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Daniel Thornton | Scottish Landscape Art - Scottish Landscape Paintings

Posts Tagged ‘Daniel Thornton’

Art and landscape – a short trip to the American North West

This morning before leaving home for my studio, I had another quick look at the map of the United States of America. I looked at the state of Washington in the far North West and then across and down just a little bit to the state of Oregon. It looked just a short distance on the map until you glance at how much more …much, much, much more of the USA there is. The journey we made from Seattle to the small town of Joseph in Oregon seemed long and the landscape amazingly varied and huge and yet the map says there is so much more. It really is a very big country.

In reality of course we caught just a tiny glimpse of its beauty and grandeur but it has quite taken me aback. I wonder now why it has taken me 56 years to get to see some of this amazing country. Probably something to do with being an artist and always being skint I guess. Strange then that art was the reason Nita and I were over exploring this stunning landscape but very exciting and rewarding.

art trip to Oregon

Wild flowers at Buckhorn, Hells Canyon, Oregon

As you already know, I am taking part in a collaborative art and science project with a small research team working at Microsoft in Seattle. The piece of work we are creating will combine 2 dimensional visual arts with an audio system that delivers different levels of audio / sound interpretation depending on the proximity of the viewer to the artwork. The purpose of the two week long trip was two fold. Firstly, we went to meet up with the team I’ll be working with. We needed to fix the basics for the work and to start planning how the audio and technological side of this piece might work. In short, we had two full meetings at one of the huge Microsoft buildings just outside of Seattle and two more informal meetings in restaurants in the city.

Art trip to Oregon

In the Hells Canyon area of Oregon

The second part of the trip, lasting for 11 days, saw us driving down to the small town of Joseph in Oregon where a week long artist’s residency had been arranged for me at the Josephy Center of Arts and Culture. The main emphasis of this part of the trip was for me to explore the very varied and rich landscape of this part of Oregon and to record as much information as possible about it in order for me to create three large (8’ x 4’) pastel drawings on my return to Scotland. We also needed to make a large number of sound recordings while out in the landscape in order to support the audio side of the artwork. We made the journey with film maker and photographers, Daniel Thornton and Cindy Apple, Dan who is the lead audio artist for the project and Cindy who was making a photographic / film record of the trip and work.

As I say, the landscape in this region of Oregon is incredibly varied and has three main areas. The small town of Joseph sits at a little over 4000 ft and has the huge 10,000 ft peaks of the Wallowa Mountains rising immediately behind it. In the opposite direction lie two very different regions, a huge area of high prairie and an even larger area of deep canyons known as the Hell’s Canyon area. All three of these very distinct geological regions are stunningly beautiful and are very individual. We needed to visit all three areas on our arrival and with time so short, I had to make a decision as to which area I would base my drawings on. The mountains and prairie were amazing but I decided that I’d work on the canyon area ….it is so different from the landscape I’m used to.

Art trip to Oregon

Nita and Kendrick, Hells Canyon region, Oregon

We were very lucky to be guided on three occasions by a local botanist and wildlife photographer called Kendrick Moholt and he took us to some amazing locations within the complex region of canyons. On the Monday we drove to Buckhorn, a view point over looking one of the huge deep canyons. When we arrived everywhere was in cloud (we were at around 5000ft) but as we waited in this high and quiet place, gradually the cloud started to break up and lift and the scale and depth of the canyon became evident. It was quite a breathtaking scene. The following day saw us way down in the canyon driving along a dirt road to reach a magnificent viewpoint where I spent several hours drawing. The canyon at this point dropped steeply down to the river but also climbed high above. Finally Kendrick took us to the farm of a friend of his, situated right in the base of the canyon next to the river. It was an impressive situation and once again I was able to spend quite a while drawing and recording. The final large works will I think be based on these three locations and I am hoping that the sound recordings we made will convey the different positions within the canyon.

Art trip to Oregon

The Columbia River Gorge

We got back to Scotland yesterday morning and this is the first day back in my studio. I’m planning to start work on some preliminary studies in the next day or so and will also be starting work on sorting through the numerous sound recordings we made.

It was a really amazing trip and the people we met were so friendly and helpful. There is a huge amount of work to be done for this project over the next four months but it is very exciting. When all is complete we’ll be exhibiting it as part of the big “9e2”project in Seattle in late October. After that, we are hoping that the work can be shown in other locations and with a bit of luck, brought over to Scotland…..hopefully to be exhibited alongside a large Scottish audio / drawing work that I’m planning. As they say ….watch this space!

Finally, my thanks must go out to Dan who has done so much to put this project into place. …. I look forward to working with you and the others on the project over the next few months or so.

No walks, just work

'The Saddle from glen Rosa, Isle of Arran', Graphite on paper, 125 x 75 cm

‘The Saddle from glen Rosa, Isle of Arran’, Graphite on paper, 125 x 75 cm

I had hoped that we’d have been for a good walk by the time I came to write this week’s blog, but what with one thing and another I’ve spent most of my time down the studio.

We did get out though on Thursday, driving through to ‘the gallery on the corner’ in Edinburgh to collect the work after my exhibition.  I had a pleasant surprise though as we only had to collect 5 framed paintings and the 7 mounted drawings.  The gallery had sold a couple more paintings and wanted to hang on to several others as they have customers interested in some of them.  It seems from what they said, that a number of people who follow either this blog and or my Face Book page, visited the gallery to see the exhibition ….so if you’re one of those ….thank, you.

For any of you who do go to my Face Book page, you’ll know that I’ve spent several days working on a new graphite drawing.  I’ve posted a couple of photos of it at different stages and it is now finished I think.  I got the measurements wrong on FB though ….the actual size of the drawing is 125 cm x 75 cm.  It’s a nice size to work on and more importantly it’s given me an idea of quite how feasible it would be to do a very large drawing using the graphite sticks and pencils.  The answer to this question is, very feasible.  Yesterday I started a second drawing this size, also based on our recent visits to Glen Rosa.  These medium sized drawings should also give me an idea of how I might compose the really big drawing when I come to do it.  Anyway, this is the first one, completed the other day.

We will finally get out walking tomorrow.  As we haven’t been up a hill for several weeks now we reckon a gentle introduction to steep ground would be a good idea.  We’ve decided to head over to The Pentland Hills just outside Edinburgh.  There appeared to be a lot of snow on them still when we drove to Edinburgh on Tuesday, so despite their gentle nature and lack of any real height …we’ll still be taking the winter gear just in case.  We are going to meet up with Dan Thornton, the photographer who we walked with in Glen Rosa a few weeks ago.  He was up in the Pentlands Hills a short while ago when all the snow arrived and he took some beautiful photographs.  You can see some of them on his Face Book page: Daniel Thornton.

Finally, I have taken part in the Scottish Art Circle Easter On-line Sale.  Several of my paintings are included in this along with a number of other artists.  You can visit this by following the link:  http://www.tcweb.co.uk/scottish-art-circle/listings/846.html

Right then, that’s it for this week.  Tales and photos from the Pentland Hills and maybe even another walk next week.  We need to get some exercise …only just less than four weeks to go till our May walking holiday ….on the Isle of Harris.  Can’t wait!