks before continuing on north to their breeding grounds.  I'll celebrate them and every spring migrant that pauses as they pass through.  I'll celebrate the rain we're receiving today!  I'll celebrate the old farmstead we live and work on...not as farmers but still embracing the earth with our vegetable gardens, berry crops, the native prairie pasture, the bee hives lending a hand with pollination.  I'll celebrate the Earth each day with my art work and photography...with the sounds and smells that are our natural heritage.  I'll support organizations that are working hard to preserve this natural heritage - not squander it on the profit of the moment.

In Iowa, check out and support really worthwhile organizations - with your heritage in mind; like the Iowa Natural Heritage Foundation and the Nature Conservancy.  And an excellent publication that shares what others are doing every day to embrace their natural heritage is Woodlands & Prairies Magazine...I highly recommend these!

Its not too early to Celebrate Earth Day.  And it is not too early to care...to "Really" care.

From the Tallgrass - 2012

 

artwork  © Bruce A. Morrison

(click on image for a larger view) 

Thank you to everyone who made it to the exhibit's artist reception!  If you haven't been able to stop by the Witter Gallery in Storm Lake just yet, I hope you can make it sometime while the exhibit is up through the 26th of April!

Thank you...

...Bruce