The Outdoor Challenge

Thorn Finch. Acrylic on varied papers, collaged. 2026.

Painting outdoors is a challenging tradition, especially when my visual language has moved toward fragile scraps of paper! What might it mean to take my working process fully outdoors?

I live in the town of Elora, Ontario, which has become known for its annual Plein Air Festival. I relish the enthusiasm of the painters -- some are trying something new to them, while others travel great distances to be here for the 4 days. The painting days culminate in an exhibition at the Elora Centre for the Arts.

I embraced the challenge of working in the cold and the wind, gloves that allow my fingers to poke through. I worked in acrylic, for a change, to take advantage of the drying time - ideal for collage in a short time-frame. I began by taping an array of papers to some plywood panels -- yes, I carried the plywood from the Pilkington Overlook all the way down to the Grand River's flood plain. I used fluid acrylics and water-soluble crayons to generate a range of stained and gestural papers.

I was drawn to a cluster of thorned trees. As I worked at the tree images - painting it several times - birds would alight around me. It was difficult to grab my camera in time. The bold streak of yellow, however, became my obsession: a gloriously yellow finch would land quite close and then vanish again.

I am quite moved by this piece. The spiky forms carry a sense of warning, and the swirling rhythms shift between abstraction and close observation. The spring goldfinch brings the work's poetry into focus.