Granville Island

A few pictures I took when we were at Granville Island in Vancouver...one of my favourite places in the city. I wish we had something like this in Victoria.

The fun of blogging

What is really fun about blogging is hearing from people who stumble across your blog and email you. Gilles, the fellow from Sanary who is doing a paper on Huxley in Sanary and who took us to where Huxley lived in the area, happened upon my blog recently just by chance. He suddenly thought, "I know these people!" We had a really enjoyable day with Gilles starting at his apartment in Sanary that has great views of the village. Here are some photos I took that day from his balcony.

Some photos of our old Alma Mater

My main memories of UBC are very West Coast,,,walking in from distant parking lots in the rain, listening to the old foghorns half asleep in Buchanan Building classrooms, enjoying the mountain and ocean views from the campus.

Some old haunts haven't changed:


The Grad Centre


International House

And some of the new:


I love this "pagoda inspired" building


The new library...the old "stacks" will never be the same

And "plus ça change..."


In our day it was reference to the Viet Nam war

Vancouver in the summer

It doesn't really quite seem like summer although we did swim in English Bay on Thursday after we watched the tall ships coming in. Friday we woke to all too typical Vancouver weather....rain...but we have a nice view of English Bay and somehow it was ok. Jim did his research at UBC and Richard took me to lunch and the Vancouver Art Gallery. Lots of neat stuff at the Art Gallery...Rodin exhibit, some neat modern things, and of course the Emily Carr's I never tire of seeing.

Looks like a pretty good day today so will head to Granville Island and follow our nose from there.

The best birthday ever!

Yesterday we came into Vancouver to celebrate my birthday with Richard and just as he was arriving at our hotel he received the call that he got the job at Technicolor!
We were all thrilled. He will start as a Technical Assistant to the Colourist. The company is in expansion mode and assured him he will have excellent advancement opportunities. So, using his computer skills, learning new things, and being in the movie business...his dream. Their offices are in Yaletown so he can take the Aquabus from his new apartment on Granville Island. A great working and living situation especially since he thought he might have to go to Toronto eventually to get a good job...ugh.

Congratulations, Richard!

We celebrated with Bruichladdich Islay Sinlge Malt Whiskey...a super gift for our birthdays from Don and Elaine. Thanks, guys, it couldn't have come at a better time.
We loved the cards!

Some recent art projects

View from Les Pins Penchés Restaurant
14 x 18 acrylic on canvas



Poppy field mat
22 x 28 acrylic on linoleum

The painting I based this mat on has become my favourite that I did in France this year so felt I wanted to do a mat with the same design.



Ratatouille Provençale on table
This is a commission I was asked to do.

Matisse's Chapel of the Rosary in Vence

I found a couple of postcards I bought when we were there...wish I had bought the booklet now but we seem to have so many of these things. Again, it's the simplicity of line that appeals. This small simple chapel in a small village touched me in a similar way to Notre Dame in Paris....saying something since Notre Dame and Paris are probably the most wonderful places in the world for me.

More vintage postcards....

Vintage postcards from France

I guess it's the simple lines that appeal to me in these vintage postcards.

Rainbows

Not much chance of a rainbow lately since there has been very little sun! Terribly hot in France and Italy these days...guess we have to prefer the West Coast chill to that option.

"Blockhead" sculpture

From a sculpture garden in Nice

Views from our villa

Before we left Carqueiranne I took some photos of various views from rooms in our villa.


View from my studio into the backyard.


View from the living room. Our very leafy wisteria....wonderful shade and starting to need it as we left.


View from our guestroom.


View from our bedroom.

And more pines...

Pines, Pines, Pines

The great thing about digital photography is that you can take loads of pictures and it doesn't cost anything. I probably took a couple of hundred pictures of these pines and it will be great to have them on the laptop so I can paint from them. I'm going to post some of these today and on the next post.

Pins Penches Restaurant

We had two superb meals at the "Pins Penches ("Leaning Pines") Restaurant" while in the south of France. The restaurant is located on a fabulous estate on the water with loads of these wonderful "pins parasols" or "umbrella pines".


Jim petting the house cat.



Jim and I wandering the grounds after lunch.


And some pictures of the pines on the property:

Free Flickr Pro Accounts

Reading over my email when I was in France I realize I have two free Flickr Pro Accounts to give away to people since I was among the first wave of people to get into Flickr. This is a photo sharing site. If anyone reading this blog knows about Flickr and would like an account just give me an email. First come, first served.

As the world turns...

Travel and talking to people who travel or live in other places is always interesting because of the various perspectives it brings.

It was interesting being in France when the vote on the EU constitution was taken. Many of the French were very concerned about losing their wide ranging social benefits and more relaxed way of life. One fellow being interviewed said something like this:

"The English and the Americans work like dogs...we don't want to be like that. I want to go home and drink wine with my wife, dine, go to the theatre, go on long holidays...no, no, we don't want to work like dogs. Life wouldn't be worth living."

The French definitely have a point.

The Dutch also voted no and they were very concerned about the influx country of people, especially Muslims, who don't understand and accept their "free" way of life. They have created a video that depicts the special hallmarks of Dutch society that all potential immigrants must watch....footage of people smoking up in pot cafés, nude beaches etc. Except that the Muslims were outraged by the nudity so they actually made a special Muslim versiion without the nudity. Seems to be a bit of a disconnect there!

And this from a friend who lives in Philadelphia now. The city wanted to pass a bylaw that limited gun buying to one gun, per person, per month. The bylaw was voted down. My goodness, what on earth do people do with all these guns?

And the last of the paintings done this year in France

As I mentioned I really got into tulips since they are so important to Carqueiranne's economy. Again, running out of paint made some choices of colour for me.


"Red Tulips in blue vase"



"Yellow Tulips in red vase"



"White tulips in white vase"

And more.....

"Promenade des Anglais, Nice"....supposed to be from the balcony of the Hotel Suisse but perspective got a bit weird...will have to try to do this again because the view is wonderful.



"Sunflowers with orange background"....sunflowers starting appearing in the markets so decided to give it a go...paint colour choice more to do with running out of paint than deliberate choice...



"Sunflowers with blue background"...I like these ones better.