Mural Painting

Here's a mural I painted at a really cool company located in Dundas, Ontario, called Wilderness Medical. The company specializes in medical training in wilderness contexts. They wanted something to liven up their office space, so I took the mountain from the Wildnerness Medical logo and went from there. I really enjoyed working on the project and found about it through my next-door neighbour, a paramedic, who works for Wilderness Medical. Did I mention I have great neighbours?

Art is Work*

Here, at last, is an acrylic painting I started when I was expecting my second baby. That baby is now 14 months old. I was going to write something about how that gives an idea of how long this painting gestated for, but paintings don't gestate-- they sit in your studio space for extended periods of time, begging you to just forget about everything else and do some painting already! I think this painting turned out well enough. What I'm more excited about is that I made the time to do the work and was reminded of how enjoyable it is to paint with acrylics. That's the funny thing about painting; it is work, you're physically labouring at a task that's mentally demanding, but it's just so fun.

*props to the amazing Milton Glaser and his kick-butt book

Getting it Done

A little lino-cut inspired by a photo I took this summer (see below)

So the other day I did something that I haven't done in a while-- printmaking. Which got me thinking, I haven't written anything on my blog for quite some time either. I find when you haven't done something for a while, you start to spend more time thinking about doing the thing in question rather than just taking the time to do it. Not an especially effective strategy for getting done what you want to do. On the other hand, cancelling Netflix and having your free cable cut off by the guy who's fixing your phone is extraordinarily helpful for getting things done. Just saying.

Painting on Autopilot

I couldn't resist painting one more leaf. A couple of weeks ago I went for a walk and came home with a fistful of good looking leaves. It was a difficult process of elimination, but I had to make up my mind before all I had on hand was a dried up pile of leafy bits. Working on this watercolour turned into a kind of Zeno's paradox; I wanted to finish the painting but the more I looked at the leaf the more I had to keep painting. When this kind of thing happens and I feel myself getting too persnickety, I turn off whatever music I'm listening to and that helps switch off the painting autopilot so I can wrap it up.

Splendour in the Leaves

My favourite time of year is here. I love the fall, but it's just so short. Knowing it's brief is probably one of the things that makes me enjoy autumn all the more. All those bright and beautiful leaves will shortly blow away. Summer has its moments where you think it will never end. Fall, with its sharp breezes snapping at the sunshine, supplies no such illusions. And really, it's impossible to think of enjoying something beautiful and fleeting without thinking of newborns.

My baby is six weeks old and when I snuggle him in my arms, it's hard to imagine that he won't be so little for long. Trying to describe the wonder of an infant by just calling him 'little' is a wordsmithing injustice, but I'm too sleep deprived to put that feeling into words. Fall reminds me that each season and each stage has its particular splendour that needs to be savoured before it's gone. Which brings me to this watercolour painting: my tribute to fall.

As for the title in the bottom right, there's the obvious Canadian flag reference, but, while I worked on the painting, my patriotic tendencies were also helped along by listening to an interview with Paul Henderson on the 40th anniversary of the 1972 summit series win against Russia.

Just so you know

Woohoo! www.stephaniesikma.com is running smoothly.

Website Difficulties

The server for my website is experiencing some problems so my site, www.stephaniesikma, is not loading. I'm working to get this fixed, and in the meantime, my online portfolio can be viewed right here on my blog and also on my facebook page, Stephanie Sikma Illustration. I've been told my site should be back up in 12 -24 hours, so hopefully this inconvenience won't last long. My apologies if you've been trying to access my website.

I'm frustrated with this technical difficulty, so to counteract that feeling here's a photograph of my beautiful boys that makes me smile and think of the finer things in life...