A THOUSAND WORDS

A THOUSAND WORDS

My father’s favourite painting was The Fighting Temeraire, Turner’s 1836 depiction of one of the last great English warships being towed into port by a steamship. He had excellent taste. The picture, which hangs in the National Gallery in London, was voted the nation’s favourite painting, and it now appears on the £20 banknote, along with a portrait of Turner himself.

In addition to being a stunning example of Turner’s transcendent skies awash with light and cloud, the Fighting Temeraire is rife with symbolism: the ghostly old warship, representing the might of the British Navy and wind power in general, being towed to her final berth by the smoky black emblem of a new, industrial era. It’s the passing of the torch, a sign of the times, the end of a glorious age giving way to a powerful but uncertain future. My dad saw himself in the painting, still useful in spirit, but being inexorably towed toward a different chapter. He eventually bought a print and hung it in his apartment, where his grandchildren grew up knowing it.

This morning, my youngest son, a lawyer, started a new job serving as a clerk in the Federal Court in Ottawa. He was given a cubicle, and there, presumably left behind by a previous tenant, he found this:

Absolute coincidence, but still, an auspicious start for young Ronan, with a grandfatherly nod and wink from beyond.

Just as I’m writing this, John is rounding the bend with his new toy: an ATV. The cottage is water access only, so he tugged our dock over to the landing to pick it up. Here’s a shot of him coming into the bay:

It reminds me of the Turner painting. It’s not so much a symbol of the end of an era, although you could make an argument that it represents an older man’s acceptance that he needs help lugging baggage up the hill. He’s no less able than he was forty years ago; he has simply acquired mechanical assistance.

He actually plans to use it to clean up our property, which is quite extensive but heavily wooded. When he arrived, he invited me to take a spin with him on the new machine. It was great but hilariously brief, considering we only have a 200 yard path from the dock to the cottage. Big dreams start with short steps.

Returning to art, here’s a shot of of our cottage picture wall:

It came about as solution to all the old paintings we have accumulated, mostly family executed, some of them quite mediocre. There are a few by my mother, painted when she was a teenager, and even one by my grandmother, done when she was a young woman herself, therefore over a century old. There’s a landscape of open fields, brought by John’s grandmother from Czechoslovakia. There’s a decent copy of Edward Hopper’s Lighthouse at Two Lights, painted by my dad, and several works by Josephine H.J. White, also known as John’s Great Great Aunt Josie. Aunt Josie was a noted English painter who was widely exhibited at the turn of the last century, and her paintings may even be worth something, but no matter. They have washed up at the lake where they hang with the dabbling of lesser talents, a link to the past, before travel became commonplace and painting a landscape was often the closest one came to visiting

I wish I could paint. Such artistic ability that I have is limited to the written word, but no less inspired by the beauty around me. Gazing at the picture wall, with the actual forest and the lake beyond, I can see how and what others saw years ago, and understand the need to interpret it for posterity, even with limited skill. Landscapes don’t change much over time (or else they do, dramatically, largely due to human intervention.) These garage sale items have a certain dreamy timelessness. I hope they continue to hang here long after I’m gone, when another generation can decide their value, sentimental and otherwise.

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ve been summoned for another 30 second ATV ride.