This past August Rhonda and I visited a local Shaman just outside of Calgary to participate in our animal naming ceremony. I was intrigued to have my animal symbol given to me since I am often offering up my idea of other people’s symbols in my paintings, it would be nice to see what someone thought I was. I’ve been drawn to many animal symbols in my life, specifically the bird, otter and whale. At the end of the ceremony, Rhonda is a Bear, and I am a Red-Tailed Hawk. Our friend Heather also went a few weeks later, and was also a Bear.
Heather and Rhonda have been lifelong friends, and I consider Heather a part of the family. Thus, I decided to surprise them with paintings of The Bear for each of them. I wanted them to be similar, to symbolize the bonds of their friendship, with one slight change to Rhonda’s painting which includes the smaller bear within the larger bear which related to the point in her life (moment of her birth) when her animal symbol first appeared to her.
I tend to not paint very much between January and April. I don’t know why. It just sort of happens that way each year. Maybe to give my hand (and head) a rest, maybe just the winter blues tampering with my chi and dampening my motivation. Then as the snow melts so does my hibernating mind, and the ideas start to flow. Then more and more ideas come, and my head explodes into torrent of inspiration and I can’t get to a canvas quick enough.
This was the 4th hanging I did (originally for Andy and Fiona until that whole couch fiasco – see 
This was the second hanging I ever painted, and threw it together over the span of about a week and honestly did not put a whole lot of thought into it (that has never happened since, let me tell you!).