Click on the paintings for more details and to see it in a larger format. Artists are listed alphabetically.
John Almstedt

Gatineau River
|

A view from Feather Island, Lake Clear, Renfrew County, autumn, 2004
|

Ottawa River
|
John is an Ottawa River Institute member and director. He
divides his time between Westboro in Ottawa and Lake Clear in Renfrew County.
He paints for personal enjoyment, sketching scenes of our natural heritage in
their actual settings. Medium is mainly in oils but in the cold days of
winter pastels are the means. Has painted for over 40 years, strongly
influenced by his friend Ralph Burton who painted for many years with A.Y.
Jackson. John has kindly donated these paintings to ORI for fundraising purposes.
The originals are for sale as are same size, archival quality prints on cotton
rag paper.
John Bateson

Laurentian Road | Turtle Spirit |

Island on Hurd's Lake | 
Frozen Lake near Mont Ste. Marie |
John is an ORI member and an advisor to the ORI Board. He
has been painting since he was a small child.
A life in balance, with time for expression, for family and
community, and for developing peace in the heart, everyone’s hearts, is really
what I am attempting to achieve, and if the pictures displayed here help to
move towards this end then I have been successful."
Archival quality prints on cotton rag paper are available
for each of these paintings. The original of Laurentian Road is also for sale. John Bateson A. O. C. A.
"My father also did a fair bit of drawing, mostly pen and
ink, and I also recall him sitting with me and showing me such things as how to
draw a box so it appeared three dimensional.I enjoyed art in school for the most part, especially when
left to my own devices, and I took several evening life drawing classes, along
with my mother, and took various fine art courses at Algonquin College in
Ottawa, but ended up a few credits short of a diploma. However, this was my
first exposure to the world of professional artists, and I enjoyed the whole
experience and learned quite a bit. I began to be more experimental while in
this milieu, as this was encouraged. I did a lot of palette-knife oil
paintings, some of which I’m still quite fond of, and I learned various new
techniques, most notably screen printing. I went on to become proficient in this
discipline and worked in industry doing among other things, display work for
the National Museums of Canada.
This
work involved the use of a lot of toxic substances and provided little room for
creative input, so I contemplated a return to school. I was fortunate enough to
be accepted at the Ontario College of Art (now called the Ontario College of
Art and Design). Toronto,
where I ended up spending the next ten years. I worked as a commercial
illustrator after graduating. Eventually I found that commercial art was a bit
on the stressful side and again, often with not a lot of room for creative
input.I had begun to draw and paint as a child as a way to
communicate and as an effective means of putting down thoughts and feelings
about things, a way to bring internal images out to be seen and shared.
I
suppose the past fourteen years have led me inexorably back to this path. I
still do the occasional commercial job, but prefer to do the sort of work you
see here. A life
in balance, with time for expression, for family and community, and for
developing peace in the heart, everyone’s hearts, is really what I am
attempting to achieve, and if the pictures displayed here help to move towards
this end then I have been successful.I hope
you enjoy these pictures! May your blessings increase…" John Bateson.
Beatrice Biderman
As an exhibiting artist, I have been showing and
selling my work since 1986. Living in Pembroke, an area of scenic beauty, makes
me a painter who is inspired by the colours, forms and diversity of
nature. My paintings are done in watercolour, oils and acrylics.
They are landscape, heritage farms, abstracts and floral.
Until my retirement, I was employed at the former Pembroke
Civic Hospital. Holiday time was often used to attend painting workshops and
classes. These opportunities have taken me to Banff, Hawaii, Arizona,
Killarney, Ottawa, North Bay and Haliburton.
Edith Hantschek
Photographer

There's Light
Kathy Haycock
Painter

Top of Chute | Rock Lake |
Though mainly self taught, Kathy’s view is strongly
influenced by her father, Arctic painter Maurice Haycock, and by his close
painting partner of 30 years, A. Y. Jackson. She grew up surrounded by their
work and first glimpsed Canada’s vast land in the paintings they brought back
from their numerous sketching trips across Canada.
Kathy began weaving in 1973. Arctic trips with her father to
Beechey Island in 1975, and Baffin Island and Greenland in 1984 introduced her
to the lure of the North and inspired a graceful sweeping rhythm in her work.
The flowing, uninterrupted land lent itself to lively, fluid woven images.
After years of tapestry weaving, stained glass, design and pastel painting she
tried oils and instantly fell in love with them and on-site painting.
John Macgillivray

Star Birth | Dandelion Escape
| 
Final Gestures |
John is an Ottawa River Institute member from Pembroke. He is an artist and an art teacher. John says his art is chiefly about his passionate and spiritual response to life: nature and the human condition. Archival quality prints of these paintings are available to be purchased.
Jordan Smith
Jordan is a native of Pembroke, Ontario.
"I do most of my field work in and around Algonquin
Park and the tributaries of the Ottawa River watershed (Petawawa, Nipissing,
Madawaska, Barron and Bonnechere). I work on location and I don't use photography
as a reference aid. I try to take the things I've learned from these
smaller works and develop larger format pieces that are more conceptual in nature."
Kathrin Winkler

The Changling | River Spirit |
The Deep
|
Trying to capture an elusive essence in the process of dabbling in watercolours though colour, shape and rhythm is a source of joy for me. My paintings evolve from the shorelines, vistas and tangled forests of my own life journey. I have the good fortune of living on the river and spending my days teaching (and being taught) as a high school art teacher in Pembroke. Through my work I understand how rich and varied art- making can be for all of us and how marvelous this process is. The arts open a door into seeing what we have so we can cherish the beauty that surrounds us - and if that door is opened wide enough we will strive to protect that life-giving gift of river and sky.