Pigeon
Spire and the Howser
Towers over the Vowell Glacier
Watercolour and gouache
©2012 Charlene Brown
This is one of the paintings I started the first day. Note the word ‘started’… Robert suggests that
when you’re dropped off (note the term ‘dropped off’ as I’ll be going on about
that at some length) in a spectacular spot such as this, you capture the ambiance, the lights and darks, and general awesomeness of the place as quickly
and spontaneously as you can, then put your painting aside before you start
puttering. He himself started as many as six paintings every day.
In the format of my on-going Drama of Painting Plein Air, his
actual words, when he saw the painting as it looks below, were:
Robert Genn: You must abandon this immediately.
It has taken me almost two weeks to see this with ‘fresh
eyes’ and add the shadows and extra clouds that appeared later in the afternoon.
Now, about being dropped off by a helicopter… On the bus
from Banff to the heliport in the Columbia Valley, the procedure was explained to us.
At first, I thought they were kidding, but no, this is really how it is done… When you set
down on some windswept, not-particularly-level ridge, the helicopter doesn’t
actually stop, and they don’t want anyone near the ends of the rotor. So, as
soon as you’re out the door, you crouch down no more than two meters from the runners,
covering your head and holding all your stuff down until the helicopter is gone,
and the prop-wash and the racket give way to silence. Then you straighten up as
smoothly as possible, brush yourself off, and try not to think about assuming
that crouched position again (with your eyes closed) while the
helicopter lands beside you when it comes to pick you up.
