A Ballad for Day Nine: Pouch Cove Foundation Artist Residency

As day nine at my Pouch Cove Foundation residency begins in rural Newfoundland, I am reflecting on this first week of exploring far reaches of the island and downtown St. John’s. My goal with any residency is to immerse myself in the culture, the landscapes, icons and people of a place and Newfoundland is rich with all of these things. Surviving here on the easternmost point in North America takes grit, inventiveness, gratitude, and community. I am writing and painting a ballad for Newfoundland.

As I work through all the imagery, moving and still, I have captured on my Nikon and my iPhone my goal is to have three distinctive visual stories sketched out on three large canvasses stapled to my studio wall, by days end. Writing down my ideas in my black composition notebook, then typing them out on this blog, helps to build the framework for what I decide to paint.

This morning I am listening to a playlist I built during my Banff Centre artist residency last winter. The playlist includes Joni, Neil, Billie. The Hip and Debussy. Over the Canadian Thanksgiving weekend I was down in Petty Harbour, where I heard some live jigs and reels in a place called Chafe’s. I heard stories of Alan Doyle as we ate lobster and ‘recovery fries’. The vessel I am as I travel my homeland and I’ve written my own song, to go along with the days ahead.

Beneath the sou’wester sky, where the ocean meets the rocks,
In Newfoundland’s embrace, where the wind talks,
Jelly bean houses, in colors so bold,
Tell tales of a history, weathered and old.

(Chorus)
Oh, Newfoundland, with your dories on the shore,
Codfish dreams, where the lighthouses soar,
In the arms of the cliffs, where the wind does play,
A maritime ballad, echoes every day.

Fishermen cast their hopes, like nets in the sea,
A dance with the waves, as wild as can be,
Siding tales of reships, that sailed long ago,
In the heart of the harbour, where stories still flow.

Oh, Newfoundland, with your dories on the shore,
Codfish dreams, where the lighthouses soar,
In the arms of the cliffs, where the wind does play,
A maritime ballad, echoes every day.

The salty air whispers, as the reships set sail,
Journeying through tales, where the ocean is the trail,
And the beer in the taverns, flows like a stream,
In the warmth of the hearth, where dreams find their theme.

In the echo of the wind, and the seagull’s cry,
Amongst the jelly bean houses, where time passes by,
A symphony of stories, etched in the land,
As Newfoundland’s heart beats, with a weathered hand.

Oh, Newfoundland, with your dories on the shore,
Codfish dreams, where the lighthouses soar,
In the arms of the cliffs, where the wind does play,
A maritime ballad, echoes every day.

So let the winds carry, the tales of the sea,
From the reships to the rocks, where the heart longs to be,
Newfoundland, in your essence so clear,
A timeless ballad, for every seafarer to hear.