Winter Manor

warm hearth

as snowflakes gently fall

le manoir d’hiver

Our visual arts collection at the University has a wonderful program titled ‘sketch and de-stress’, where they post images from their collection and people in the community can draw, paint, or sketch their own version. Over the break, the challenge was a watercolour by P. R. Wilson titled “Dorval Manor House”, showing an old Quebec manor in the wintertime, with a Santa in his sleigh out front. The digitization team at the Library worked their magic and here’s the piece with the snow gently falling.

I decided to try the challenge and worked up my own watercolour, but decided(why I do not know!) to attempt a tiny version of the piece, done on an approximate 2×3 inch piece of watercolour paper. It was fun, but getting all the details in was beyond my skill level, so I opted to leave out Santa and his sleigh. So, my art is just a simple winter manor, or manoir d’hiver in French.

Winter is in full swing here, and I do simply love the way snow envelopes landscapes, houses, and trees. It changes everything, brightening the world, and having sub-zero temperatures allows for opportunities to snuggle next to a fireplace with a good book. It’s also a great time to get out skiing or skating, but sometimes watching the snow fall from the comfort of a living room is, well, pretty perfect.

Happy January!