Bright Weeds, 1986

Private Collection, Calgary

Dorothy Knowles was raised on a farm in Saskatchewan and enrolled at the University of Saskatoon to study Biology. Upon her graduation in 1948, a friend convinced her to participate in a six-week summer art course organized by the University of Saskatchewan at Emma Lake, led by Reta Cowley and James Frederick Finley. Knowles’ interest in painting blossomed as a result and she returned to the workshops in the following years.   Knowles embraced the advice of Clement Greenberg from these Emma Lake workshops, continuing to paint from nature and discovered the importance of working “en plein-air”. With her family commitments and raising three daughters, Knowles found it difficult to find time to station herself outside for extended periods of time to paint. She produced some finished paintings outdoors, but often made sketches and took photographs to use as reference in the studio. “Bright Weeds”, dating to 1996, would have been painted after her children had grown, thus enabling her to spend more time painting outside.   The handling of the acrylic paint in this work appears transparent like watercolour, allowing the artist to build up veils of pigment in the landscape, capturing the rugged natural texture of the ground cover. The palette is expansive with greens and blues, with pops of yellows and rust. The panoramic sky occupies over half of the composition, with large masses of softly rendered clouds, imbuing the work with an atmosphere of calm. “Bright Weeds” highlights the dramatic landscape of Saskatchewan that inspired Knowles.