Steven Rhude - Paintings/Drawings

                                                Boudreau's Shed, Isle Madame, graphite on paper, 18' x 24", Steven Rhude   “Phillip was sort of a strange genius, because he figured out exactly where the holes were in the system, and he used them. He didn't 'fall between the cracks.' He lived in the cracks.” ―  Silver Donald Cameron,  Blood in the Water: A True Story of Revenge in the Maritimes  

                                                  Leaving Long Island, oil on masonite, 23" x 32", Steven Rhude  The road has mixed feelings for you. One being the love of a place you leave behind, the other being the love of place you imagine. The difference to you is self evident. This is the in between world of the picture making process. You wake, you drive, you imagine, you dream, and then you try to etch the experience in your mind. You press on. Two ferry's out are waiting for you to return. Your reconnaissance is nearly over, but it's hard to let go of it. You have some notes, a few drawings and numerous photographs. You will wait a few months, then recollect the place in oil paint on a substrate surface. But it is not the place you recall as reality challenges your perceptions. You dislike a shed colour so you change it. A type of aluminum siding is ...

                                                 Two Houses, oil on panel, private collection, Steven Rhude   “I think of Acadian cussing as a form of bilingual folk poetry. I take a powerless battery from my boat to the local garage, and Claude Poirier shakes his head sadly as he announces his diagnosis: 'C'est tout fucké, ça.' 'He's so goddamn cute!' says an Acadian grandmother adoringly, cradling her baby grandson. 'I could just squeeze the fuckin' shit right outta him.' Perhaps my favourite line of all is a disgusted Acadian's declaration that 'That fuckin' t'ing is fuckin' well fucked.” ―  Silver Donald Cameron,  Blood in the Water: A True Story of Revenge in the Maritimes

                                              Woman, Arno River, Florence, Italy, graphite, 5" x 12", Steven Rhude He remembers the winter wind tunnel of Toronto's University and Dundas intersection. Weather there never made falling in love easy. One had to time the insensitive blustery gusts to take in a facial expression,  or just to touch -  on a chilly December day. This was at a time when the clock had several hours left till midnight - while on the way to make a gallery bank deposit at one of the big six ... he still can't recall which one, but he can see the sidewalk slush and her red scarf. Wasn't there a Chinese art supplier somewhere along the way?  For some reason it remains in his mind. He met her forty years ago on December 13th. Back then, they would fall in love, get married, and go to Florence, Italy for their honeymoon. He quit his job in Tor...

                                                  Water Woman, graphite on brown paper, 10" x 13", Steven Rhude When Simone and I lived in Fox Island, water came with baggage. The day we took possession and turned on the kitchen tap... mud came out. Our water came from a twelve foot dug well and was often silted with flooding. Foot valves were constantly being replaced by me as I climbed down into a watery grave of darkness - on one occasion to find out later the replacement valve was indeed faulty and had to be replaced too. The ocean frequently breached the beach into our yard and salt water infected the precious source of our survival - and so needed to be pumped clean - another decent into the pit of darkness. Frost and ice frequently shifted the crocks that lined the well, and in the spring I often found floating, dead voles and other vermin. In the summer gu...

                                    Briar Island's End, Grand Passage Lighthouse, oil on masonite, 16" x 20", Steven Rhude The overtone of the title implies the setting of the sun on a crystal like day. Briar Island is two ferry's in, or if you happen to be one of the two hundred or so residents that live there, two ferry's out. When my son and I arrived at the Briar Island Lodge to check in for the night, it was completely empty. No staff, no restaurant chef, no one to show us to our room. A call to the manager, who wasn't on the island, connected me with a local resident who gave us a room key and said "enjoy the lodge - it's all yours!" Later that evening, a dirt road led us to the north tip of the island where the Grand passage Lighthouse is located. There's also the Westport Search and Rescue Station's presence to remind one of the perils of the sea. I've always been fascinated with the concur...

                                         The Last Canadian, oil on canvas, 38" x 52", Steven Rhude "You are a big country. You are the kindest country in the world. You are like a really nice apartment over a meth lab." - Robin Williams, Comedian As a comedian, Robin Williams was aware of the use of disparate elements in art, whether it was words or pictures - it was grist for his occupational mill. These disparate elements have been around a while, and were employed in the existentialist philosophy of Jean Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir, shaping a twentieth century world that became more absurd than understandable. Today, we are constantly confronted in life and art, by artists with characteristics in their work that are incomparable and indeed appear at first nonsensical -  but the ritual is far from  meaningless.  Well, it may go without saying, we are not the k...

                                      White Ghost Shed, Digby Neck, oil on canvas, 40" x 60", Steven Rhude "In the history of art, white isn't as pure as we think. Over the course of history it's been loaded with ideologies that are divisive and at times even dangerous, so dangerous in fact, that white may just be the darkest colour of them all."  - James Fox, British Art Historian  The story goes that Whistler and his painting of Joanna Hiffernan, that young woman in white, standing on a bear rug, changed the course of modern art. After Whistler, white was never the same, and eventually became the cold, unwelcoming, and exclusive colour of the artistic elite. Public galleries today still emit the residue of the white cube that marked twentieth century austerity and minimalism. A cultural despiritualization. Gazing through the window of a fishing shed, while Sam and I were waiting fo...

        Moon over the Droke, Job's Cove, oil on masonite, 24" x 34", Steven Rhude What's in a name of a community - in this case a lot: Devil’s Cove, 29th of May, 1812 The following is from "Place Names of the Avalon Peninsula of the Island of Newfoundland" (1971) by E.R. Seary, which also states that this petition was published in "'The Royal Gazette and Newfoundland Advertiser' on 11 June 1812 and subsequently". We the undersigned Inhabitants, conceiving the utility and benefits resulting from an early conception and sense of Religion instilled into the tender minds of our Children, and of the rising generation, do unanimously resolve to change and alter the barbarous, execrable, and impious name of "Devil's Cove", into the ancient, venerable, and celebrated name of "Job's Cove" ; and that the public News-paper of St. John's will publish these our resolutions three different times, so that every person in t...

                              An Odd House, Bonavista, oil on Birch panel. 12" x 12", Steven Rhude What really constitutes an allegory? When I encountered this house in Bonavista I naturally wondered about its hidden meaning, its spirit, and all the psycho/social configurations that accompany a dwelling that is one third stripped bare of its clothing, or outer cladding if we are to respect the tradesman use of the term. Revealing the underlayers of mind and mentality, it was once configured a home with parents and children that fished. Nonetheless it is by appearance an odd house. One rarely encounters a dwelling in such an indecisive state.  But this is just one thing - the health of another house, that is a resource based industry is another. Both houses were intentionally  connected. A cemented relationship within its neighbourhood - the sea.  Is it just an illusion for us to visually pass over,...

                                            Custer's Head Road, oil on canvas, 40" x 90", Steven Rhude     Timeline Hant's Harbour 1697 – Abbe Baudoin reports that there are four houses at Hant's Harbour. 1801 – Five families are listed as living in Hant's Harbour. 1813 – T.E. and Mary Pelley die. The gravestone recording this still stands. 1820s – The first known church is built in the community. 1830s – The population consists of 400 people. 1847 – Ten vessels carrying 271 men are engaged in the  seal hunt . 1853 – Eight vessels totaling 767 tons carry 294 men to the seal hunt. 1868 – 1870 – A second and much larger church is built, serving the circuit until 1907 when it is destroyed to build a new one. 1871 – Lovell's Newfoundland Dictionary lists 81 of the 104 householders in Hant's Harbour as fisherman. Two others are listed as farmers. 1880s – The population...

  Two recent works in a series of florals and the sea.                                                               Ocean Rose, oil on masonite, 23.5" x 19", Steven Rhude                                          Tulips and Buoy, Atlantic Spring, oil on canvas, 40" x 30", Emma Butler Gallery

  "You may think that the equation is 'boat and water.' It's not. It's 'money and boat.' The water is not really necessary. That's why you see so many boats in backyards." E.Annie Proux - The Shipping News                                          Man on a Boat, oil on masonite, 26.5" x 17", Steven Rhude My first memory of being on a boat was as a four year old. My aunt and uncle were on their way to view a cottage on an island in the Kawartha Lakes in Ontario. The day was cold and overcast as I hid under the bow of a open cedar strip smacking along choppy waters. I didn't escape my wooden prison until we pulled into a boathouse smelling of engine fuel and moldy jackets. The cottage was acquired and later in the summer my image of the boat changed after being woken from my bunk at midnight to a full moon, and then to be blanketed and paddled around a lake as smooth as glass in or...

The Great Auk's ghost rose on one leg,  Sighed thrice and three times winkt,  And turned and poached a phantom egg  And muttered,  "I'm extinct." Ralph Hodgson  1871 - 1962                        Great Auk (Henry Drummond's Vision), oil on masonite, 20" x 20", Steven Rhude Colonel H. M. Drummond was a highly respected Ornathologist. In December 1852, eight years after the Great Auk was supposedly extinct, Henry was sailing home for Christmas. Good old Henry spotted what he thought was a Great Auk off the coast of Newfoundland. The following year a dead bird was allegedly found washed up on the shores of Trinity Bay on the eastern side of Newfoundland. This account is from Eric Fuller's book The Great Auk. Science has little patience for ghosts, and Henry had no camera or an eye witness to back up his claim - only his word and his vision. I on the other hand, had a great specimen skeleton from the Rooms ...

                                                       From Red Head Cove, oil on canvas, 30" x 64", Steven Rhude He was born in the Cove. They said he was tough as boiled owl. They were right, but from my own perspective, I saw a different individual. Admittedly, more than one brawl provided a brick or two to his reputation as a solid wall of community respect - but he was young back then. He did a number of things to earn his keep and he was feared no matter what the job was. Once he went shrimping to Greenland and  told a crew member who was praying on his knees in the wheel house during a life or death storm, to "get back to your post." If you crossed him it was wise to leave town, if you were his friend you could sleep at night knowing your traps were safe.  As a young man he divided his time between the boat and the fish plant up the...

 Black Dog in Spring Field, oil on masonite, 12" x 14" Wikipedia (folklore) suggests that a black dog is a supernatural, spectral, or demonic entity originating in English folklore covering Europe and the Americas. They have been regarded as sinister and malevolent, connected with the devil - an omen of death, and the incarnation of the hellhound. The above painting is a bit of an oxymoron since the subject "Hagrid" is not in the spring of her life, but rather the autumn. She was acquired by me about fifteen years ago as a gift for my son; a transaction made outside the confines of collective domestic acceptance. However, it all worked out in the end. I never found her malevolent or demonic. She always greeted people with a bark, an energetic wag of the tale, and a humble countenance. It was only on a few rare occasions that she expressed caution or even raised the alarm with an individual. Ironically those individuals were dressed in long black coats out on the Wol...

   Years ago, or in one of those 'time out of mind' nights, on the furthest most easterly point of mainland Nova Scotia , Canso poet and dear friend, June N. Jarvis, told me of a tragic, painful, and sad poem she wrote. It's a poem with vengeance and a curse that starts when a young woman is as they say - led astray by a young man. It's about the days of yore, the sea and all the allegory it represents. It's about a woman's decent into supernatural darkness and the August gales that accompanied her.  This is a familiar story in the sense that it is tied to the very nature of folklore, yet like all memorable folklore, it still has a powerful resonance to contemporary times. It entails, a young woman and sex, the passage of time, fishing commerce, a Canso ship in distress, the loss of Betsy's seventeen year old daughter to the sea, and the inability to console, where reparations are like gulls uselessly screeching in a tempest. It is a tale that is...

  C rossroads have always intrigued me, both literally and figuratively. If I were to follow the idea that I’m living in a strange twilight between the tangible world I belong to and the painted world I create, I could metaphorically refer to this as some sort of "crossroads". I don't meditate, probably should, but I still on occasion murmer a prayer. However while doing these flower still life paintings I believe the elements that comprise them - light, the sea, atmosphere, wood, lead, cloth, plant and petals - are in their own way meditations on some of the things I find mysterious and yet calming, beautiful but indifferent. Steven Rhude, Wolfville                                                         Orchid with Three Buoys, oil on canvas, 40" x 30", Steven Rhude       Iris and Adam, oil on canvas, 28" x 38", Steven R...