Matawatchan and area draws artists!
Artists of all kinds, musicians, singers, painters, sculptors, bakers, jewellers, and on, and on...
We are gathering a list of great artisans and planning to put photos and links to their works on this page.
If you are an interested professional artisan, please contact us and we'll post your information. We need to build this list!
You can contact these artists through matawatchancentre@gmail.com
Musicians, Musical Groups,
and Callers and Singers:
​
The New Pickled Chicken String Band) Hillbilly Music with a Twist!!
The Tall Boyz Favourites to get you rockin'!!!
​
Numerous individual artists And more coming all the time.
Visual Artists, Potters, Sculptors and What-have-you:
We know you're out there. Please send more in!
Cathie Cooper Oils
Having artist parents (Rudy and Lois Cooper) provided unique opportunities for Cathie. Holidays always revolved around painting. Out in the bush painting might mean being on the margins of the Madawaska River or on the ‘Quebec-side’ or in the Algoma region above Sault-Ste-Marie. Regardless, painting was always central.
The process in creating a painting begins in exploration, according to Cathie. You look, you see and then something strikes you—often it is the light. Cathie knows what she has to paint when it excites her: often waking her up during the night. She goes to the site and watches how the light changes the landscape and when she knows what she wants she paints an oil sketch. An ‘oil sketch’; usually on panel, captures the moment and the light. If she is satisfied with the result she will bring it home and it may become a ‘studio work’ or if she is not satisfied, it will stay in the bush. An ‘oil sketch’ might take twenty minutes or a few hours to complete but sometimes sketching in oils at minus thirty degrees Celsius can be challenging.
Of the paintings that she has retained, there are about thirty studio works and some seventy-eighty oil sketches. Many are sold but many others are available for sale. Paintings sometimes fund tools, maintenance for the orchard she cultivates on her property or more paint and canvas.
Cathie now lives in the Madawaska Highlands in the Village of Matawatchan. Being close to the Madawaska River, the area is full of landscapes worthy of the ‘Group of Seven’ She says that she sees ‘brush strokes’ everywhere.
Artist, Writer, Rovers
R. Ernest Jukes, has won awards for his art and design across Canada, USA, Europe and Mexico. His articles and poetry have been published in premier publications and anthologies in North America. Ernie has been a regular contributor to our Madawaska Highlander since inception and has 4 books to his credit. His donated paintings of our valley and records of our fire tower may be seen in "The Wall in the Hall Museum" in the Matawatchan hall.
Audrey and Ernie's travels have taken them from Sicily to the Baltic Sea and Prussia to Galway Bay. They have fortunately explored every province of our great country including Haida Guaii, Yukon and Labrador. He has also canoed the Madawaska and far north rivers and painted the Inuit of Hudson Bay. Their rovering and sketching include most of the U.S. and states of Mexico and Guatamala studying the ancient cities of the Maya and Aztecs.
The log cabin studio and art gallery is the centre piece of Camp J. This 4 cabin retreat on Carswell's mountain has been a boon to artists, writers, Boy Scouts, hunters, fishers and photographers since 1944. Many folks in the area currently enjoy old Camp J for weekly horseshoes, scheduled art lessons, occasional quilting, viewing paintings and general discussion often historical, (sometime histerical) or on art and travel.
