Zooming in and out of the Canadian
North like a hummingbird on a flower, my mouse was beginning to heat up.
An armchair explorer’s best friend, Google Earth was helping me
understand the massive scale of the Arctic (here's my video all about it). Trying
to figure out where to plan my plein air painting journeys in this huge landscape
was making my head start to spin.
The few photos posted on the
interactive globe were helping me to visualize what I might encounter up
there, though in most places there were no images to be found. The
ruler tool allowed me to gauge distance, and see if I
had any hope of even getting from one place to another.
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Cory working on "Arctic Sentinel-study" en plein air.
Ivvavik National Park, Yukon, Canada.
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"Arctic Sentinel-study", 12" x 8", oil on linen. Where Alaska meets
the Yukon
meets the Arctic Ocean. Ivvavik National Park, Yukon, Canada.
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With the first step of my project
completed - the dreaming part - I was now beginning to plan in earnest
my project to paint the Canadian Arctic. But I was getting ahead of
myself...I didn’t even have a name for this undertaking.
As an artist I wanted to create a
significant body of plein air art oil paintings from the north, but also wanted to
share the experience of doing so with others. Many of these places had
never been painted before, and are so seldom traveled,
that my journeys could also serve to connect other artists and appreciators with this vast
wilderness. After writing down innumerable word combinations, I came up
with Into The Arctic: An Artist Journey To The North.
That would have to do.
Next on the list was determining how
long this extreme outdoor painting and exploration project should take. My original vision of 40 plein air paintings, which
grew to 50 paintings over the course of the project, would have to take
me across the Canadian Arctic to have any
chance of doing justice to the many different faces of the land. My
research was driving home that this would not be easily accomplished.
With the shape of the north forming a kind of huge triangle from the
Arctic Circle onward, I determined that three expeditions,
one to each corner of the Arctic could allow me access to an immense
variety of geography. And no less than a month on each of these journeys
would be needed to really get a taste of these lands.
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Cory plein air painting Tanquary Fiord at the top of the world.
Quittinirpaaq National Park, Ellesmere Island, Nunavut, Canada.
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"Tanquary Vista- study", 16" x 6.75", oil on linen.
Quittinirpaaq National Park, Ellesmere Island, Nunavut, Canada. |
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After numerous calls to Parks Canada
staff in each region, outfitters, and anyone I came across that had
traveled the north, and weeks of scouring the internet, books and
magazines, it started to come together. I had figured
out routes that could lead me to an incredible variety of remote
wilderness vistas.
But there was one major thing missing...money.
Traveling the north is not cheap. I
could fly my entire family, and even my wife’s family - and she has 12
brothers and sisters - from Toronto to Florida for what it would cost
for me to get to Ellesmere Island by myself!
So what’s an artist to do when his passions exceed the size of his wallet? I mean not just by a little, but by a factor of “there’s no way on earth I could ever afford to do this!”
I held by breath and took my next big step…which I will share in the next post. And if you missed my first post on my Arctic exploration, read it here.
--Cory
Cory Trepanier is an artist/with
a passion for capturing remote wilderness regions on canvas. His
current Into The Arctic project has seen him undertake three extensive
excursions to the Canadian Arctic to develop
a collection of 50 oil paintings and create 2 films. He shares his
unique artistic and adventurous explorations on television, through film
touring, writing, photography and through public speaking. Cory is also
a proud member of the Explorer’s Club. Visit Cory's fine art website, Into the Arctic website, and join him on Facebook for more info.