Wiseton is a prairie village with a population of some 120 people, in west-central Saskatchewan. It’s hard to pass Wiseton without stopping for at least a few minutes.
The reason: a new mural on the side of the town’s Memorial Hall. The painting, a brightly colored panorama of a prairie harvest scene, is 25 by 40 feet and easily visible from the highway.
While stunning from afar, it is up close that one really appreciates the skill of artist Cecilia Elizabeth.
The centrepiece is the town’s Saskatchewan Wheat Pool elevator. A combine works in the foreground while a grain truck waits in the back to take the harvest to the elevator.
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There is a pond, a scene of the town which includes the hall and its mural, a farm yard and, off in the corner, a derelict combine.
But look closer. Ducks fly over the pond. Butterflies and a meadowlark flutter around the old combine, a rabbit sits in the grass and a deer peeks out from some bushes. In another part of the mural a red-winged blackbird flies over the golden fields.
You won’t see all this detail and more in a quick glance. The mural must be studied and studied again.
Elizabeth worked on it for 22 days, coming out during the week and going back to her home in Saskatoon for weekends. It is painted in regular latex acrylic which she feels should stand up as long as any house paint and, being on the north side of the building, should never fade.
She painted in the sky freehand, down to the 15-foot mark on the wall, then sketched the rest of the mural in sections.
Since it was hard to draw on the stucco wall, she told me that she had to “go with few lines.”
Primarily a water colorist, Elizabeth teaches water color techniques. She calls herself a prairie artist. She loves painting Saskatchewan scenes, and says elevators are her trademark though she laments that she “can’t get to them fast enough before they tear them down.”
She is sad to see the demise of the old-time elevators; “You can’t see where the towns are any more,” she says. Asked if she will paint the new, cement structures, she replies, “I don’t think so.”
Now that the Wiseton project is finished, Elizabeth will move on to other things.
She will be back in Wiseton in late October when the Hall board holds a banquet and dance to celebrate the official opening of their remodelled building.
