 Hello, everyone, and good evening. My name is Taryn Urquhart, and I'm the Arts and Special Events Programmer here at the West Vancouver Memorial Library. On behalf of the Library and the West Vancouver Art Museum, I would like to welcome you to tonight's Art Talk. While I recognize that we are all in different places this evening, I would like to acknowledge that the West Vancouver Library and Art Museum reside within the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territories of the Squamish Nation, Slewa Tooth Nation, and Musqueam Nation. We recognize and respect them as nations in this territory, as well as their connection to the lands and waters around us since time immemorial. I am personally grateful to call the Pacific Northwest my home, and I'm thankful to the Coast Salish communities that continue to protect the natural beauty and animal diversity that surround me every day. It has been my great pleasure to work with Hilary Letwin and her guest tonight to bring this event to your screens. And now I would like to pass things over to Hilary, who's waiting over at the museum. Hilary? Thank you, Taryn. We're so delighted to be partnering with the West Vancouver Memorial Library to present this Artist Talk this evening. I'm joined here by Ross Penhall, who of course is the exhibiting artist in our current exhibition, Losing Control of the Landscape, which is here at the West Vancouver Museum until December 16th, so please come and see it. Ross, thank you. It's so nice to get together and have an opportunity to chat about this particular exhibition. Yes. So we've been working towards this project for almost the last two years or so. We've been talking about the exhibition. And we were really, from the beginning, very certain that we wanted to show something a little bit different, a little bit surprising. We wanted to include your new work, the opportunity to include some older work, and we definitely lasered in on the new work. Yes, you did. So let's talk a little bit about what you've been up to for the last few years. There are some things that you're doing a little differently. So let's talk about your COVID experience and what you've been doing a little differently. Well, yeah, COVID, I mean, I'll start there. So it was nothing changed really. I just went to my studio every day. I mean, isolation is what I'm really good at. So we're isolating. And it was an inspirational time. It sounds terrible to say that because I know many people suffer. But I'm lucky to have that open. I just went to my studio and worked. And things did come to a grinding ball of calories, obviously. But it was almost kind of freeing in a way. I felt the pressure just off. And I was able to just work. And without anything in mind, it just worked. And then, you know, with the Outdoor Paint, it's been a huge boost for me as far as creativity and not the impression of precious imagery and just being out there and doing it with friends and by myself. I like it by myself. I mostly do it when I travel. So that's new and, you know, a little less sketching the pencil, more like on my iPad and working out compositional issues with small paintings. And I sort of confine myself to three sizes, 8x8, 8x10, 6x12. And that covers everything. So I will shoehorn imagery into those or just change it completely. And so that's been great. It's a little daunting. It's not for everybody. Because when you do stand out in the middle of a field or wherever, you just, like, it is overwhelming and you have to sort of focus in. And you have to sort of ping. It was one trick I was on. I just pulled off the 101. I said, I have no idea what's at this turn. I'm just going to find something. Even if all I do is just color match. You know, the dry grass and the sills of passers-by. And after I did that, I got back in the van. I felt so good that most of my wounds are dictated by my heart. Whether I'm feeling like I'm moving forward or just if I can get something done in the morning, my whole day looks better. Everything kind of defines me. Because you touched on the small words, I'd like to clarify for audience that we have a number of your sort of signature large-scale canvases in the exhibition, some of which you can see right here. But we also have a number of these small panels, these new small panels. So this is more or less the first time that you've exhibited these small panels. So is this something a little bit new? Yes. I mean, I've been showing them in California starting in the last couple of years, I would say. I've been approaching it slowly. I've finally figured out how I like to do it and how I apply paint to these good panels, and they're coming together. So yeah, I'm more and more confident about showing them. And they're just, for the sake of priority, they're absolute small gems. They're beautiful. They hold just as much power as the large-scale landscapes do. I would argue maybe even more than something. There is that, for sure, people often say about the group of seven who did a lot of, you know, they tear their lids off cigar boxes and paint on those and perpetuate things and leaving areas uncovered. And yeah, they were loose and thick and spontaneous. And that's what the small ones are. You can't help it. You don't get brushes. You get in. You know, sometimes they take an hour. You know, I can go back and work on them a bit afterwards. But yeah, it's about making quick decisions and laying down what you're talking about. It doesn't get any better. But when they take that same image and paint it big, unless you're going to paint with brushes, maybe this big, goop the paint on the paint exactly like you did on the small one, I don't know if you can capture it. It's hard. Everything gets tighter. But that's okay. It's alright. It's a whole different thing. But there is a looseness. And I think it's starting to translate from the larger work to a little bit more. So, are you tied all of the losing control of landscape is a little bit around you actually loosening control over your painting? Yes, and trying to, yeah, losing control. Yes, giving up control. I mean, assuming you ever had it. Which is a, yeah, so I think, because every time I start painting, whether it's a small nor big one, it's just a little bit of a fail. And I feel like I'm doing it for the first time. And it's a, you know, when you think about all these years, I've had it down, but I, you know, it's starting to paint his heart for me. And that's mostly his heart. But once I get going, it's funny. And then finishing it's not a problem. But, yeah, I don't think, all the way through, I'm mixing paint on the canvas. I'm just, you know, whether it's putting a cloud in a perfectly, perfect sky you've just done, you could just screw it all up by putting it in the wrong cloud. Or is this convincing? I don't know. So, yeah. I mean, lots of painting. I'll say that. You've mentioned Group 7, so let's dig a little bit into your influences, your artistic influences. You are very quick to list a long list of people who you draw inspiration from. So I'd like to just touch on some of those people. We've spoken about it before, but perhaps for the sake of our audience, and just talk about how different artists influence you in different ways. Well, I guess to deny my influence on Group 7 would be silly. Would be insincere. They are there. But I realize after thinking about it, and Robert has forgiven me one of H.A. Cassin's books, which I had years ago. I need to sit here and take this. I've got a new one. It's quite a collection. I started realizing this is the guy. It's not the Group 7. It's actually H.A. Cassin. I realized I forgot how much influence he was in a year. To the point where I didn't go meet him. I didn't go to his house. You wrote a letter to him? I just looked him up in the phone book. He's running the phone. I thought we were talking on the phone. He said, did you say Cassin on the phone? She goes, oh yeah, here he is. He said, give me his number. This was made before the internet. Yeah, early 90s or whatever. Yeah, so he called him up. And spoke to his daughter. And he said, yeah, come on. So you went to his visit with him. I went for his visit? And he was in his 90s? Yeah, in the 90s. Yeah, he died in the 50s. No, not too far after this one. Anyway, it was... Yeah, so going back to that, I realized his use is... The law neighbors I like. We're all commercial artists. They're sense of design and things like that. So I... And I was too for a short period of time. But yeah, I really appreciate their sensibilities to design. And their light and dark shadows. You know, how they play with the landscape. Yeah, he did that. So Edward Hopper said... Yeah, he's pretty big. He, I think from him, he's actually... He was amazing at your... So I've always... loved his actions. Look, his contrast light and dark. He has this moody piece. Amazing. And just his weight crops. And yeah, just a simple... He's a bit cheap on the paint. Like he scrubs his paint on. He was a funny guy. Yeah, he was a real gromp. But he painted the loneliness of New York. And again, his light shadow. Like how he would repeat light. He would place things. Everything was very well thought out. And he was a commercial artist too. Yeah. So I went to his 1995 show. He opened me. And we just last remember him. Yeah. And to see his new show at the week. At the new week. And he's always actually there. So that was... It was... They moved me more than his paintings actually. So I'd like to talk a little bit about your printmaking. Because we were very fortunate of you currently selling one of your prints as part of our Artist Editions program. Thank you very much for that. Which means that we keep the proceeds of all of the sales. So that's incredible support for us. So let's talk a little bit about your printmaking. Because you... Why don't we even say that you started off doing drawing or some paper and prints even before you started painting your artists. So I meant to talk a little bit about your printmaking. You don't make prints all the time. The majority of your time is spent painting. But let's talk about how you got into printmaking and what you like about it. And I think it's really important to clarify that your prints look very different from your paintings. Almost in the same way that Hopper's do. So let's talk about that. What do you know about printmaking? Well, I loved it. Right from when I went to Cap College, my high school art teacher Fred Duel, he introduced us to Hopper. There were no zinc plates. And acetate, we drew on to clear acetate. And we were pulling prints from that. And then when I went to Cap College, Wendy Scott was my printmaking teacher there. And he really encouraged me. And then I carried on. And then when I joined Malice, I couldn't be able to draw a lot. You have to show a competency which I had and then give you a locker and you can go into the studio anytime and just work. I was so happy back then. I wasn't interested in anything other than just building that part of my creativity. Sales were another thing. It was nothing. Just going there, spending all day there and coming away. Just going to do a nice shift in the fireball. So this would have been the early 80s in Granville Island. It was a wonderful experience. And then I got really good at it. And I did that in so many things a week. Because I don't do it as much now. But once a year I go in and work with Peter. He's usually around Christmas. I go in and pull some prints. And there's always a nice distraction in the studio. So Peter, he's the master printmaker. I work with the plate. And then he proves it for me. Because printmaking in itself is an art form. You're actually wiping the plate and getting the pressure right. I got quite good at it. But it's just another level later that I don't have time for. Rather be. I got to be. So it's a good distraction to get out of the studio. So I just wanted to like about etching. I just like scratching on the plate. And I love the black and the equality. You know, the dark, dark line. And I did a lot of drawing. And that was the sort of printmaking and drawing. Graphite and cobalt pencil. And some pastel. And I was just sort of working my way to something. Eventually I knew I wanted bigger. I wanted to work with paint. But it wasn't generally my way. So you don't have to switch. It's time to switch. So you took a class in the car. I took a night class. And I also took a lithography course of two. That didn't have to be those. Drawing on stones. Which is too delicate. Etching is nice. But you can just scratch. You can pretty much make a mark with anything. That's the part of my life. But, yeah. So I took a paint class with Lucy Haught. And I taught. She was very good. I remember one. The thing that stuck with me is, you know, when you're a beginner struggling with material, you just think, I'll just put more paint on it. And eventually she said, Rats, you're just pushing paint around. You're just scraping it off. Scraping it off, yeah. So, you know, that's like, you know, Whistler, you know, he wouldn't paint for eight hours or as long as he was scraping it all off. But there'd be like a halo left and then he wouldn't start the next day. So that stuck with me so much. And it's just the routine of doing it. And it really made me figure out whether I'm going to acrylic or what. But, yeah. It was good. It was a good exercise. Everything else has been like, studying other people's work. Not boring completely, but little aspects. Like, you know, Sean Skellig like, his edges are amazing. So, you know, it's okay to tweak things and make it a little imaginary. So there's a, everybody has something, you know, that I borrow from Reminders, yeah. You know, a lot of it's just you learn to figure out, painting is like your signature, it's how you write and how you make a mark as individual to everybody. And you ask me, do you want who you are teaching to? I don't teach how to paint. I would inspire you. And I do materials, but I'm not going to continue your work. So let's talk a little bit about some of the digital tools that you use now for your work. Because I think that's one significant change that your work is that you've sort of embraced in recent years. And it does seem quite different from how you used to work. So tell us briefly how you've worked creating digital tools, and then tell us how you work now. Yeah, well I did sketchbooks, I stopped doing stacks of sketchbooks and you know, my little carry pencils and boxes. And it's not that long ago, I had a box of photographs that would just not go through. They didn't appeal to me, and suddenly they appealed to me. So I had those, and at that point I wasn't in their page yet. So a lot of sketching, a lot of figuring out a lot of cropping, that Edward Hopper thing where you're just like how close does that telephone pole need to be here? I spent a lot of time cracking before I even get to this canvas. And then so I remember going from I've been at this so long, I remember sending slides and pictures down to the galleries in California 22 years ago and it's amazing how long things took. Now, well with my iPad I just, I had it, and I had it before I would insist it's the new one, and it has the stylus. And I can manipulate before I ever get to a painting I can take these mountains and make them taller I can squish, I can lengthen, I can do all these things that you take a photograph and just introduce all sorts of things that interest me that make it me. The photographs are all yours. They're all mine. And then what I also do is when I am done with it, and I got to a certain point and I'm going, does it need me? I will say brushes. And I will start moving around with new mountains, making the clouds. It's such an easy app to work with. It's like painting on an iPad. You know, David Haughton, he was one of the first people to have a whole show of digital artwork. And I remember that with the young in San Francisco it was long. And then you could buy iPads, all these iPads on the wall that you've drawn. The iPad came with the image you buy the iPad. And anyway, so the app to be able to do that has become such a tool. It's a tool. Artists are always very good at figuring out tools. And the other thing that I actually do, going back to that, is artists have always, painters have also done that to me. It's over the years. It was their way of multiples. Being able to reproduce. I didn't know that when I first started, but I learned that later. It's this kind of thing. Oh yeah, a huge tool of dissemination from the Renaissance School. So let's talk a little bit more about how you select your views. It's been interesting, a lot of our visitors have come in recently and wanted to do the exact location where a painting shows. For the most part, yes you're manipulating the image, but for the most part the places that you're painting are good places. If one really knew their geography they could pick out most of the locations. But let's talk a little bit about your perspectives. So all of the works that we have on the show are photographs with the exception of the small panels that you're painting up on there. And a lot of these places are fairly remote places. So how do you what about a particular location makes you think this would be a great picture? What are you looking for when you're looking for places to paint? Well let me just think here I tend to I have to go out and find them they're not so I will take something like I'm trying to think of the titles I'm drawing blanks here like Tangled Beach here that is a fun special game here and I get up in the morning and I go out and I sat there I've done a smaller version of that one I'm always looking I'm never not looking I took a window seat on the plane I was just in Saskatoon and I made sure I got a window seat because I didn't really want to look at it And so I will find I have friends with boats I have a good boat and when we go up the coast in the morning and I'm pretty much on the front of the boat and I'm seeing clouds and I'm seeing all these things and I'm going, that's a good one I can work with that so I will take like I kind of remember the name of that I will look at it and say this is so great I'll get little aspects of that I can work with that I can make that taller I can do this I can squish it a bit but you're just looking at a blank wall so I will actually create a gap so that there's and that may not be true in the location but everybody see like if you go up the coast it's very, it's a thing you see all the time you look at it gasically it goes through there but I like there always to be a way through the work I don't want to be stopped I love in something that I read about your work you love that expression don't tell me what was the expression don't let's get in the way of a good composition yeah, it's true and that's the heart of it art is all art is an exaggeration art is about taking what's in front of you and making it your own nothing more getting like this is but you still like close, you know, real estate but I still you still need to put something with you there's many ways to do it but that's the way I do and it is like I need to feel I'm looking at this image I need to make it feel a little more claustrophobic so I will exaggerate things or I will you know in the prairie but you're not really testing that as much as I squish if it was on the coast this way I would stretch and that's another program I found where you don't lose anything you don't crop anything down you just squish it so for instance like I took pictures of a window of an aircraft coming into Calgary and they didn't interest me at the time and they probably sat somewhere in my folder five or six years and I do it, I scroll back in time and I go let's not just go back to 2016 and see what I was thinking or even further and I said oh look this is very interesting so then what I did was and it was actually all recallable when he thought this painting is really great boss but it needs to be this wide and it was another painting like that so he was the one that actually kind of got me just like manipulating the image it doesn't work with everything so it has its limitations but you have to know if you're pushing it too far so anyway with the prairie it was like okay well we're coming in and say it's 4,000 feet and you're looking down and then with the squishing program you just squish it and suddenly you're at 200 feet so it just becomes wider and the whole just everything becomes the laws of perspective as you get lower to the horizon and that's really interesting it's a very horizontal painting so you touched on this a little bit but just for the sake of clarity for our audience so we've arranged this exhibition according to geographical location so we have in the first gallery we've got our most proposed views in the second gallery we've got our mountains and our prairie and then in the third gallery we have our most proposed views and those are paintings of football and so I'd like to just talk about how because you've touched on this already there are different visual tools that you're implementing there are different visual languages that you're implementing according to where in Canada you are depicting and a good example of this is on the west coast your waves and one of your paintings are very long and flat the water is quite the better word flat and of course in the east coast paintings your waves are quite tall there's a real verticality too so you're still looking at these different places these different locations and depicting reality because in the east coast that's how water is do you want to talk a little bit about that? sure, even with my higher water paintings when I went to Fogo I was invited there and I did a commission for some people that hosted us and just the month before that I was in I was in Hyderabad and so one month later I was on the extreme west coast of one coast and in the extreme literally the other coast and just the similarity but when I was with my daughter I could see these waves coming you don't even know the rollers you're just gradually going to be done and then you see a break and I did paint that coast I was busy fishing and I was taking photos but I didn't spend a lot of time outside I spent a lot of time inside so I've always lived in sort of protected waters like even the painting here I'm terrible but it's sheltered sheltered water I look around a lot of these you're right mountains are very tall but I'm always looking for that sort of anchor at the bottom they are calm the Fogo piece was all of Fogo Island the whole area around there was in high definition and crisp and sharp and the sun in September when we were there in the rocks were dark and sharp and so I was realizing the more I looked at that painting that's what I was feeling the air was fresh it was just a wild Atlantic so the house sound can be treacherous the Georgia Strait is one of the most complicated on the coast there's like three bodies of water coming in all directions so it can be terrible but I I don't know I think I'm more interested in the mountains and the water is just an anchor it's just to make things sit so I know that answered your question it does so you mentioned the word treacherous to dig in a little bit to that so you worked as a firefighter for 29 years here for the district of Boston Cooper and that you've said in previous instances impacted the fact that you became an anchor and the way in which you've worked let's talk about the balance between working as a firefighter and as a painter sure I knew at a very young age I wanted to part my life I knew that was going to be 19 you're not pretty sure about that especially back in the 1979 it was a different world and so but I also I wanted freedom I needed a job so I thought well I just had to shift work I wanted large blocks of time so that I had the freedom to do that that's what I chose to part my life plus I liked the job I needed appeal to people I was working in the ski patrol and the ambulance when I was younger around that time and I was getting a smatter and all this and I joined a firefighter volunteers, they had volunteers and I just had no idea when everyone's running that way you're running this way I don't just appeal to my real seeking risk taking attitude my head and it was completely different than being an artist it was the opposite one is all about the team the other is all about the not team you spend time by yourself after four days in the studio you need some even contact now so I had this great talent and as far as people who teach you do you ever paint flyers no, not really it doesn't really interest me but driving around in a fire truck we'd be like look at the light on those clouds and they started like what color is that for us it's a cerulean blue so they started to like they were always when I took my lithography course I joked and said if you guys want to print you want to print from the show 50 bucks each you'll get a printer so you guys call me from the other halls and they're all like the course is paid for by the firefighters we've never had more firefighters than in the exhibition they were very supportive so I wanted for our last question I want to talk about what it is to be a landscape artist in the time of climate change we're looking at some really significant climate emergencies that are happening here in BC and around the world and in a way the most here is a catalog of endangered species so I'd like to talk a little bit about that and talk a little bit about how you how you tackle questions about climate change I think these are these paintings and the felt in which we should mention as well are really are really an interesting thing to look at the nature that we want to see preserved in the future so what is it to be a landscape artist in the time of climate emergency well it's climate emergency is cracked up on us like it's suddenly I didn't start out realizing that we were in quite a dire situation I should have said I worked in the lighting industry when I was a teenager that was your first job and it was an idol work and but I'm glad I did I mean I'm glad I did it taught me a lot about human nature and people and then I just want to be here as far as my painting goes like I recently you know, back in 2005 when that book came out the Gold Spurs I it profoundly affected me but it wasn't until I re-read or now I re-listened or listened to it and for some reason that was even more profound I was almost like not PTSD but I was having flashbacks to my forest days when I was working in the forest and his description of just the lighting industry and all that I mean everything you talked about I mean I remember those names the names of different jobs and choking and chasing they were a person not real they were just the crazy people who were working in these camps two months in the camp and they go back to Vancouver and just lay waste to the downtown and he said I'm just like I was just terrible and I so reading his book I realized he describes the fact and then China's able to lose control of the landscape you know the First Nations and he talks a lot about Mosul and Haida and how they lost control of their landscape you know they were part of the fur trade they, you know according to John Donnellan if you can't be any, I guess you got a joint that came from Europe and Otterfers were just so coveted and then the otters ran out like the buffalo and whatever other species were decimated and then the Haida were like no we do you know and then they came for the forests and then they came for the fish and then they came for the minerals and this is John Donnellan quoting this more or less paraphrasing and then sort of we're losing control of the landscape you know like so that soon we never had any control and again you know I think the First Nations did have control I mean I think they might have a lot less they lived within their means and they weren't on this mission to deforest I mean they came the only reason why we're sliding behind the east coast is it just took longer for them to come around but once they figured it out for the industry and they were looking for these sail masts you know something like 97% of BC's old growth forest is gone and what we have left that 3% is the protected bit so you don't paint clear cuts you don't paint landscape that has been decimated and by focusing in on the beauty we're seeing a different version of the reality and I wonder what's possible yeah I mean a lot of these can be you know just over the hill it could be curved cuts it would be very good at making you not see what was just over the hill and that's what grab handle and go this way there's a screen of what we see and then all of the curved cut happens and you do have logs that you have logs in a lot of your paintings and some of them get washed on creeks from erosion or whatever and some come out a lot of them and it's yeah it's a lot of fun in the so the coast every person should read that book it's a permit for understanding why we're where we are with the forcing yeah a lot of it let's talk about your felt the last minute you just started felting something you do in the evenings to relax when most people felting so you tell us a little bit about that well it started but my daughter was the first one she tries all sorts of things and she she gets a little dog and when that shows that you can do this it's so easy so of course because she just keep poking and you know of course I go on YouTube and I I discovered Mewa on Granville Mountain and they sell all the wolves and all the stuff and you go on Amazon and you find felting pads and all these things and it's such a it's not messy but you're using your hands and you just the sound is so relaxing and of course I appreciate how I make trees and they seem they're just it's a challenge the forms are just rolling and you just start poking it unveils itself ever slowly so the more you poke in the area it's a barbie you push the fireworks through, they lock and then you can create depressions and you can pretty much add, cover over it's very flexible so it's just like a big one because I don't know what to do with them I have like 60 other colors so they're all different colors and I'll try this color it's all dye natural from using it in the fall I'm looking for a local to source they're very you they're very distinctly you there's no denying they're off your show you see where the bulking takes you and then there's you can actually spray and dye it yourself so I make it into that and intriguing possibly Ross thank you so much for speaking with me this evening it's great to sit down and chat about the exhibition this has been great as I say the exhibition is on until December 16th and we encourage you to come in and see us for open Tuesday to Saturday from 11am to 5pm and we did produce an exhibition for this publication which is available here for purchase for $30 and there's a great statement by Ross and it's a great meeting and we encourage you to come and check that out so thank you to the library for co-presenting us co-presenting us this evening we look forward to seeing you in person thank you