While I grew up in Ottawa, all my summers were spent at our family cottage on Lake Opinicon swimming, fishing, exploring the lake shore and learning about nature. At that time the lake was quiet, the bass amazing, cottages were few and far between and I was queen of the lake with a 10 horsepower outboard engine on my grandfather's 23 foot fishing boat. I left Ottawa in 1971 to live where I belong; in the country in a heritage home surrounded by nature and the quiet beauty of the rural Eastern Ontario Landscape. It is here at home, in my garden, at the cottage and by the sea in Maine that I am inspired to paint the natural beauty and history that surrounds me.

Ever since I was a small child I have been exposed to and fascinated by art. Both of my grandmothers were accomplished artists and my mother had great talent but passed away before she had the chance to focus on her art. While art has always enveloped me I didn't have the time to take lessons and commit to painting until 1993. Since that time I have taken lessons from and attended seminars by those whose work I respect. I have built up an extensive library on decorative art and studied museum collections and the work of some amazingly talented painters. My goal is to develop my unique style by learning as much as possible about other artists techniques and using what I learn “to paint things I like on things I like“. I love to paint “it is like writing stories with images instead of words“.

Nature and history are my muses and the desire to capture the beauty of the natural world and days gone by are the forces that drive me to create. I paint primarily on wood and tin. When I come across an interesting paintable object I delight in designing something to paint on it that I believe makes the object even more interesting. Along with my first two loves my Pennsylvania Dutch ancestry shows in my work in motifs and colours reminiscent of Pennsylvania Dutch folk art and fraktur art. I enjoy exploring and experimenting with old techniques such as reverse glass painting, tinsel painting and faux finishes and adapt them to make them mine. When on holiday I work on developing my knowledge of water colour techniques and experiment with them.

My favourite time to paint is in the early morning. I love the light at that time of day. In the winter I paint at my kitchen table close to my wood stove where it is warm. On frosty winter mornings I can watch who comes to my bird feeders and gaze, past the mist curling out of the top of the covered stone wishing well, over the glistening snow covered beauty of the garden and across the meadow towards the lane and creek beyond. Armed with a good strong, piping hot cup of coffee and with some favourite music in the background, paint brush in hand, time just seems to fly and all too soon that wonderful light is gone for another day.

I will consider commissions and may be contacted by e-mail at jane.topping@sympatico.ca