Saturday, 11 October 2014, 10 am
Came home a couple of days ago from an expedition to the
Macquarie Marshes and Warren in central NSW – 2000 km round trip.
It was organised by Bill Phillips and his organization
RiverSmart to raise the profile of the wetlands in that area. Several artists
and students were involved, mainly the Australian Plein Air Group, a group of
traditional plein air oil painters. Works were exhibited in an ancient building
in town as they were finished.
I adopted the strategy of getting up when aroused by the
galah alarm to capture the pre-dawn and early raking light, then lazing under a
tree for the rest of the day to avoid the heat in the high 30’s. The others got
up a bit later and worked through the worst of it. Mad dogs, Englishmen and
plein air painters……
My first work was started at 5.30 am in the Tiger Bay
Wetlands, a small patch of artificially maintained wetland on the outskirts of
Warren. Lots of birds.
“Tiger Bay Wetlands
#1”
“Tiger Bay Wetlands
#2”
After this, I did some exploring to find suitable subjects
for the next day. Dawn found me at Raby horse stud, about 20 km north of
Warren. Love a bit of signage.
“Raby”
Then back towards town a few kilometres, to the Quinines
Reserve to have a go at a bend in the Macquarie River. Quite a tangle of debris
and it took a couple of hours to resolve its structure into something
comprehensible.
“Bent”
Then back to Warren to have a go at the bridge below the
downstream town weir. It was warming up and I wanted to get this one finished
before I melted.
Struck me as funny how all these gubbas love to name
structures after themselves, hence the title. Kind of like dogs marking their
territory.
“Jack's Bridge from
Brian's Weir”
Next day I was up before 5 and off to the Marshes and Willie
Retreat, where I arrived about 7. There was no one about apart from an emu, who
rifled through the back of my ute, and a couple of goats who showed me around.
The goats took the lead and the emu followed.
After finding Myra, a sprightly host in her mid eighties, I
found a spot to camp and a shady tree to do this –
” Willie Woodlands”
Stylisation creeping in. That night I did the scene around
the campfire. Annie and Gloria moved around a bit and were drawn in several
positions.
“2 Annie's, 3
Gloria's”
Dawn the next day found me 20 km east of Willie at the bird
observation platform on the Quambone road. Lots of birds, including a mob of
spoonbills in the distance. A fair bit of water around, unlike the last time I’d
been at this spot eight years ago. The rest of the artists turned up when I was half way
through this one.
“Big Terrigal Ck.”
I drove on another 10 km to Wilgara, a property owned by
Eric and Carollyn Fisher. I’d drawn Eric’s portrait for the ‘Dying Darling’ project
and wanted to catch up with him while I was in the area. Turns out Eric had
sold the property and was moving out before Christmas.
Carollyn fed and watered me while we waited for Eric, who
turned up eventually and directed me to a small creek behind the house. It was
hot and I was looking for some shade, and that’s exactly what I drew. I was
taken by the tree shadow on the milky tea-coloured pool and when I set my
panel down noticed that the shadow fell on to it, so I traced that instead. So
this is literally a rendition of the shade of a coolibah tree on my panel –
“The Shade of a
Coolibah Tree”
That was enough sweating for one day.
Dragged the pastels out and had a crack at the dawn next
morning –
“Willie Sunrise”
Then it was off to an appointment with National Parks at
Halls Block in the Macquarie Marshes proper. I was directed to an area along
the banks of the main channel. It was a bit wet and spectacularly colourful,
with red azoller weed (native) on the water, rich green verbage and bright
yellow swamp buttercups. Some big redgums, too.
“Halls Block - Main
Channel”
“Halls Block
Regrowth”
That night did a quick nocturne of the Willie Retreat
building (for paying guests) itself. Couldn’t interest anyone else in joining
in. Most artists don’t think that night-time scenes are a suitable source of
inspiration. What I like about them (apart from the depths and subtleties of night light) is
the way detail disappears and the composition simplifies.
“Willie Retreat
Nocturne”
Next morning caught the Telstra tower in the pre-dawn light.
Bronwen had pointed it out to me the day before as the sort of thing I’d draw
and I’d told her I’d already noticed it. Wanted to capture it before dawn, when
its lights were still on.
I had an alternative title, ‘Facebook Friend’, prompted by
all the Facebook activity around the campfire the previous evening (‘I’ll
friend you, will you friend me?’). Figured there wouldn’t be any of that
Facebook friending without the tower, but decided to go with Bronwen in the
end.
“One for Bronwen”
I moved on from the profane to the sacred, returning to
Hall’s Block. I decided to draw a patch of swamp buttercups with my last large
panel, being a bit bored with redgums.
I sketched in the darks first and did the drawing with a
kneadable erasor. Does it for me. A few bits of nardoo in there as well.
“Swamp Buttercups”
I headed back to Warren and waited for the closing
exhibition the next day. I went over to the relocated church, which was to
become the new Wetlands Centre, with Bronwen, the next morning.
“The Church of St.
Bill the Innocent, with Blue Gum, Warren”
As a postscript, came across this bloke on the way home, on
the outskirts of Glen Innes. He was leading his horse (trotter/drafthorse
cross) home, after a day working cattle.
What a portrait subject! Note his working dog curled up at
his feet.
