Joan Haberman website: habermanart.ca
COME WALK WITH ME
There are three parts to this show: the forest, the gardens and the origin pieces. The first two are linked by the earth beneath them, both of them literally grounded, as they send up incredible splendours to delight, inspire and nurture us. The origin pieces are from 2018-2019, and are found in the Process Gallery, behind the Main Gallery. They depict my early attempts in these areas of work, and trace my journey of developing a language in paint on canvas for these places. Everything I do now can be traced back to these earlier pieces.
All my work is created in my studio and is based on my own photographs, as the compositions are too complex to complete outdoors in a day or two. I paint in order to share what I’ve experienced – the wonder, the awe, the mystery and, at times, the sheer joy I felt as I came upon each scene or object.
To help my viewer “walk” with me, emotionally, I focus on the smallest details, the light source, the shadows and some of the minutia in the negative space between trees in a forest and foliage in a garden – those are the elements that often lead me to have an emotional response to what I see. If I depict them as I feel them, I hope to be able to convey those feelings to my viewers, so they can share my experience.
There are many layers of paint on each canvas – I paint and repaint each element repeatedly until I am satisfied that I’ve revealed its “personality”. I use small details in both the positive objects and in particular, in the negative space to invite my viewers to lean it and take a closer look in order to see what’s happening in those darker, usually unseen spaces.
In both forests and gardens, I am drawn to the lushness, the apparent haphazardness, and the lack of uniformity, all of which somehow creates its own patterns or organization, even as the individual elements transform from day to day.
I hope you enjoy these paintings.
THE ORIGIN PIECES
I stopped painting in the autumn of 1972, after the premature death of a beloved art teacher and a summer at what was then the Banff School of Fine Arts, where I was first exposed to the emotional side of painting.
I returned home, started university and put painting to one side, returning to it very gradually. In 2004 – yes, 32 years later – I participated in my first year of many one-week plein air pastel workshops. There I was, out in Grand Manan, using pastels and painting landscapes – under the hot sun, in strong winds, surrounded by beating rains, and immersed in dense fog – sometimes all in one day. I knew nothing at all about either pastels or landscape painting at that time but it didn’t matter. I donned a smock, got dirty and felt like a painter again.
A few years later, I took a couple of painting courses at the AGO, which had me returning to brushes, paint and canvas. I tried painting on my own at home, but it was impossible on weekdays while I was still working. Even weekends, with their lists of chores and errands, made it extremely difficult to find more than a few hours consecutively over two days to lose myself in a painting.
I finally realized that if I was drawn to paint the way I wanted to, I would have to retire and dedicate real time to it. I was so far behind already, and felt I had so much catching up to do. Fortunately, I was in a position to retire early, and did so at the end of 2016. There was still little time for painting in the first two years – I had met and married my husband during that time. We each sold our homes and moved into one large enough to accommodate studio space for me and a workshop for him. We undertook extensive renovations. There was still no time for painting.
It was only late in 2017 that life settled down and my real work of becoming a painter began. The pieces in this gallery represent my early efforts to paint forests and trees. I had no conceptual basis for either at that time, no idea how to approach them, no techniques with which to do so. I had moved from oil to acrylic paints, so discovered some different colour names and learned to work with their very different properties. I experimented, failed, tried again, worked hard at it, played a bit and these are the pieces that emerged and sent me forward on my journey. It was through these pieces that I “learned to see” and developed the techniques that you see in the adjoining room, techniques I am still working on.
COME WALK WITH ME….through forests.
I’ve been drawing trees and forests for many years and, only recently, decided to try adding colour. This really enhanced my ability to display them as they should be seen.
Every tree is a monolith, tethered to the ground, revealing to us only their trunk, branches and leaves, perhaps a fragment of above ground roots. This is how we have come to understand trees – based on the parts we see – and how we depict them in art.
But beneath the ground lies a network of roots that runs deep and spreads wide, connecting each to others, so that in times of trouble, they actually support one another by diverting nutrients to those most in need. Living trees remove CO2 from our environment and provide us with oxygen. They also provide shade to us and habitat to birds and wildlife. Yet, we walk by them, often without a glance, without an acknowledgement of gratitude or appreciation of their complexity and physical beauty.
Walking in forests has, in recent years, become a form of therapy. Originating in Japan, Forest Bathing is now used as preventative medicine, to lower blood pressure, reduce stress and much more. In summary, trees are unique in nature in terms of how they assist others of their kind, humans and wildlife.
During the lockdowns of 2020 and 2021, the cottage was the one place we felt able to go safely, and walking in the woods was a salve during difficult times. It soothed me and helped me sluff off some of the anxiety I had been experiencing in the city. The forest’s lush density invited me in, to experience, to examine and to explore. These feelings of calm returned as I painted from my photos of them in the studio.
I’ve included some early work in the show, as they are the foundation for my development of a language with which to speak about trees in paint.
Take your time as you walk through the gallery. As you review these images, try to shut off the outside world and imagine what you might smell, as well as the birdsong and more you would hear if you stood before these scenes. Lean into the work, to see what lies between the trees and on the forest floor. Allow each painting to transport you to the forest, if only for a moment. Enjoy the respite.
Come Walk with me……..through gardens.
Soon after I started experimenting with forest paintings, I began thinking about trying my hand at gardens – as their scale is so much smaller, I can get in very close to the elements of my subject and maximize my ability to focus on the small details within a dense composition.
Despite more than 20 years of gardening, I remain amazed each year as the snow and ice recede to reveal specks of green, which shoot up towards the sun and eventually, open into gorgeous blooms. I am fascinated by how the seed of something I planted in one corner can take root in another in a following year, how some plants manage to bully their way across a bed, how you never know for certain what will come up, or, precisely, where. I hold my breath each spring as the garden unveils the year’s show, a show that changes daily in the early months of spring right into November.
I take photos incessantly, at each stage, is all weather. I started looking more closely at the photos I had been taking of my own garden, brought my gaze lower, and became hyper-aware of other gardens I encountered on my pre-Covid travels, amassing a library of garden photos I can now work from. This collection includes gardens from the UK and from Florida but my most cherished pieces are those I painted based on my own garden. The connection to that work is very strong, as I see my “models” out my windows throughout the warm and hot months.
Like forests, gardens can provide a sense of wonder along with tranquility. These are valuable assets at this time in our lives.
So come walk with me in the gardens. Feel free to stray from the paths and don’t worry about walking on the grass. Breathe deeply, take in the floral scents, feel the sun on your face, listen for the bees flitting from bloom to bloom. Relax. Enjoy.
Joan Haberman – September 2022