Susan Tooke at Long Branch Studios

The Barrens, Mt. Uniacke, acrylic on canvas, 4' x 4' The parklands of the Mount Uniacke Estate include trails through Acadian forest, wetlands and the barrens.  The trails wind through woodlands, sometimes with deep undergrowth.  However, along the Barrens Trail the woods are dominated by red spruce.  The survivors reach above the unsuccessful fallen trees whose trunks and branches create a pattern of white bones across the forest floor.

installation shot of "Woodlands" at Gallery Page and Strange    Visual Viewpoints: Tooke invites viewers to Woodlands show the Chronicle Herald, Arts and Life, September 18, 2013 - 5:41pm  BY ELISSA BARNARD ARTS REPORTER I have been to Hemlock Ravine, but I have never seen it the way  Halifax artist  Susan Tooke does. Her woods teem in colour and line in a cheerful and exciting new  show, Woodlands,  at Gallery Page  and Strange at 1869 Granville St.  in Halifax until Sept. 27. The side of each wood panel is painted in the acrylic colour — red,  or teal, or royal  blue or green —  that will dominate the background  of each image.  With eye-popping colour, outlines and a visceral  energy in her lines and abstracted  forms, Tooke  continues to create  an exalted experience of the land that she first  introduced in her  show,  Transformation, two years ...

Back to elm street studio. Summer has lots of distractions.  It is a time for gathering ideas, working in the garden, traveling, hiking, socializing.   Ideas from Shannon Falls, BC have stuck with me... Here is the latest work from the studio.

I had the great pleasure and opportunity to work with the poetry of George Elliott Clarke earlier this year. Lasso the Wind: Aurélia's Verses and Other Poems will be out this fall.  Here are several illustrations... a bit of a preview!

Bog Trail, Cape Breton Lately, I have been working on paper, creating pieces for the Paper show at Gallery Page and Strange.  The show opens on Friday, February 15, 6-8 p.m.  To quote the gallery: "This exhibition is focusing on paper. We bring elements of the artists studio into the gallery so you can see parts of the process too. Sketch books and initial works on paper are on display to give you a sense of what really lies behind the artworks that you love. Not only is it fascinating to see the history of a work of art, it is beautiful. This exhibition is fantastic for a new collector. Works on paper will be available and often cost significantly less than a fully realized canvas. Work on paper in a private collection loans a sense of sophistication and deeper appreciation of what it is an artist does." Hope to see you there!

Three Totems, 5' x 4', acrylic on wood panel October in Cape Breton is spectacular... even when rainy and wet. Richard and I hiked each day, sketching, painting, and immersing ourselves in the landscape.  On one of the trails on Mount Grenville, St. Peter's a clearing in the woods held three ancient trunks in varying states of decay. They seemed to be watchers with a stoic dignity, at the edge of the forest; echos of the old-growth, with grasses and brambles forming a quilted covering for their roots, still anchoring them to the earth.

Near Shannon Falls  acrylic on canvas 36" x 48" Ravine acrylic on canvas 36" x 60" I am currently working on a series of woodland paintings.  The  complexity of the imagery, combining minimal sky, vertical forms, tangles of roots, soft carpets of moss challenge me to find the structure in the composition.  So often I have turned my back on the forests, heading instead for the shore and the action of the waves and wind, the ancient formations of rock molded by the elements.  Now I am returning to the coolness of the woods, full of mystery, decomposition and rebirth.

Back to my painting after a Titanic interlude and the MASC conference for young illustrators and writers in Ottawa.  It is an enjoyable, if intense, process to paint for me: to interpret more than with optical accuracy, but to still retain the emotional connection to the landscape.   I am freed from the pedantic! Cape Breton Spring 48" x 60" acrylic on wood panel                                 

We had an exciting rehearsal today, with all of the pieces coming together... Lukas Pearse creating an electroacoustic score, real-time video processing.  Infra-red sensors allow for Veronique MacKenzie to enter the animations; her exquisite choreography touches the heart.  I am so happy to be part of this collaboration.  Tim Tracey was invaluable in his technical and artistic advice. The following are several stills from the animation/videos.

Kej Woodland (acrylic on canvas, 36"x 60") interprets the damp mossy woods of October in Nova Scotia. The patterns of the leaves drift across the trunks of uprooted trees, the ferns turn golden with the shorter days, and grasses lose the strength to stand upright at the end of the growing season.

Another spot on the High Head hike is this incredible cove, filled with rocks tumbled into spheres by the tide.  As the tide rises, a spout of water is forced through the granite formations, lending itself to be christened by Richard and me as Spittle Cove.  It is also the location of one of my early paintings entitled "Fifteen", after my daughter, Amy, who posed as a figure in the landscape.  27 years separate these two paintings.

One of my favourite hikes is the High Head Trail, Lower Prospect, NS. Near the beginning of the hike, a stream courses through rocks, just stepping stones at high tide, but as seen here at low tide, a trickle of water is trapped until the surge of the next tide releases it. Inlet at High Head, acrylic on wood panel, 36" x 48"

A waterfall within a damp ravine of the rainforest in Goldstream Provincial Park, BC, I worked from a study done on site.  By further simplifying and abstracting the image, I drew the lines of movement and the exaggerated angles formed as rock and trees collapse toward the forest floor.

Veronique MacKenzie (dancer/choreographer), Lukas Pearse (sound designer) and I have been working on a collaborative project involving movement, animation, and sound, with each of these elements responding and interacting with the other.  Last night at Nocturne in Halifax, we presented our explorations  to the public.  A truly absorbing and expanding experience, working with these two great professionals in other disciplines.  Thanks to Richard Rudnicki for help with set up, take down and photography.  Here are some images from last night. View of crowd at gate with one of the projections above. Looking down Granville Street with projection down the block. Lukas Pearse, with his complex technical setup was the master puppeteer. At 9, Lukas went off to another gig, after instructing me on how to run the sound, blend the videos with the live dance.  View from Granville Street with all three projections.   All of the projections were ...

A lily pond at midsummer:  how do you paint this subject without the cloying sweetness that florals often have, and yet maintain the feeling of 'pond'?  The dominant blue green suggests a gentler landscape; in the stillness of dawn wet grasses and lily pads balance in damp air and pond water.

The south shore of Nova Scotia -- the spruce trees clinging to the rocky ground, the tidal pools left behind amid the worn granite of the shoreline.  My solo exhibition at Gallery Page and Strange continues through August 26.