The Mackay Creek Series: Paintings by Ron den Daas

This beautiful, large-format art book contains sixty oil paintings by British Columbia artist Ron den Daas, entitled The Mackay Creek Series. The book contains little text by the artist but a foreword by Brian Riddell of the Pacific Salmon Foundation and an essay by Bill Jeffries, a teacher, gallery owner and environmentalist explain the project the artist had in mind and its ecological significance.

Den Daas has undertaken this project for environmental reasons—the midsize creek is close to his studio, and it is now part of a habitat for the migrating and spawning coho salmon. He painted the panels at the same location sixty times over the period from November 2008 through October 2010. Each panel is full-page and the artworks are beautiful. Though they depict the same stream at the same location, den Daas changed the view slightly, including a little more foreground or background or side views from painting to painting. Each is labeled by a number and date. In addition, he included ten full-sized paintings (all the way to edge of the paper), some showing details of paintings, others on slightly different topics. But most readers get bored viewing similar paintings sixty times.