Warming Up
     One spring recently, I had an urge to make a maypole of sorts.
     So I went out to the bush nearby and found a small likely-looking tag alder sapling about six or seven feet high. After respectfully requesting its permission to sacrifice itself to the cause and making a small offering of some tobacco, I cut it off near the ground and carried it home to work on.
     The bark was stripped off of it on all but the top 18". Traditional maypoles have their tops left untouched. There were also 3 short bands of bark left on the sapling about 8" down. Above these bands, a 3/4 " blue band was painted on with a narrow red band enclosed by it. Below the bark bands a similar painted band was applied: this time a wider red band enclosing the narrow blue one. Bits of the other in each... yin/yang... above, sky with clouds... below, earth with water.
     Next, leather wrappings were applied both above and below this collection of bark and painted bands.
     Attached to the upper leather by leather laces were 3 feathers I had acquired at different times: a hawk (a raptor and sometime thunderbird) feather, a partridge (a hunted bird and drummer-in-the-woods) feather and a Canada goose (a bird of both the air and water, and a far-traveller) feather.
     The lower leather wrapping had three things attached with leather laces as well.
     There was a string of seven wooden beads (it seemed to be the right number at the time), a patch of wolf fur from a bag of pieces I got at a trading post once, and the lower jawbone of some kind of small animal.

     I had come across the jawbone in a pile of dead bones and fur remnants in the bush the previous fall, while deer hunting. I don't know what kind of animal it came from since the rest of the skull was absent, but it was definitely a predator, judging by the long canine tooth in it. The bits of fur seemed to be grayish so I considered it might be a lynx but the tooth looked too large for a feline... could have been a small wild dog or coydog I suppose. Anyway, I took it home and bleached it and wrapped it with leather for use somewhere in the future and this pole became it. It was from an animal that was a predator but had become prey to something else. I liked the mystery in that and didn't need to know more... nor even why I wanted to use it here.
     The maypole was then set up in my backyard for a while, until it occurred to me to replace it near where I had cut the sapling. The idea of it being near the bush, but separated from it by both distance and what I had done to it (which could be considered cruel from the sapling's point of view) seemed to set up a kind of paradox that intrigued me enough to do a painting. Maybe in some nebulous way, it might served as a kind of half-assed metaphor for our relationship with nature. Trite, yes but maybe apt nonetheless... The title "Mayday" contains certain ambiguities as well though I'd rather let others interpret that for themselves if they want. It's more fun all around that way.

    Pencil studies were done of some of the elements for the painting and I had determined a general colour scheme as a guide for it as well. I planned a split complement (yellow-orange complemented by blue and violet) with an opposing complementary pair (green and red) crossing it at right angles, although I expected to use fairly subdued versions of these colours.
     I planned to begin with transparent acrylic colour washes and then move on to more opaque techniques (hatching or drybrush effects) to further define the forms later... especially those in the foreground. I had the idea to try for a sort of "magic realism" look, like Andrew Wyeth or Alex Colville, etc. I'd see where it would go from there.

Preliminary work
     A quick sketch was made to work out how the elements of the painting will be placed.
     I guess the basic compositional rule of thumb was roughly applied here... that being the well-known "rule of thirds". That is, the foreground subject--the maypole--was placed a third of the way, horizontally, across the scene. Vertically, I decided to not worry about; I just placed it where I felt it looked okay. I tend to follow a more instinctual sense of composing... learn the rules and then forget them.
     The vertical orientation of the frame will tend to emphasize the skyward, ordered, god-influenced nature of the work, since a maypole is intended to link sky and earth at the point where it stands. A horizontal composition will lean more towards the earth, the landscape, the earth-goddess, in this way of thinking. The vertical composition will focus attention more on the long slender vertical maypole, rather than the landscape and bush behind, in which it can easily become lost.
     A bit of breeze blowing the feathers around, in addition to displaying them more favourably, will also suggest a sense of spirit and magic present in the scene. Winds have long been associated with spirits and powers unseen, only felt. The word "spirit" itself comes from a word meaning "wind".
     There was already a slight curve in the sapling and I liked the esthetic way it slowly curved out of plumb from bottom to top. It doesn't really mean anything I guess... I just liked it. So I went ahead with the final version. The maypole itself was brought home for reference during the painting.

Step One
     After having worked out the basic cartoon, a simple line drawing locating all of the elements of the painting with no other values added, I transferred it lightly to the watercolour paper ground to be painted on: Arches 140 lb cold-pressed paper, 18" x 24".
     Then the blue sky was washed into the upper part of the scene, with lots of water and leaving enough paper showing through in spots to suggest high, wispy cirrus clouds for a cool spring day effect. Some warmer colours were subtly worked upward from the horizon to give the sky a bit more depth. It was a good start.
     Then some dirty yellows and greens were brushed in as a basic background wash for the grasses in the middle ground. I started to indicate lightly some of the bush and trees as well as the maypole in the foreground. Following that, I also began to paint in darker bluish and violet colours some of the background tree tops to get an idea how they will look. From here on in, I can foresee a lot of bouncing around the scene: adding some here, suggesting a bit there.... and probably getting lost in the bush behind. I'll have to build up the forest tree by tree, working my way forward out of it. I will also have to remember to work on the maypole and its elements as well to avoid losing it in the background as it develops. Picture-making concerns...
     By the way, something in this paper really stinks when you wet it. Smells kind of like dirty socks... I guess that's to be expected with 100% rag paper... nothing but the best, eh? Phew!
     Well, we just have to soldier on through.