I started doing a fun series of birds in December. I plan to post one per day for the “Twelve Days of Christmas” with a short poem from Tom for each. Hope you enjoy!
Now tell me the truth:
Aren’t I what you’ve waited for?
Bright elegant bird.
Image (c) 2020 Hilary Farmer
Poem (c) 2020 TJ Radcliffe
I started doing a fun series of birds in December. I plan to post one per day for the “Twelve Days of Christmas” with a short poem from Tom for each. Hope you enjoy!
To you I look swift
darting through the winter air.
To my eyes I’m slow.
Image (c) 2020 Hilary Farmer
Poem (c) TJ Radcliffe
I started doing a fun series of birds in December. I plan to post one per day for the “Twelve Days of Christmas” with a short poem from Tom for each. Hope you enjoy!
“Fly south!” they all said.
But who would miss the beauty
of the snowy days?
Image (c) 2020 Hilary Farmer
Poem (c) 2020 TJ Radcliffe
I started doing a fun series of birds in December. I plan to post one per day for the “Twelve Days of Christmas” with a short poem from Tom for each. Hope you enjoy!
So many berries
So little daylight these days
Winter challenges!
Image (c) 2020 Hilary Farmer
Poem (c) 2020 TJ Radcliffe
A small bouquet of pansies from the garden – subtle shades of velvet. I love how this one came out. It almost makes you want to put your nose to the painting!
Tom wrote a haiku that perfectly evokes the day.
butterflies gather
fluttering in shadowed light
lazy summer days
image (c) Hilary Farmer
poem (c) TJ Radcliffe
This painting started life as an abstract and some elements of that are still here. However, the piece really started to develop after a visit to a friend’s beautiful garden back towards the end of August. That’s when floral elements started to show themselves. I went back and forth on this one for about a month building up layers and thinking about it before I finally decided it was finished. The title comes from the anenomes that are on the right side which are sometimes called “windflower” and as well, the feeling of a breeze drifting through the petals of all the sunlit flowers.
Here is Tom’s lovely haiku which captures the scene so succinctly.
dawn over garden
summer world in soft dissolve
through the morning mist
image (c) 2020 Hilary Farmer
poem (c) 2020 TJ Radcliffe
Early in September I went out with my gear and found another local beauty spot. It was really hot that day! I was glad to find a bit of shade to set up in. The challenge as usual with plein air painting was to catch the light quickly – as well as the colour of the water and the shapes and locations of the clouds before everything changes. The result is less detailed but fresher and more dynamic than working from a photo.
Here is Tom’s poem which at first seems to be for another scene but wait for it – the final couplet tells the tale.
In summer gales these waters roil
as wind and tide and waves contend
for who shall make the sailor’s toil
the worst. And who shall best unmend
the flapping canvas, spliced up rope,
a bimini not made to cope
with gusts that come from angles all
around the compass. Masts might fall
as waves come in from every point.
The bow is bounced, the stern is slewed,
the sky with clouds ascudding’s strewed
as the sea tests every joint.
But in the calm it lies serene
as if those storms were never seen!
image (c) 2020 Hilary Farmer
poem (c) 2020 TJ Radcliffe
Having bought some sunflowers at the market back at the end of August, I had to paint them of course. I decided to use extra thick and juicy brushstrokes a la Van Gogh. Sunflowers just seem to want that approach.
Tom wrote a haiku that gets to the heart of the painting in so few words.
transient fires burn
triumvirate of blossoms
brighten summer days
image (c) 2020 Hilary Farmer
poem (c) 2020 TJ Radcliffe
I do love flowers in their natural setting more than those in a vase. This is a study in white playing with the warm and cool tones to give a natural play of light and shadow on the petals.
Tom wrote a haiku for this one that captures the essence of the moment.
delicate scent wafts
petals open to the sun
summer afternoon
image (c) 2020 Hilary Farmer
poem (c) 2020 TJ Radcliffe
I have been playing with more abstract (and abstract adjacent) painting this year. This one was built up over many layers ending up somewhere between impressionism and abstraction. At some point in the process, the moon appeared in the sky and stayed. The feeling was quite dreamy and more subtle than this photo shows but I can’t get another because it sold quickly.
Tom wrote a delightful sonnet with a rhythm of anapestic tetrameter (like Dr. Seuss) which really suits the mood of the painting.
The farmer’s abed and the Moon is reborn
so we’ll dance and we’ll sing from the eve until morn
when we’ll lie down exhausted and sleep through the day.
In the shadows of grasses and flowers we will lay
until the soft darkness ensilvered by stars
creeps out of the gloaming and brings us awake
to drink from the dew by the light of bright Mars
and sip the sweet nectar of flowers ’til we slake
our thirst and our hunger. Our bodies adorned
with trews made of petals, so silken and gay
we’ll jig to a hornpipe like England’s old tars
who served that old pirate, Sir Francis the Drake.
For we are the Fairest of Folk in this land
obeying no law but the bright Moon’s command.
image (c) 2020 Hilary Farmer
poem (c) 2020 TJ Radcliffe
