Wednesday, January 27, 2010

Disappearing Glaciers


Crowfoot Glacier 1910

Watercolour and crayon

©2010 Charlene Brown

This is what the Crowfoot Glacier looked like about 100 years ago, based on a photo by Byron Harmon. Next week I’ll paint this glacier, which is about 35 km NW of Lake Louise in Banff National Park, as it is now – using my own photographs.

I had intended to paint both versions in the manner of Eric Aho a contemporary superstar whose wonderfully spontaneous landscape drawings I have just discovered through the Art of the Landscape blog – and got off to a fairly successful start scribbling crayon, as Aho does pastels. But when I tried to apply a watercolour wash in place of the blending of the pastels, I pretty well lost the effect. A little scribbling was reintroduced when I flipped a few lines in over the dried wash using a No.3 rigger. I will try to replicate this style (whatever it is) when I paint the much reduced, but still impressive, present day glacier.