Canning Season

I’ve painted with transparent watercolors many times throughout my life, but I had not encountered the joy of gouache (pronounced gwash, rhymes with squash) until 2019. Gouache paints have become one of my favorite mediums to work with. I like how it adheres smoothly and evenly onto the paper. I apply my gouache to thick acid free watercolor paper. I like how it reactivates with water and that the colors are opaque, making it a forgiving medium, as you can make a mistake but then can skillfully cover it up. You can paint a light color, such as white, over a dark color such as black. The consistency of the paint allows it to blend really well. Adding water thins the paint and makes it more transparent, so you can achieve a variety of effects much like you would with transparent watercolors. So, it can be both opaque and transparent. And it dries quickly. This fast-drying time keeps the creativity and workflow moving forward. I get some really great results with gouache, as it doesn’t fight much with me. Because water will reactivate gouache, I seal my completed gouache art with Dorland cold wax medium, which repels water.

Much of the subject matter in my paintings comes from my own world – from my own spaces. Decor from inside of my house or flowers and scenes from the gardens outside of my house. Even scenes from around the woods and river nearby. I am surrounded by things that inspire and there are always scenes to paint. I only need to look around me. Accompanying this paragraph is a gouache painting that I created which represents this, and I call it “Canning Season”. This is a scene that takes place in our kitchen and dining room in late summer through autumn every year, when we preserve food. It’s a gratifying time in the middle of or at the end of a growing season, which blesses us with the fruits of our labor.

The ladder-back chair belonged to my Grandma Allen. This is a fitting focal point, as it’s an empty chair (in reference to the poem), but it’s still present and ready for use, representing the passing of still relevant knowledge to future generations. So, it’s a wise old chair, or it once belonged to a wise lady. It had no seat on it when I received it. I don’t know what happened to the original seat. I imagine it was probably wicker or some kind of caning material and that it might have fallen apart with use. My Dad had the chair, and meant to put a new seat on it, as a project to keep himself busy and to save his mother’s old chair. But he never got around to doing it. After he passed away, at the age of 78, the chair was given to me. I had never woven cane on anything before, so caning a chair seat was a cool and useful thing to learn. I acquired the materials and the tools needed, and I learned how to do it and I was very happy with how it turned out. Now I know how to cane a chair. We use the chair and it’s been a good chair. I sit on it to put my shoes on, and it also conveniently holds dust, coats, and many other items that don’t really belong there.

My wife wears a straw-weave hat when she’s working outside in the gardens. It breathes but keeps the sun and rain off of her head. It hangs off the back of the chair. The other ornament hanging off the back of the chair is an oddly shaped piece of metal. I don’t know the placard’s origin or intended use. It has a capital letter printed “A” on it, and three holes drilled along the top edge of it. It has a strand of brown jute cord tied through the center hole, into a loop, like a hanger. It was a gift to us from my sister-in-law (my wife’s sister), and the letter “A” obviously represents “Allen”. We like it and the back of the chair seemed like the most natural place to hang it.

An empty wicker wine basket, which can hold two bottles of wine, a corkscrew, perhaps a towel, and a couple of flute wine glasses, occupies the space beneath the chair. Underneath the chair seemed like a perfect out-of-the-way space for it. I believe it belonged to my mother-in-law. We end up with peoples’ things eventually. We inherit said things or they are dumped upon us, and sometimes they end up in a painting.

You will notice that stacked next to the chair there are three cylindrical vessels. On the floor, is a 6-gallon Red Wing stoneware crock. At one time I had planned to ferment mulberries from our backyard in it, to make wine. In this painting it’s holding up a couple of metal pots. Atop the stone crock is a steel 20-quart water bath canner, and atop that is a 15-quart aluminum stockpot. On the floor, on the other side of the chair, are some glass jugs which at one time contained apple pie moonshine out of Harmon, Kentucky. They’re empty now, but the jugs are unusual and useful. Towering over the jugs is a butter churn which has been around longer than me. When I was a child, I played with my toys on and around that old butter churn. My Dad gave it to me before he passed away. Oddly it’s like an old familiar friend. Maybe you have an item you can relate that to.

“Canning Season” reminds me of old-world ways – maybe a harder life, but a more simple and gratifying life – the lifestyle of my ancestors. It makes me think of domesticity… the smell of vinegar… gardening fruits and vegetables… food preservation… and self-sustenance. Taking care of family and oneself. Particularly in these uncertain times, I think gardening and food preservation are good things to know how to do.

Thanks for reading!