Tag: painting

Stars over Killarney 2023 recap: a marriage of culture, beauty, and science

Stars over Killarney is an annual festival celebrated at Killarney Provincial Park. The event’s 2023 theme — Colours in the Cosmos — was inspired by the parallels between the beauty and the colour in provincial parks and the beauty and colour of the skies above.

And beautiful colour was found everywhere at this year’s event!

The program took a very hands-on approach, so what was being presented could easily be seen and captured by paintbrush or smartphone.

Continue reading Stars over Killarney 2023 recap: a marriage of culture, beauty, and science

Painting the picturesque: a guide to art in nature

Today’s blog comes from Megan Callahan, a customer service assistant for Ontario Parks. Her love for nature and educational background in fine arts has created wonderful synchronicity in her parks career.

Oftentimes, when someone thinks of art and Ontario Parks, they think of the Group of Seven.

You know, the group of artists that were inspired by the Canadian landscape and made famous the windswept trees in Killbear Provincial Park or the many landscapes painted in Algonquin Provincial Park?

Your art education may have even dabbled in recreating their art, like mine did in high school!

However, there are SO many artists that visit our beautiful parks to this day, to create masterpieces from their experience in nature.

Art is therapy, and so is nature! What a fantastic combination the two make.

Continue reading Painting the picturesque: a guide to art in nature

Frances Anne Hopkins: documenting the lives of voyageurs through art

Today’s post comes from Taylor Bottoms-Cau, a second-year Discovery student at Samuel de Champlain Provincial Park. 

You’ve likely heard of the Group of Seven, artists who travelled the remote landscapes of Ontario to capture their rugged beauty by brush.

But they weren’t the only artists who travelled rough and painted what they saw!

Fifty years before the Group of Seven, Frances Anne Hopkins was roughing it in a voyageur canoe between Lachine (Montreal) and Fort William (Thunder Bay).

Continue reading Frances Anne Hopkins: documenting the lives of voyageurs through art

Colours in the cosmos: where the beauty of nature meets the science of the cosmos

“The heavens wheel around you, displaying to you their eternal glory and still your eye is upon the ground.” – Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy

Many of us live in areas afflicted by light pollution, which prevents us from gazing at the heavens whirling around us.

However, most of our northern and many other parks afford visitors a spectacular view of the cosmos, rich in stars and the Milky Way.

Continue reading Colours in the cosmos: where the beauty of nature meets the science of the cosmos

Can we bring painted rocks to the park?

Art and nature go together like columbine flowers and hummingbird tongues.

Indigenous artists express their relationship to land through art; Canada’s Group of Seven found inspiration in several Ontario Parks; parks offer residency programs, and our park visitors find many artistic ways to capture their memories. We love it when visitors share their artistic creations with us.

However, a new trend is starting to cause problems province-wide: the painted rock.

Continue reading Can we bring painted rocks to the park?

My experience as Lake Superior’s first artist-in-residence

Today’s post comes from Marta Stares, the Friends of Lake Superior Provincial Park‘s first artist-in-residence.

In 2021, Lake Superior Provincial Park and the Friends of Lake Superior Provincial Park established its first Artist-in-Residence program.

I was honoured to be selected as the park’s first ever participant, and to be able to paint and capture the stunning landscape of the park.

With its rugged coast, tall cliffs, remote beaches, waterfalls, and scenic lookouts, it’s easy to see why generations of artists have found inspiration here.

Continue reading My experience as Lake Superior’s first artist-in-residence