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| via parentcentral.ca |
In Brandie's own words,"I am an online and print journalist with specialties in parenting and health. Currently I'm the editor of two of the Toronto Star's specialty websites, parentcentral.ca and healthzone.ca. I decided to be a journalist in about grade 10 or 11, after I started writing for my school newspaper. But the very first thing I ever wanted to be when I was a wee girl was "an artist." In high school I discovered that I didn't have the drawing skills for art or architecture as a profession, but I continued to have an aesthetic yearning for the whole paint and canvass experience. I think it runs in the family. As you know my Grandpa Weikle painted landscapes. So did my mom's mom, Edna, who died before I was born. I started buying canvasses and painting them as what I'd call "decor art" about 10 years ago and then in the last few years, started dabbling in abstract landscape and realism, particularly as I became interested in birds.".
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| Regarding the yellow bird image: Birds are my current favourite thing to draw and paint. I guess it was my interest in birds that interested me in spending time drawing and painting for the first time since childhood. This image is the other kind of multimedia in my life. The branch the bird sits on is created using cutouts from a magazine. The pieces are from a picture of a long full skirt by Coach. The iconic print is kind of deconstructed here and - if you blur your eyes - it kinda mimics the black and white colour contrast of a birch branch. I selected the colours of this picture so I can hang it next to this landscape, which is painted from a photo I took on a drive from Calgary to Drumheller, on the way to the dinosaur museum, of course! People go all the way to Provence to photograph the sunflowers against the blue sky, but the same colour combination is available right on the Canadian prairies every summer with fields of canola against all that big sky. It was a windy day, and I liked the way the grasses in the ditch were moving in the foreground. Later, I got the idea to paint a bird cage with the door open, over two canvasses, to hint at the idea that this might have been someone's domesticated canary gone free. -Brandie Weike |
Brandie lives and works in the Greater Toronto area. You can read her insightful and informative online blog at the Toronto Star.
What beautiful and incredibly talented sisters!
ReplyDeleteGreat article about Brandie, and yes she is so talented & beautiful! Glen loved the idea that Brandie was painting and he would be pleased with how she has used the idea of "prairie colors" as a backdrop for these particular paintings. He always said, "there was a lot to see on the prairies, people just didn't know how to look at them."
ReplyDeleteBoth you girls make me very proud!
You two are so talented!! Beautiful. ♥
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