Studio stuff.

A view of a part of Linda Heslops' studio showing a work in progress (with the masking tape), a recently finished watercolor and a framed oil/acrylic hung on the wall. All are Vancouver Island westcoast scenes.

Flowerstones and more.

Yet another one of Linda Heslops' remarkable watercolor paintings of stones. Once more this image includes poryphyr (fairly common on the beaches of Vancouver Island) and a particularly nice piece in the center of the painting shows well developed 'flowers'.

Bridging Time.

Another Linda Heslop watercolor piece titled 'Bridging Time', this one also has a small piece of poryphry (upper right hand stone).

Some Stones

A Linda Heslop watercolor painting of pebbles and rocks including granite and porphyry (flowerstone) collected locally on Vancouver Island.

Stones and barnacles.

A watercolor depicting stones and barnacles trapped in a small tide pool. This image is called 'Castaways' and is available in several print formats, a better view of the print can be seen here http://www.fullcirclestudio.ca/linda/lindaheslopprints.html.

Snolar Bear.

For the first time since 1971 Canada is blanketed with snow from coast to coast to coast (yes, Canada has three coasts). Fortunately for us Victoria typically missed the worst of it, though we did get unusually cold temperatures and snow is still in the forecast for tomorrow and Christmas Day. Anyway, with typical Linda Heslop creativity, we now have a 'Snolar Bear' on our front lawn!

Show time!

 

Linda Heslop is having a show at Full Circle Studio starting  December 11th and these are some of the new original works that will be on display there. Only the bottom  seascape is an oil painting on canvas, the stones/pebbles and the starfish images being watercolor paintings done on  canvas. She's been extremely busy preparing new originals for the show and there are many more fresh works to be displayed there.

Starfish Trooper

Material for Linda Heslops' watercolors of sea stars come from photographs such as these. Abundant in rocky crevices at low tide, they await the seas return. These pictures were taken on the shoreline of Hornby Island (off Vancouver Islands' eastcoast).

Knowledge cast in stone.

 

This image of a Japanese concrete casting is called 'Knowledge', the exact meaning of the inscription apparently does not translate well into English but roughly says something along the line of We already have everything. If anyone can shed better light on the translation please make a comment.

Linda Heslop painted this in acrylic on canvas several years ago, a similar watercolor but with the casting set on a background of stones and pebbles had been painted prior to this. The casting resides in our garden.

Just a few stones!

This watercolor by artist Linda Heslop is called 'Abundance'. Easy to see why eh? There's pebbles, stones and small rocks all depicted in photo-realistic fashion. Count 'em if you can ;-)

Linda Heslop 'diving' into her work.

The three images above appeared in Immersed magazine. An international publication for, and about, technical diving. A very good magazine it was, unfortunately it ended in 2004 after several years of quarterly issues, even us non-divers could enjoy the sense of adventure produced on it's pages. Linda Heslop was commissioned to do a portrayal of the featured diver for each issue from photographs sent to her and further research at the local library in order to blend the subject matter into the image.

A couple more logos.

Linda Heslop did this design a few years ago, the grotto entered it into the 2008 NSS convention t-shirt salon and were awarded first place. Here it is modeled by a headless and legless caver!

This motif was also done several years ago (well, 11 years ago) for our friend J.P. Buchanan who built a nice little observatory on his property.

Moss Street Paint In.

Saturday, July 19th, 2008 was the date for the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria's 21st Annual Moss Street Paint In. This free event attracts more than 30k visitors over the course of the 6 or so hours it lasts, that's a lot of exposure! Linda had not planned to attend and thus her participation was unofficial. Usually, for July weekends we hope to be going camping but circumstances prevented this, so when Val (her agent) suggested setting up on a friends lawn she decided to go for it. (Most residences have unofficial attendees using their yards, driveways etc).

The street is closed to traffic at 9am for artists to be able to get set up, so we got there far too early and put the display up. I left shortly afterwards and returned with our daughter at about 11am just as the first visitors were arriving. Still fairly quiet as the pics show. Sarah and I toured about a half of the event and on returning to Lindas' site we noticed 2 sold stickers already attached to pieces. Hmmm, not a bad start. I took Sarah home and got on with replacing our front porch deck for a few hours awaiting a phone call to help dismantle everything for Linda.

So around 4pm I went back. Still a lot of people on the street, making it awkward to drive to the site. I can't tell you just how surprised I was to find there was practically no product left to take away. They'd run out of everything twice and had to get more product from Vals' gallery along with more credit card slips!! People had queued to purchase, anything from art cards to posters and limited editions to giclees, then queued again to have them signed personally. Not that Linda's unknown around here but the quality of work by other artists is extremely high, so she felt very honoured by the public response to her work.

Some advice for anyone attending in the future..... get there early. The event becomes very busy by midday and so it's more difficult to take everything in with the crowds milling around the displays. You can also park somewhat closer by and you'll be thankful for that when the long slow plod up and down Moss St is finished.

Art for Arts' Sake, Money for Godsake!!

Not my work!! This blog will mostly be about my talented and creative wifes' artwork, mostly done in watercolor. So.....

Linda Heslop.

Linda Heslop was born into a creative environment and spent her early years encouraged and tutored by her artist/architect father.

Working as a freelance illustrator, for many years she designed logos and illustrated numerous magazines and books internationally, including her own book "The Art of Caving". Linda is an outdoor enthusiast having spent decades in cave exploration and surveying in remote areas in Canada and the U.S.

Her true love is Vancouver Island, where she lives, and it is this island, it's shores in particular, which inspire almost all of her work. An interest in geology and its shaping by time is expressed in her many intricate depictions of beach stones. A passion for biology is reflected in her intertidal paintings. It is "the utter joy of being there" that she aims to capture and in doing so hopes to instill the need for preservation of this unique and beautiful place.

She works in watercolor, oil, acrylic, pencil and ink and is represented by Canadian Art Connections who produce and distribute reproductions of her works on both paper and canvas.

And as for the title, well, she ain't in it for the money, artists do it for the love of it. (But lucrative offers will be gratefully accepted!!)