Think Like an Artist

Imagine yourself alone on the shoreline of Lake Louise. Gaze across the milky, turquoise lake towards Mount Victoria. The only sounds you hear are birds chirping, the rustle of wind, and the occasional tumble of rockfall off a distant cliff. No human chatter, no sounds of cars or bus engines, no throngs of tourists blocking your view. Just you, the lake, and the day. Pretty hard to imagine, isn’t it?

When researching the art history of the Canadian Rockies, I often find myself considering the idea of the artist alone in the mountains. The watercolour painter extraordinaire Walter J. Phillips (1884 - 1963) lived in Banff for twenty years and walked to his most favoured sketching locations, where he would sit with his paint box on his knees, working for hours without seeing another soul.

Group of Seven painters Lawren Harris and A.Y. Jackson went into the backcountry in the 1920s, spending days in relative solitude at places like Maligne Lake and Mount Robson, intensely looking and sketching. The requirements of their craft necessitated remaining still for extended periods of time, contemplating, then arranging and capturing, their unique versions of the scene. I have great admiration for their work, but what I really envy are those by-gone days, times when one could be alone in paradise.

As the author of three mountain art guide books with a fourth upcoming, I feel responsible for the congestion on some of today’s trails. But I also understand the thirst for beauty that draws us — with an overwhelming pull — to the mountains. So how can we experience the mountains like Phillips, Jackson and Harris, despite the crush of people we might encounter? I would suggest that we think like an artist.

Thinking like an artist will enrich your experience. It forces you to slow down, to extend you viewing time, to enter a state of deep contemplation of what you see, with consideration of how to capture it. If you set out to express your most recent mountain days’ experience creatively, what would it look like? Would you draw a memory of blue shadows on snow from your

last day skiing, try to paint a particular shade of gold that you recently observed in a sunrise, or would you write about or dance out your experience? And how do you come away from that day with enough source material to create something of real artistry? For that, to create something meaningful, you’ll have to really engage with what you are seeing.

To really get into the artist’s headspace, spend some time in one of the many galleries and museums that now house their work. The Whyte Museum of the Canadian Rockies in Banff, and the retail galleries in Canmore, Jasper, Lake Louise, and other mountain towns offer multitudes of interpretations of the landscape. Choose a work you like, and take a good, long look.

Studies have shown that the average visitor to a gallery spends less than fifteen seconds looking at any one painting. Rather shocking, considering the amount of time the artists spend making them. How lucky these painters and photographers were, to stay engaged with their chosen subject for so long. This is where my kernel of jealousy sits. So be less concerned about the number of kilometers you have hiked, the elevation you have reached, or the number of bucket-list spots you have seen. Leave the distractions of technology behind. Be open to the joy that can be found in sitting still and just looking, in listening for the birds, in absorbing the essence of where you are. See, truly see, the colour of the lake or the sky. Touch the trees, feel the rocks, smell the air.

Quality art, in every media, requires serious intent, a deeper kind of interaction with the subject. The artists I have studied spent their time keenly observing. It took Phillips multiple journeys to reach the uppermost waterfall at Johnston Canyon. On his first forays, he stopped and painted each waterfall he encountered in turn, and from a variety of angles, as he slowly, over the course of one summer and multiple trips, made his way to the top. Heed his example, spend some time seriously looking, letting the beauty of the natural world wash over you, and you will be rewarded with a richness of experience that you otherwise might have missed.

By: Lisa Christensen