Barn In Winter

When I was growing up up-north, we lived in one house that backed off onto an old farm. I’m not sure what it was initially used for, grazing possibly, as it included areas of rolling field eventually bordered by some woods. The back of our house faced west and this provided us with plenty of gorgeous sunsets in the summer, so much that I have meta-tagged them in my mind as a ‘Classic Powassan Sunset’.

When the sun wasn’t setting and the clouds weren’t casting long shadows on the grass below, the remainder of the year was filled with Winter. There was a large abandoned wooden barn at the edge of the property very much to the style of this painting. Inside, rotten wood and iron tools were scattered about. My cousins and I would explore what was left behind when they would come up north to visit. We would all end up with something interesting, an old farming tool, some sort of stake, play with it for the day then return it back to the barn when we ran out of uses for it.

I can still smell inside that barn, animal musk long gone but a hint of the busyness that once occupied the space. This watercolour was painted in 1974, I speculate if it still sits as it was when it sat and posed for this painting, as I wonder if the barn behind our old house is still there too.