#2391 "Pines Rock Water 2020"

Rumble island is very rugged. It is another of the 30,000 islands that comprise the Parry Sound Archipelago . One would have to look hard for a safe place to land a canoe. The trees were reaching toward the east with their blown over backs facing the west. Even enduring the constant pressure of the weather, these trees were doing the breathing for the planet like other trees all around the world. They seemed happy in their work. 

My wife thinks I should paint more structures. My portfolio is perhaps full of too many rocks, lakes and trees. There are not many structures unless I leave the Singleton Sanctuary and that is not in the COVID cards. 

Rocks, lakes and trees reminded me of the rock, paper and scissors game. That hand game is also known by other permutations such as scissors paper rock, scissors paper stone or even ro-sham-bo. Two people simultaneously form one of three shapes with an outstretched hand. These shapes are "rock" (a closed fist), "paper" (a flat hand), and "scissors" (a fist with the index finger and middle finger extended, forming a V). "Scissors" is identical to the two-fingered V sign (also indicating "victory" or "peace") except that it is pointed horizontally instead of being held upright in the air. Ro-sham-bo is a simultaneous, zero-sum game that has only two possible outcomes: a draw or a win for one player. 

On the other hand, rocks, lakes and trees is a slight of hand game played with a brush loaded with oil paint. Everybody wins as long as nature is appreciated and protected. Ro-Lak-Tree (a name I made up) is a nature stewardship game that the Group of Seven invented while they were searching for the Canadian identity around the time of the 1918 Flu Pandemic. 

Tom Thomson (back left) with his city visitors (left to right) F.H. Varley, A.Y. Jackson, and Arthur, Marjorie, and Esther Lismer in Algonquin Park, fall 1914. Photograph likely taken by Maud Varley. 

The portfolios of Tom Thomson and his friends who would create the Group of Seven were loaded with rocks, lakes and trees. This COVID-2019 version is my attempt to continue to record the character of Canada in oils. I promise to include more structures in that identity but do not expect the city scapes of glass and steel. 

Alberta Pandemic Poster 1918

The 1918 flu pandemic or the Spanish flu was an unusually deadly influenza pandemic caused by the H1N1 influenza A virus. The 1918 pandemic infected 500 million people which was a third of the world's population at the time. It struck in four successive waves between February 1918 and April 1920 - more than two years. The death toll is typically estimated to have been somewhere between 17 million and 50 million, making it one of the deadliest pandemics in human history. 

Sadly history repeats itself. It is time to respect nature and to heal the scars that man-kind has inflicted on the planet. 

For this and much more art, click on Pixels. Thank you for playing rocks, lakes and trees better known as Ro-Lak-Tree.