Autumn/Winter. — Painting by Bob Kirchman
Spring/Summer. — Painting by Bob Kirchman
Mohomony. Painting by Bob Kirchman
These paintings I have done of the mountains I love. David Crockett loved mountains too, and wrote this poem;
Farewell to the mountains whose mazes to me
Were more beautiful far than Eden could be
No fruit was forbidden, but Nature had spread
Her bountiful board, and her children were fed
The hills were our garners - our herds wildly grew
And Nature was shepherd and husbandman too
I felt like a monarch, yet thought like a man
As I thank the Great Giver, and worshipped His plan
The home I forsake where my offspring arose
The graves I forsake where my children repose
The home I redeemed from the savage and wild
The home I have loved as a father his child
The corn that I planted, the fields that I cleared,
The flocks that I raised, and the cabin I reared
The wife of my bosom, farewell to ye all
In the land of the stranger, I rise or I fall
A shortened version is sung by Fess Parker, who plays Davy Crockett in the movie. I think that might have inspired me to paint the first one.
Detail of “Cherokee Portal” — Watercolour by Bob Kirchman
The Art of Painting in the Rain
I painted this in the North Georgia woods that were once part of the Cherokee Nation.
“A lot of people come out here to paint this place… but the only one who ever got it right was an ‘Abo’ (Aborigine), because he was painting his own land.” – Joe Harmon in A Town Like Alice
In the novel, Joe Harmon lives in the Australian Never-Never, and observes this connection to the land in his Aborigine neighbors.
Cherokee Portal is the only painting in this series painted on site in watercolour. The rest were painted in studio. I was at an architectural renderers’ conference in Georgia when we had a morning set aside for painting en plein air. Most of the participants settled in around the resort buildings for a ‘busman’s holiday’ painting architecture.
But here I was in Brasstown, high in the mountains – way up in Cherokee country. Those mountains were calling. I set out with my paints up a mountain trail. It was a brisk autumn day and a bit overcast. In fact, it kept getting more overcast. I set up and it began to rain.
And then the mountain told me her story. I’d heard it years before, hiking the Appalachian Trail in Georgia. It was a story of long ago, when this was the Cherokee Nation. I painted away as the raindrops added their random flavour to my watercolour. My friends and I had been drenched when we set out to hike the beginning of the AT. Now the rain began again. The mountain continued her tale where she had left off.
The rain picked up. The day was raw. The colours were beautifully muted. The song of the mountain and her people was vivid. But the rain had grown intense now and I couldn’t paint. Frustrated, I made my way back to the resort, back to my fellow renderers who were knocking off nice little architectural details as they sheltered under porches.
My day though was ruined… or WAS it? I relaxed at the resort, chatted with my fellow wizards, had lunch, and retired to my room. There it was, my ‘ruined’ painting. It seemed to want my attention. Reluctantly, I responded.
I took the painting and my supplies into the bathroom. I added the crisp tree trunks and defined the trail – now it was a passage through time. As I worked, I was inspired by the story of the mountain. It was like a passage from J.R. R. Tolkien. I was visiting another time. I was feeling the inspiration of those who lived in these woods long ago.
That is how I came to paint Cherokee Portal. I cannot consider it a work solely of my own. Perhaps more of us need to paint in the rain.
“Breakthrough.” — Painting by Bob Kirchman
Our Students are In the Youth Art Show!
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