Petit Prince

The location of this painting was across the street from the Petit Prince elementary school at the intersection of Olmstead Road and Jeanne Mance Street.

I had taken photographs, done six drawings / studies over the coarse of a month before setting out to paint this canvas.

This location appealed to me for several reasons. It is close to our new home. I regularly walk past there on my way to get food. It was a rather complex landscape. The intersection opens up in all directions. The telephone lines dissect the skyline. It was a church as a centre point mixed in with the houses and local businesses. The snow did not dominate the lower half of the composition. The pavement would balance the night sky as the trees would claw upward… it made a good mix / integrated components.

I find the church to be a rather humble building. It is by no means a cathedral, less a temple. There are no abstentious features, not even a cross on the roof. All the houses and local businesses are white from the outside. And conveniently the church is a builders red brick grade finish. This was another subtle feature that attracted me to this location. The brick church versus the white houses adds to the composition and centre point of the composition.

It was Friday night, February the 11th, 2005. It was not that cold, -10 degree Celsius, and no real wind chill to warrant much comment. There were absolutely no clouds in the sky, but the stars still could not be seen. Because there were no clouds the city lights did not glow up the sky, and thus the night was darker.

At around 10 pm Madame Gagne Morrisette (Erika's mother) drove past to say hello. She offered me to jump in her car to warm up. But I refused and said, "It is best that I do not - paint on your leather car seats - bad idea." We laughed and smiled. She was very encouraging (an took a photograph).

I could work much faster than other nights because it was not that cold. But still the titanium white tube of paint was near empty and I could not squeeze any more out - simply my fingers were too cold. So I did my best to get out as much as possible and economize and mix with the lead white. But the lead white for some reason seems to get much stiffer at cold temperatures. To work around this I used more mixing medium and buttered up the paint on the palette. I used the supply of white paint with measure so not to run out and thus avoid the potential risk of not being able to finish the canvas.

Due to the size of the canvas being 40 x 54 inches, combined with the painting lying horizontally on the transport unit. I could not really reach across to the top portion of the sky region. So I would walk around and paint the top section of the canvas upside down. While working on the painting upside down I observed the perspective more abstractly in terms of the sky line falling down on the roof of the church. Much to my fortune the black roof and sky melted thus heightening the unplanned diagonals in the top portion of the painting.

As I was finishing up and as my brain started to concentrate less my body needs surfaced. Desperately I had to urinate. But my fingers felt like boxing gloves, painful arthritis. I had great difficultly for five or so minutes trying to manipulate my button and zipper but had no success. So I had to do my best to orchestrate matters quickly. Fortunately it was late, no one around, and a fence to curtain my rain dance.

I put my art materials away, placed the painting in the box and walked home. It was such a beautiful walk home.

My mind was very excited. It was running. I could not fall asleep for several hours. I had much more energy. I made some popcorn and listened to music and read.