Liz Schamehorn - Artist

Red Forest Series

2010-01-28T09:14:00.005-05:00

"Red Vertical" acrylic on canvas 30" by 12"

2010-01-28T09:12:00.001-05:00

"Red Triple" acrylic triptych 16" by 30"

2010-01-28T09:10:00.000-05:00

"Red Tangle" acrylic on canvas 30" by 36"

2010-01-28T09:08:00.000-05:00

"Red Shine" acrylic on Canvas 24" by 24"

2010-01-28T09:05:00.001-05:00

"Red Panorama" acrylic diptych 20" by 30"

2010-01-28T09:02:00.002-05:00

"Red Oaks" acrylic on canvas 24" by 24"

2010-01-28T08:59:00.000-05:00

"Red Maples" acrylic on canvas 24" by 24"

2010-01-28T08:57:00.000-05:00

" Red Flash" Acrylic on canvas 12" by 12" $250.

2010-01-28T08:54:00.002-05:00

"Red and Gold" acrylic on canvas 24" by 24"

Painting a four by six foot triptych

2009-11-27T21:03:00.011-05:00

Stage one..painted on site in High Park, Toronto.
Stage two - studio: oaks, red pines and goldenrod - sky lightened.
More light added in the negative spaces...a stag's head is appearing. Forms built up, stag-headed man appears

Finished. Landscape forms tied in. Now showing at Loft Gallery, Clarksburg, ON

Gaea

2009-09-21T20:24:00.006-04:00

"Gaea" acrylic, oil, enamel, bee's wax 36" by 48" Now showing at Loft Gallery, Clarksburg, ON.
Gaea, the earth goddess, formed from original chaos, second after Eros (love), followed by Erebos(darkness) and Nyx (night). Gaea gave birth to Uranos, the heavens, and Pontos, the unfruitful sea. Eros began to stir up these forces and create pairings. Gaea was paired with Uranos and they produced Titans, Hekatoncheires, and Kyklopes. The twelve Titans represented the forces of nature. The three Hekatoncheires, each with a hundred hands, represented the crashing force of waves and earthquakes. And then there were the three one-eyed Kyklopes whose flashing eye represented storms and volcanoes. Thus love created the most powerful forces of the world.
Source: Who's Who in Mythology, Alexander S Murray, British Museum.

Ikaros

2009-09-21T19:06:00.008-04:00

"Ikaros" acrylic, oil, enamel, bees' wax 36" by 48" $900.

The father of Ikaros was Daedalos, a great artist. His talent as well as his decision to help the queen Pasiphae, wife of King Minos, daughter of the sun god, lead to his son's downfall.

Minos, after being made King of Crete, prayed to Poseidon to send a creature from the deeps to sacrifice to Zeus. Poseidon sent a shimmering white bull. Minos , instead of sacrificing it, decided to turn it out to pasture with his own cattle. To punish him for his deception, Poseidon caused the bull to turn wild and escape; at the same time he caused Queen Pasiphae to develop an unnatural passion for the white bull. She pursued it throughout the island until Daedalos caught it and held it until the Queen's desire was satisfied. She gave birth to a monster with a man's body and a bull's head. Daedalos had now to use his skills to design and build a labyrinth from which no one who entered could escape. The monster Minotauros was placed in it. Human sacrifices were regularly sent in, until one day Theseus - but that's another story.

As a gift to the queen, possibly to ease her sadness, Daedalos constructed a figure of a cow that was so lifelike, the king's cattle accepted it into the herd. When King Minos found out, he had Daedalos and Ikaros imprisoned in the labyrinth. They escaped - Daedalos knew the design, after all - and left Crete by flying away on wings that Daedalos made, out of wax and feathers.

It is at this point that the familiar part of the story ensues: Daedalos warned Ikaros not to fly too close to the sun, but Ikaros didn't heed him. He reached the highest point in his fight, his wings melted and he plunged into the sea.

(Source: Who's Who in Mythology, Alexander S. Murray, British Museum, Bracken Books, London)

Trees Along the River

2009-08-15T08:33:00.008-04:00

Trees Along the River oil 16 by 48.

SOLD

Riverbank

2009-08-15T08:26:00.012-04:00

Riverbank oil 16 by 48. SOLD

Black River Currents

2009-08-15T08:23:00.007-04:00

Black River Currents oil 12 by 36.

Black River Shore

2009-08-15T08:15:00.009-04:00

Black River Shore 12 by 48 oil.

This is the first in a series of studies of the Black River based on a canoe day trip my husband and I took last year. We started at the bridge over highway 169 and made our way back to our house downstream from there, shooting rapids, getting grounded and taking photos. It was high summer.

The Sirens

2009-05-31T08:39:00.014-04:00

"The Sirens" ink, acrylic, bees' wax, oil 36 by 48 $900.
This is the story of the Sirens: they were the daughters of a river god and a Muse. They were childhood playmates of Persephone, and when she was carried off by Pluto they failed to protect her. As punishment for this, Persephone's mother Demeter turned them into half-bird creatures who could be heard singing in the forests.

Sometime later they challenged the Muses to a singing contest and lost. As punishment for that the Muses plucked their feathers and decked themselves with them. The sirens became half woman/half fish creatures still with their beautiful voices, living in the cliffs of the islands between Sicily and Italy. Their singing bewitched passing sailors who crashed to their deaths on the rocks after trying to follow the voices. Two times the charm didn't work: when the Argonauts sailed by with Orpheus aboard, they focused on his unsurpassed music and fended off the sirens; later when Odysseus passed, he had himself lashed to the mast so that he could hear the sirens' voices but not respond to them. In despair , the Sirens cast themselves into the sea and were changed into cliffs. (Who's Who in Mythology, Alexander S. Murray, British Museum)

"The Sirens" is painted on birch panel. Starting with a splash of ink on the wet wood, I then poured over the dried ink with various colours of acrylic. When that was dry I added beeswax, melted and poured on. After smoothing and polishing the beeswax, I worked into the image with oil colours.
As usual, I named the painting after it was finished.

Red Pine Forest

2009-05-07T21:41:00.006-04:00

Red Pine Forest acrylic 36 by 48 SOLD

This new "red pine" series has emerged much more easily than I had expected. I mixed six tubs of colour and stuck to only those, plus some greys produced by combining a couple. I have finally accepted the "plastic " look of acrylic and learned to make it work for me.

Tall Red

2009-05-04T22:24:00.008-04:00

Tall Red 48 by 24 SOLD

2009-05-04T22:16:00.008-04:00

Red Pine Trilogy acrylic triptych SOLD

2009-05-04T22:05:00.006-04:00

"Three Dancers" acrylic 48 by 72 triptych $2500.
This is the third and probably last incarnation of this painting. I keep working on it. The last thing I did was add the red and gold while it was hanging on the wall.

2009-04-07T10:00:00.006-04:00

Rock Studies acrylic and oil on wood 9 by 12 each in plain black float frames to be hung in a grid.

A group of very fast impressions from memory of the rocks trees and light in the woods where I live.

2009-04-07T09:45:00.006-04:00

Portrait of a Lady 30 by 24 oil and acrylic on wood with antique frame $650.

A quickly painted impressionist face partially obliterated with paint remover and scraping, then embellished with red and metallic gold.

Narkissos

2009-04-07T09:24:00.008-04:00

"Narkissos" 36 by 30 oil acrylic and wax on board $900.
Narkissos fell in love with his own reflection in pools of water. He eventually died of unrequited love. The gods turned him into a flower. This is what happens to you...

Skyblue Forest

2009-04-05T12:33:00.008-04:00

SOLD

I live in the pine woods, so this is the kind of thing that happens when I paint trees. I am interested in the visual confusion of positive/negative space. The colours are not quite arbitrary, since there is sky blue and leaf green in it, but also elements of native spirituality in the Four Colours - black, white, yellow and red.