Latest / Ducks Unlimited Podcast / Portrait of a Farm: Cameron McIntyre on Decoys, Paintings, and Inspiration (Ep. 730)

Transcript

Portrait of a Farm: Cameron McIntyre on Decoys, Paintings, and Inspiration (Ep. 730) · Ducks Unlimited Podcast

• 0:06
  Katie Burke: Hi, everybody. Welcome to the Ducks Unlimited podcast. I'm your host, Katie Burke. And today on the show, have Cameron McIntyre, decoy carver and painter, and we are here in his studio in Virginia. The
• 0:27
  VO: following episode of the DU podcast features a video component. For the full experience, visit the Ducks Unlimited channel on YouTube, subscribe, and enjoy.
• 0:37
  VO: Can we do a mic check, please? Everybody, welcome back to the Ducks Unlimited podcast. I'm your host, doctor Mike Brasher. I'm your host, Katie Burke. I'm your host, doctor Jared Henson.
• 0:45
  And I'm your host, Matt Harrison.
• 0:55
  VO: Welcome to the Ducks Unlimited podcast, the only podcast about all things waterfowl. From hunting insights to science based discussions about ducks, geese, and issues affecting waterfowl and wetlands conservation in North America. The DU podcast, sponsored by Purina Pro Plan, the official performance dog food of Ducks Unlimited. Purina Pro Plan, always advancing. Also proudly sponsored by Bird Dog Whiskey and Cocktails.
• 1:21
  Whether you're winding down with your best friend or celebrating with your favorite crew, Bird Dog brings award winning flavor to every moment. Enjoy responsibly.
• 1:42
  Katie Burke: Hi, everybody. Welcome to the Ducks Unlimited podcast. I'm your host, Katie Burke. And today on the show, I'm here with Cameron McIntyre. Welcome to the show, Cameron.
• 1:51
  Thank you. So we are not obviously in the studio. This is not the Ducks Unlimited studio. We are not there. So where are we?
• 1:59
  Where is this?
• 2:00
  Cameron McIntyre: Well, I guess, technically, this is a studio to me. It's your
• 2:04
  Katie Burke: studio. Yes.
• 2:05
  Cameron McIntyre: It's a pretty disorganized, messy one, to be honest
• 2:08
  Katie Burke: with you. It's not a set up stage studio with, like, weird knit knacks on
• 2:11
  Cameron McIntyre: the back? No. Although it's cleaner than it's been for several months, if you can believe that.
• 2:16
  Katie Burke: Yeah. That's well, I mean, I've been in bunch of these. I will say that yours is, you have, like, a bigger space. I like so would you build this did you build this studio?
• 2:25
  Cameron McIntyre: Yes.
• 2:25
  Katie Burke: Okay. So we are actually in Virginia. Where would you say in Virginia we are, like, area wise? Because I am not from here, obviously.
• 2:33
  Cameron McIntyre: Well, we're on the Eastern Shore Of Virginia, which are two counties that are separate from the entire rest of the state, and we are in the Far Northwestern corner of the Eastern Shore.
• 2:46
  Katie Burke: Okay.
• 2:46
  Cameron McIntyre: We're about, you know, 15 miles or so from Chincoteague and just south of the Maryland line.
• 2:55
  Katie Burke: Okay. So, I guess, just to kinda so I'm up here because I went to Easton, obviously. We saw each other there. Right. And I've done this this is my third year.
• 3:07
  This is my third year to kinda go to Easton to the festival and then kinda visit a few of you guys. First year, I did Grayson and Pete. Yep. Last year, I went up to New Jersey and did Jamie and George. And then this year, I'm down here with y'all.
• 3:20
  So and I did Oliver Toots yesterday. Nice. So it's been really great. I like doing this, and I will hope to keep doing this because there's so many of you guys out here. It's kinda the nice part about this area.
• 3:33
  So much history with decoy carving. And so you're not from here, though.
• 3:38
  Cameron McIntyre: Right.
• 3:38
  Katie Burke: You know? And I wanna say also before we get into all this, you have another podcast episode that we did a lot of years ago, I think we really it's one of my favorites, so I have them rerelease it a lot. Okay. Well, good. So if you haven't listened to that, go back and listen to it because you'll get a lot more like, we're not gonna do a whole lot of background information.
• 3:58
  So go to that one, kinda introduce yourself to you as a decoy carver. But you so you grew up in South Carolina, obviously. You come up here. So why did you choose to come up here? Like, what was speaking of, like, the heritage and stuff, like, what was your motivation to move?
• 4:16
  Cameron McIntyre: Right. Well, when I came up here for the first time when I was a young kid, you know, maybe I think I was about 11 years old when I first came to the Eastern Shore
• 4:24
  Katie Burke: on a
• 4:25
  Cameron McIntyre: hunting trip. And now where we hunted in South Carolina was this beautiful area called the Ace Basin, but it was just this one particular area where you duck hunted because there's loads of coastal marsh down there, but very little of that marsh has any duck hunting. It's all you had to go to this one place.
• 4:46
  Katie Burke: Yeah.
• 4:47
  Cameron McIntyre: But when I first came to the Eastern Shore, like, the entire Eastern Shore, whether you're on the seaside or the bayside or up in Maryland, just it's it's just waterfowl. You know, it's like a waterfowl paradise. And then, obviously, I came to learn about all the carvers past and present that that live in this area. So this is like the decoy capital of the world, really.
• 5:11
  Katie Burke: Yeah.
• 5:12
  Cameron McIntyre: So I I I just knew I was gonna gonna move here. I just first time I saw it, I thought, you know, I'm coming up here.
• 5:20
  Katie Burke: It's just a matter of time.
• 5:21
  Cameron McIntyre: Right.
• 5:22
  Katie Burke: Alright. So this place, which I mean, you can see the shop here, but you have your home and you have this whole, you know, your whole area that you've built up here. It's very Right. Idyllic. And so at what point did you start kind of working to get this, like, to this setup that you have?
• 5:40
  Like, how did that come about? And
• 5:42
  Cameron McIntyre: Well, I you know, ever since I was in probably the fourth grade, I just knew that one day I was gonna have a farm. I mean, because I grew up in a in a small house in a in a small neighborhood. And so that was my dream all these years. Of course, you know, to buy a farm takes money and blah blah blah. But but as I got more established with my carving and then I got married and the place where we're living was great, but I just always wanted a farm, and so I went on a mission to try to find a a farm to buy.
• 6:18
  Katie Burke: Okay. How far into your career were you at that point?
• 6:22
  Cameron McIntyre: I was about ten years. Okay. Real close to ten years. Yep.
• 6:26
  Katie Burke: Yeah. That's interesting. So as someone in which we talked about a little bit before, but, like, this is all you've ever done. Right? You've never done anything
• 6:33
  Cameron McIntyre: else. This you know, when I was in high school, I had, you know, some different jobs here and there, but, you know, my whole adult life since I was you know, since the day I moved up here when I was 20 years old, this is the only thing that I've ever done for a living.
• 6:47
  Katie Burke: Yeah. So how did you I think about so what were you carving in before? Like, did you did you have an idea of what you wanted as a studio or as, like, a place that you wanted to and even a home just
• 6:58
  to be inspired by. Because, I mean, obviously, as a carver and an artist, you're inspired by what's around you. Right. And I've you know, I I particularly have always been subject to inspiration. Yeah.
• 7:14
  You know, I can I'm
• 7:16
  Cameron McIntyre: just constantly inspired by things. And when I moved up here, you know, there was a certain sort of early colonial architecture that was similar to South Carolina even though most of the houses down there were much more extravagant. But there was these simple little story and a half Eastern Shore houses that I just fell in love with with the dormer windows and the exposed chimneys. And, you know, I I just thought, you know, if I build a workshop or a studio, I I kinda want it to look like that. And then if I ever I didn't know that I was gonna find a house that I could actually move, which is what I did, but I thought, you know, if we ever build a house, it would be based on early colonial architecture.
• 8:00
  Katie Burke: Moved your house?
• 8:02
  Cameron McIntyre: We did. Okay. Yeah. I didn't know that.
• 8:04
  And I would never ever do that again. That's my one, contribution to society. And, and I can tell you why, you know, Colonial Williamsburg has an endowment from the Rockefeller because it take it would take a fortune to maintain a house that was built in 1785 like the one that I live in. Yeah. It does have the original siding on it, which I've maintained.
• 8:28
  I mean, I have to paint that thing about once every three and a half years if you can believe that. Just, you know
• 8:33
  Katie Burke: but Yeah. Saltwater air.
• 8:34
  Cameron McIntyre: But yeah. Yep. Saltwater air. And but the fact that it's still all there is pretty remarkable. But, yes, yeah, we we dismantled dismantled that house for the most part and moved it about 14 miles and rebuilt it and restored it and added on to it, and now we get to maintain it.
• 8:55
  Katie Burke: Yeah. Now you get to it. Yeah. I'll also say, like, y'all always have up here this, like, it's not just a home. Right?
• 9:02
  Like, you have a home, and then you have this little building where your studio you have a barn. Like, every all of these little they're almost like little homestead type
• 9:11
  Cameron McIntyre: Right.
• 9:11
  Katie Burke: Environments, which is very particular to this, I feel like, up here. And you have that here.
• 9:16
  Cameron McIntyre: Yep. In New England, they they tended to attach the buildings together, and then they would call it like a door yard. It would have, you know, the house and the a a a breezeway connected to the barn, connected to the garage, and that's all so that you don't have to go outside in the freezing cold and, you know, waist deep snow. But, yeah, there's a lot of lot of little outbuildings associated with the Virginia houses.
• 9:43
  Katie Burke: So did you build all of your outbuilding? No.
• 9:45
  Cameron McIntyre: I didn't. I I move I have the oldest building on my property is actually a smokehouse. It was built in 1750, and I keep some of my carving wood in there. It was supposed to be my wife's garden shed, but it's my carving wood storage shed.
• 9:59
  Katie Burke: Yeah. That's all that's all. But
• 10:02
  Cameron McIntyre: yeah. There and then, you know, there's an historian that that I got to be friends with. And along with the outbuildings, the Eastern Shore, colonial architecture has all these different types of fences, and and he would come over here and see that I was working on this style of fence and that style of fence, and then he called it Cameron's Unfinished Fence Museum.
• 10:22
  Katie Burke: Yeah. That that was very and I noticed well, the when I went to Jamie's last year, his whole place is very
• 10:29
  Cameron McIntyre: similar. Yeah.
• 10:30
  Katie Burke: Yeah.
• 10:30
  Cameron McIntyre: Great place.
• 10:30
  Katie Burke: Yeah. And it's the same vibe, like, little all the little outbuildings and well, you don't have horses. He has horses. But I don't think they're his horses, though. I think they're someone else's.
• 10:39
  Cameron McIntyre: Thankfully, I I've got lots of other things that I do that I shouldn't do, but, thankfully, one of them is not horses. Because I have a good friend of mine that has horses and
• 10:49
  Katie Burke: They're like having boats. Do you have boats?
• 10:50
  Cameron McIntyre: I do have lots of boats.
• 10:52
  Katie Burke: Yeah. And there there are lot of maintenance. But no. I I grew up. We had horses and yeah.
• 10:56
  They're a lot. It's different when you have to, you know you know, you feed your dog in your home. But when you have to feed horses, you actually have to go to the horses and feed them
• 11:05
  Cameron McIntyre: every day. Yep.
• 11:06
  Katie Burke: And they're usually not at your house. So they it's a whole thing. And that was my job when I got a license was I had to go feed the horses.
• 11:14
  Cameron McIntyre: Right. Well, I don't think I'll Don't do
• 11:16
  Katie Burke: that. That road. Oh, I I don't I don't think I will. No. I love this area, and I just really wanna talk about that because I know you're inspired by your surroundings and when you were going in choosing, like, the home you moved and the place you've been, like, what were how did you choose a place to pick where you were going to?
• 11:36
  Because obviously, it's continued to be an inspiration for you after. I mean, was only ten years into your career.
• 11:42
  Cameron McIntyre: Right. Well, I I I sort of delve into that in my catalog for the show that I'm getting ready to have. And this farm where I live was not for sale. It was just a place that I would ride by all the time on my way to go duck hunting. And I just thought, boy, I love that farm.
• 11:59
  It's got all this marsh. It's got these big open horizons, which I love open spaces. And, you know, I didn't even know if there was ducks here. I figured, you know, there there must be because it's in a good area. But so I contact I I didn't even know who owned the farm or how much land was included on the farm.
• 12:21
  And so I went down to the courthouse. You know, this is in the days before,
• 12:25
  Katie Burke: you know Onyx
• 12:26
  Cameron McIntyre: and Onyx and all that. Yep. Went down to the courthouse, found the names of the farmers, two brothers that actually owned all this land and called them up. And I'm sure they thought I was crazy, but they said, you know, we we don't sell land. We we buy land.
• 12:42
  You know, when farms come up for sale, we buy them, and they'd never sold a piece of property before. And it it's kinda crazy, but I met with them and, you know, I mean, it would I could write a book about the day that we met and how the ducks started flying and the geese started flying and it started snowing. And then they told me how much they wanted for it, which was about five times more than I was thinking they were gonna want for it. But it all worked out. I they they sold it to me.
• 13:13
  They financed it for me. They became my friends. They became my customers. They're my neighbors. And so all of that ties into the fact that I just feel like it was meant to be.
• 13:25
  I mean, I feel like I was meant to live at this farm. Yeah. And so, you know, one of the reasons that I haven't, you know, my paintings that I do are almost exclusively right here on this farm, especially for the last ten years or so. And, you know, I just don't feel the need to really go anywhere else. I I walk around this farm day and night.
• 13:51
  You know, I'm in the woods here a lot hunting. I'm in the marshes all the time hunting, and I haven't even I mean, I've probably painted got between the studies and and and all three or 400 paintings on this farm Yeah. Of this farm.
• 14:07
  Katie Burke: And And you do plein air. Right? Well Well, you start play studies plein air?
• 14:11
  Cameron McIntyre: Well, what I do, which it's taken me, you know, a long time to to figure out what you know, you gotta figure out what works for you. Yeah. Because we all have different personalities and DNA and, you know, and and skills that, you know, that we're good at and some things that we're not good at. And it what I've arrived at is, you know, I generally like to paint early in the morning, late in the evening, not always, but most of the time. And in order to capture the colors that time of day because, you know, they do change so fast.
• 14:48
  You have to work fast and you have to work pretty small. So I do what I call an oil study Okay. And it it's really not heavy on drawing
• 14:59
  Katie Burke: It'd be alright.
• 15:00
  Cameron McIntyre: Or or maybe even composition, but I try to capture the colors. Yeah. Because, you know, a photograph or, you know, maybe a video would do a better job, but that time of day, you you just can't take a picture of that.
• 15:16
  You know, maybe if you're Well, it won't come out. Right?
• 15:18
  Katie Burke: Like, yeah, it
• 15:19
  Cameron McIntyre: doesn't You know, a photographer for National Geographic maybe.
• 15:22
  Katie Burke: But won't get the color. It's just never gonna get the color right.
• 15:25
  Cameron McIntyre: Yeah. It can't get the and the colors, you know, and and I'm I'm convinced, you know, everybody does see colors differently Yeah. Anyway. Yeah. You know?
• 15:34
  So no peep two people are gonna see the exact same thing. Yeah. And so, yeah, the studies are are have been a huge help for me. So that's that's how I and what I do is I, you know, I paint the study, I bring it back, and I just stick it on the shelf and spend a lot of time looking at it. Okay.
• 15:54
  And then for the composition, because composition is something that, you know, and I mean, I'm not the first person to say this. Whistler figured this out, you know, a hundred and fifty years ago. The chance of you walking out in nature and finding a perfect composition is almost nonexistent. You know, you can and and that's one of the sort of stumbling blocks with plein air painting is when you go out in nature, there's so much information in front of you that it's overwhelming. Right.
• 16:23
  And it's hard to compose in front of nature. I've learned to do it, you know. So you walk out and you you see a scene that that you think for whatever reason resonates with you and this is what I wanna paint, you know, right here.
• 16:36
  Katie Burke: Okay.
• 16:37
  Cameron McIntyre: And you look at the scene and you think, okay. So what is it that I really love about this? And could be, you know, this bank of woods and the way the light catches those trees, and then it may have some other trees in it. And, you know, after a while, you can think, boy, this painting would look a lot better if that tree over there on the far right was on the left or if those woods in the background were a little closer or maybe part of it wasn't even there. Yeah.
• 17:09
  And so so that's how bringing it back to the studio bringing back the study to the studio and looking at it for a long time, it it starts to dawn on you that, you know, I can change this around any way I want. I can add a tree, take a tree out, put some water in it, put a moon. I can do anything I want to the scene, but having the colors be true to the scene is kinda what makes it believable.
• 17:37
  Katie Burke: And I would think, like, especially I was just looking at them today, and we can go into the paintings more, but, like because I went and saw them at they're at Guy and Dieter right now. And just so the audience knows what we're talking about is you're having a show at Gaye and Dieter, and it's December 6, and it's is it your first solo show?
• 17:58
  Cameron McIntyre: No. I've actually had about four or five other solo shows,
• 18:02
  Katie Burke: but this is by far
• 18:04
  Cameron McIntyre: yeah. My first auction, but this is by far my most comprehensive solo show because I I worked I I dedicated my entire year to this show. Okay. So everything that I've made this year with the exception of, like, two things is in that show.
• 18:22
  Katie Burke: Yeah. He says plus 40 plus pieces. This
• 18:25
  Cameron McIntyre: is Right. And I've been saving paintings up for, like, five years. I mean, people have been calling me, wanting me to sell paintings, and I've just, you know
• 18:33
  Katie Burke: Gotta wait till December 6.
• 18:34
  Cameron McIntyre: I've just been saving them up. Yeah. And so
• 18:37
  Katie Burke: Okay. So So yeah. That's so that's what we're referring to. And we went this morning to get some shots of this stuff so that they'll be they'll what we'll talk about will be in this video. So but I was looking at it.
• 18:50
  Yeah. That's interesting the thing. Didn't even think about that you would change you could change this scene. So why I grew up, I went to this artist. I was really fortunate to have an art teacher in my little town of 2,500 people.
• 19:08
  And she was originally an equine artist. Like, that's what she did kinda to get her start. That's where she made money, I guess, really for the most part. And now she's mostly plein air. But I I watched her, and I didn't even think about that she would I'm sure she did the same thing.
• 19:24
  She would take it. I mean, I've see I have big pieces of hers that my parent my parents bought me one of her farm. And now I need to go back and look at it and see if she moved things.
• 19:36
  Cameron McIntyre: Right. Yeah.
• 19:37
  Katie Burke: I'm sure she I'm
• 19:38
  Cameron McIntyre: sure she did. I mean Yeah. Everybody Yeah. You know, eventually, everybody has to figure this out Yeah. Because, you know, you can make it better than reality.
• 19:49
  I mean, you absolutely can.
• 19:51
  Katie Burke: But when I look at it because so when we were young, we would every spring, she would make us go outside. Like, she would make everyone like, whatever we were working on, we had to stop. And when she was like, when it gets hot, you can go back to it. But she would make us go outside every weekend. This is in the Mississippi Delta, so and it was our class was at, 5PM or something, which is right at a well, you've been to Arkansas.
• 20:13
  You know the skies you get in the Delta, those pink and purple cotton candy stuff. So we'd always have to go outside and paint and stuff. And whenever I have that painting, it's she also had horses because she also yeah. It was equinars. So I just remember I love it because it reminds me of sitting out there and being forced to paint all those scenes.
• 20:35
  But it's hers, and obviously, it's much better than what I did when I was 12. But
• 20:39
  Cameron McIntyre: Yeah.
• 20:39
  Katie Burke: But, yeah, I think about it. I need to go back and look at it and we'll see what she did there because it's funny because the colors are the thing I love about it. She was a knife painter, which you use brushes. Right? Like, you're all
• 20:51
  Cameron McIntyre: I mean, I have used palette knife Yeah. Quite a bit. I mean, I'm not saying I'm not gonna use them again because I probably will, but I mostly use brushes now.
• 21:02
  Katie Burke: Yeah. I can't. I am not a big fan of I mean, they're nice for skies and big things that like, your swats of things you're doing because you can go faster.
• 21:09
  Cameron McIntyre: Right. But And I do things in layers. I mean, I'm a That's a oil. Yeah. Layer type person.
• 21:14
  I Yeah. Because one of the reasons I paint in so many layers is because I'm not happy with the beginning stages, and I always end up painting over it and painting over it and painting over it. And
• 21:26
  Katie Burke: That's the beauty of oils.
• 21:27
  Cameron McIntyre: Right.
• 21:28
  Katie Burke: Yeah. Yeah.
• 21:29
  Cameron McIntyre: I guess I would be a really miserable watercolorist.
• 21:33
  Katie Burke: Yeah. You can't change them as much. Oh, you'd be throwing like, you talked about earlier, like, you have all your throwaway heads behind you. You'd be throwing away a lot of water clothes.
• 21:40
  Cameron McIntyre: I would. Yeah. Throwing away a
• 21:42
  Katie Burke: lot of oils. So well, my point was, when I was thinking about that, you're talking about it, the depth of your color that I was looking at today, it provides an a lot of emotion to your work that I really appreciate. And I don't really know. It's one of those things that you really I've seen, like, your work online. I've seen pictures of it.
• 22:04
  But when you're in person, you really get to see it. It really hits you a lot harder, like, when you come in.
• 22:10
  Cameron McIntyre: Right. And and all all all art is that way. I mean, it's Yeah. That's the point. It's rare that I've ever seen a photograph of a painting that was better than the painting was in person.
• 22:19
  Oh, yeah. You know, particularly, you know, I went to a an NC Wyeth exhibit once up in Maine, and I I walked in the gallery and, you know, I was just going from painting to painting. These are big paintings. And I kept looking up at the ceiling, you know, wondering where this light was, you know, that they were shining on this painting because they all just had this crazy glow. All of a sudden, I got these chills down my spine because it wasn't the light.
• 22:50
  It was the the guy's paint, you know. His choice of color and his layers, it just it was like they were plugged in. Yeah. Was amazing.
• 22:59
  Katie Burke: Yeah. That's cool. Well, see and talk about the photographs of the things, like, in the catalog. Like, so Guy and Deere has a little catalog they did for you. And the one that I was just, like, kinda floored by because I saw it now.
• 23:12
  In the catalog, was like, oh, that's okay. I don't really I mean, I know what he did here because I know your decoys, but the new wood.
• 23:21
  Cameron McIntyre: Oh, the brand new wood?
• 23:23
  Katie Burke: Yes. That thing is incredible. Like, in person, it the photo does not do it justice at all.
• 23:29
  Cameron McIntyre: Yeah. You know what? I've been thinking of doing something like that seriously for probably twenty years.
• 23:36
  Katie Burke: Yeah.
• 23:37
  Cameron McIntyre: And how that came about was some of these some of these hanging duck still life scenes that I've carved. You know, in the beginning, I would do like a lot of other people and just find an old board somewhere and mount my duck on the old board, you know, like it was a piece of barn siding or something. And then I started wanting to make my own board because then I could make it any color I wanted, and I could sort of tweak it the way I wanted it to be. And I would spend so much time working on that board. It was crazy.
• 24:11
  Yeah. And then they would turn out you know, I mean, sometimes I would think to myself, you know, this board doesn't need the ducks. It could stand alone, I think.
• 24:21
  Katie Burke: Yeah. It's
• 24:22
  Cameron McIntyre: alright. Especially after looking at some abstract expressionism. I mean, that's pretty much what that board is. Yeah. And I'm thinking, you know, I could just make a board and frame it with a gold frame, and that is the painting.
• 24:35
  And and then the idea you know, the title for the one that I have in the show is called brand new wood because those are boards that I bought from the hardware store
• 24:45
  Katie Burke: Yeah.
• 24:46
  Cameron McIntyre: You know, like, two months ago. And if you look at the back of it, which
• 24:51
  Katie Burke: Why should I did not look at the back of it? Yeah.
• 24:53
  Cameron McIntyre: Well, if you see the back of it, I mean, it is literally brand new wood.
• 24:58
  Katie Burke: That's really great. Yeah. I mean, I saw that when I saw it in the catalog, I was like, well, that makes sense because I know, like, you have this ability to antique decoys like, make decoys look like they're a 100 years old. And, obvious they're not a 100 years old. You made them Right.
• 25:12
  You know, a month ago or so.
• 25:14
  Cameron McIntyre: And I and I would like to point out also that I'm not necessarily you know, I'm not making them look old because I want them to look old. No. Yeah. I'm I'm making them that way because I think that's beautiful. Yeah.
• 25:29
  You know, the the textures and the colors and and all the the way all that stuff works together to me is, you know, very sensual, if you will, and and beautiful and organic. And so, you know, that's why I do it. And and I don't do it on everything. No. But that's the, you know, that's the reason behind it.
• 25:51
  Katie Burke: Yeah. No. I I yeah. And you see that when you look at it too. It's I mean, when you hold those decoys, it's not so much that, yeah, they look like well, there's something about decoys.
• 26:03
  Like, you see, we just had the auction, obviously, you know, and you're looking at the ones some of the ones that go for, like, a ton of money or, like, in pristine condition.
• 26:11
  Cameron McIntyre: Right.
• 26:12
  Katie Burke: But those aren't always my favorite because there's something about the wear on a decoy
• 26:18
  Cameron McIntyre: Absolutely. That is beautiful. No question. Like, for instance, we'll take the Ward brothers. I mean, if someone offered me a mint condition 36 Ward can or a mint condition pinch breast pintail or one that's got a lot of you know?
• 26:35
  Yeah. For some reason to me, a ward just looks good with a lot of wear on
• 26:39
  Katie Burke: it. Yeah.
• 26:39
  Cameron McIntyre: And, you know, an Elmer Kroll does not. No. Or a Purdue does not. But certain birds, you know, the form of them, you know, they don't even need paint. You know?
• 26:52
  Yeah. A Gus Wilson does not even need paint. A a Dudley canvas back doesn't need any paint.
• 26:59
  Katie Burke: Especially the form on Dudley canvas.
• 27:01
  Cameron McIntyre: Certain verities, John Graham. I mean, there's certain birds that are simple enough, have enough sculptural form. You know, they look simple, but but there's something about them that it's almost like the less paint they have, the more you can appreciate the the raw form.
• 27:21
  Katie Burke: Mhmm. We were talking yesterday with Tutsu. He was mentioning people he carved with and stuff and learned from and because he was surrounded by so many people. And for some reason, Lord Tyler came up and someone had one that they just bought off. And I was like, yeah.
• 27:33
  I love them because they're really folksy and they're very different, but the full and it was really worn. I was
• 27:39
  Cameron McIntyre: like Yep.
• 27:39
  Katie Burke: But you could see it a mile away. Like, you look at a Lloyd Tyler and like, yeah. That's a Lloyd Tyler.
• 27:43
  Cameron McIntyre: Yep.
• 27:44
  Katie Burke: Yeah. And I like I I like decoys that you can by form, you can just point out who that is. Mhmm. There's something about being able to point out a decoy and say, that's disguise.
• 27:54
  Cameron McIntyre: Right. And some, you know, you once you study this long enough, you can pretty much do that with almost everybody, but there's certainly people whose work is more prone to, you know, just sort of lends itself to that instant recognition.
• 28:10
  Katie Burke: They have very much a signature of their own.
• 28:12
  Cameron McIntyre: Yeah. Right.
• 28:13
  Katie Burke: Speaking of the decoys, I wanna talk about the ones that you talking about ones that don't paint. The two standing.
• 28:21
  Cameron McIntyre: Oh, yeah.
• 28:21
  Katie Burke: Okay. So I need you to talk about these. We'll put up a picture of them, but they have the iron feet and the two standing. They're not painted.
• 28:28
  Cameron McIntyre: Yep.
• 28:29
  Katie Burke: That's so different from anything you've ever done. And I when I walked in, I was like, I mean, I could tell it was yours, but was like, this is way off what I've seen. So I was really interested on what got you there.
• 28:40
  Cameron McIntyre: Once again, that's another idea that I've had in my mind for a long long time. And I just got the idea you know, I have some wood that's really not suitable. Maybe it's got a lot of knots in it or cracks, and it just isn't really suitable for a fancy, you know Yeah. More refined decoy. And I thought, you know, I'm gonna take some of that wood and just make some weathered ducks that could be that someone could put out on their screened in porch or on their back deck, and it doesn't matter if they get wet or, you know, snowed on or whatever.
• 29:19
  And I'm gonna go ahead and make them kinda have the patina that I think they should have. And then if, you know, if they develop their own down the road, that's fine. So I had a friend of mine cast some bronze feet for those, and I've been thinking I was gonna make a whole flock of them, like six or eight of them, but I didn't get the feed in time. I just didn't it didn't work out that I could make a whole flock, but I I made a pair. You know, I I would say there's a little bit of Ira Hudson influence in them because, you know, he did make some standing ducks, but I
• 29:53
  Katie Burke: in no way has The has little Ira Hudson wing vibe.
• 29:57
  Cameron McIntyre: Yeah. But in no way was I trying to copy Ira Hudson Yeah.
• 30:00
  Or anyone else. And No. They're very unique.
• 30:03
  Yeah. I just I thought they, you know, they turned out I remember John Dieter showed me a Gus Wilson, great blue heron that he had in his gallery a couple years ago.
• 30:15
  And when he as soon
• 30:15
  as he showed it to me, I said, that's the patina right there that I want on my porch duct. But I I don't Your porch ducks. I think I missed probably didn't quite get it. But, anyway, I I do like the patina
• 30:25
  Katie Burke: of this. I think you might I think you might be the first person to make porch ducks.
• 30:29
  Cameron McIntyre: Yep. I probably am.
• 30:31
  Katie Burke: Yeah. Except maybe I mean, like, probably, like, people who do bronzes, but that's different. That's a whole different situation. There you know, a
• 30:38
  Cameron McIntyre: lot of the old time carvers, they made all sorts of I mean, some of them made doorstops and paperweights and
• 30:43
  Katie Burke: Yard signs. Right. Yep. Yeah. A lot there's a lot of those.
• 30:47
  Cameron McIntyre: Yeah.
• 30:48
  Katie Burke: Though I loved about when I came in, they're so unique and kind of off what you've done. So I was really interested to hear, like, what the inspiration was behind those. And I bet you got get chance to do more of them in the future after this.
• 31:02
  Cameron McIntyre: That's good because I have a lot of second rate wood that I need to
• 31:07
  Katie Burke: It's a good place for
• 31:08
  Cameron McIntyre: find a way to use it.
• 31:09
  Katie Burke: Yeah. Is that why you use second rate wood? Because you knew they would be outside and they would, like Yes. Have a little more. Yeah.
• 31:14
  Right.
• 31:15
  Cameron McIntyre: K. I have a lot of first rate wood too, but I I save that for, you know, pintails and geese and
• 31:21
  Katie Burke: things like that. Hanging ducks that you do.
• 31:23
  Cameron McIntyre: Yeah. Those definitely require first rate wood.
• 31:25
  Katie Burke: Let's go to a quick break, and then I have a question about that that we talked about. I guess I was, like, in Chicago one year, but I wanna kinda talk about a little bit on the show. So we'll come right back. Okay.
• 31:42
  VO: Stay tuned to the Ducks Unlimited podcast, sponsored by Purina Pro Plan and Bird Dog Whiskey after these messages.
• 31:58
  Katie Burke: Welcome back. We're here with Cameron McIntyre, De Quik Harbour. And the question I wanted to ask is I remember I don't know if this was it's probably two Chicago shows ago when you did the huge rig, And we had talked you know, I had lots of questions. I'm sure everybody had lots of questions about that.
• 32:16
  Cameron McIntyre: You mean the hanging piece?
• 32:17
  Katie Burke: Yeah. The big hanging piece with a full rig on it. Right. And you do these a lot of them, like, are one pieces. They're like, you know, the duck is one piece or things like that.
• 32:26
  Yeah. So when you're doing these rigs, I wanna kinda talk a little bit about method of it, like, because it's complicated. Because some of these, you know, when you're doing a decoy like we have, you know, the ones sitting around here, like, you're getting to go, like, you know, with the grain, like, but with those hanging ones, you have to go because the wing kinda hangs open or you're getting a underside. You're having to go against the grain. And I'm sure it's extremely stressful when you're working on a piece that big.
• 32:53
  So I can you talk a little bit about what that's like when you go into, like, planning to carve something like that?
• 32:59
  Cameron McIntyre: Sure. Well, first of all, you know, to make one of those is is fairly difficult. Yeah. But compositionally, it's a piece of cake because it's one bird, and you don't have to worry about how the second bird is gonna affect the composition. So I've made a few just with one duck.
• 33:19
  Then when you add that second duck, I'd say it gets, you know, 50% more difficult. And then as soon as you go to that third duck, it gets about 250% more difficult. And then the more ducks you add beyond that, it the the complexity of it in in both the composition and all these other factors, it gets exponentially more difficult.
• 33:44
  Katie Burke: Not only do you have the individual duck hanging like, it's a it's a dead hang. So just to let you think. So you have that individual duck hanging, and it has to look dead, obviously. But it's interacting with the second duck and then the third duck. And so they're all gravity is in play.
• 34:00
  Cameron McIntyre: Gravity is in play. And then the thing that that you gotta understand is that these things are made out of wood. Yeah. Now clay, you know, would I'm not taking anything away from someone who makes something out of clay. But, you know, clay, when it comes time to mesh them together, if you wanna change something, you just bend it this way or that.
• 34:18
  Katie Burke: You know It's a softer material. Right.
• 34:20
  Cameron McIntyre: But with wood, you have to figure all of that out as much as you can ahead of time because, you know, it's like the point of no return. I mean, once you once you lock these two together and you gotta figure out how that third bird is affected by gravity because it not only does it have to look good from the front, it has to look good from each side.
• 34:42
  Katie Burke: It is the three d piece. Yeah.
• 34:44
  Cameron McIntyre: And, you know, I was talking with Eddie Wozni at the show, and he said, yeah. Just when you think no one's gonna see the back of it, somebody will hang it like on a beam in their house where you can walk all the way around it. And that's that's true. So, you know, you have to, yeah, you have to really, really think ahead. And, you know, for the most part, wood is designed to be carved with the grain.
• 35:04
  Yep. But on those, particularly back behind, you know, you got open wings and thighs coming out and, you know, and if it's all one piece of wood, I mean, there is no way to get down in there and carve with the grain. It just isn't possible. So, yeah, when I started to make the more and more of those that I made, I had to like, halfway through some of them, I've had to stop and order, you know, dogleg chisels and Oh, yeah. Back bent, you know, front you know, left bent, right bent, all these different tools, even modify some of them my own Yeah.
• 35:41
  So that I could get in some of these places.
• 35:43
  Katie Burke: Yeah. And you have one in the show. Right? You have the it's black ducks.
• 35:46
  Cameron McIntyre: I do. I have two two black ducks
• 35:48
  Katie Burke: Yeah. Hanging. But that one yeah. I think that one in the teal you did, the green wing teal. Is it blue green wing teal?
• 35:54
  There yeah. It's a whole rig of green wing. I think that's the other one you did.
• 35:56
  Cameron McIntyre: Yeah. Yeah. It's impressive. Yeah. The the green wing teal that are actually out in the Peoria Riverfront Museum now, those are teal, and that was carved not entirely from one piece of wood, but I would say, you know, about 85 of that is one piece of wood.
• 36:13
  Oh, wow. And that really was complicated. I mean, for twenty some years, I feel like I've worked almost a 100% on commission. Yeah. And I don't show I mean, I don't do social media.
• 36:26
  I don't update my website. So everything that I make just goes out. You know, I box it up, ship it off, and the only person that sees it is me and the person that bought it. So there's a whole bunch of my work out there that no one's ever seen.
• 36:39
  Katie Burke: Yep. Yeah. I guess so. Yeah.
• 36:41
  Cameron McIntyre: But the commission pieces, it seems like or, I mean, the, you know, the the dead hanging duck scenes, you know, most of those I'm delivering to a show. Yeah. And so people get to see them. But I, you know, I haven't I might make one a year, one every two years, something like that. So I I haven't been really cranking them out, and it's not the type of thing that I'd wanna have a complete steady diet of.
• 37:05
  You know?
• 37:05
  Katie Burke: I mean, yes. On one hand, it's it's super creative. It's a puzzle, honestly, that you have to put together. Right? Like, you're having to figure out
• 37:12
  Cameron McIntyre: Yeah. There's there's a lot, you know, a lot More more engineering involved. Than a than a decoy.
• 37:17
  Katie Burke: Yeah. Whereas with, yeah, a decoy and painting, you're getting to be a little more interpretive and stuff. Like, what's what you want? You can put more feel into it. For the exhibit, how many paintings and how versus how many decoys are like, what's the what are the pieces consistent?
• 37:33
  Cameron McIntyre: I I would have to
• 37:34
  Katie Burke: Or like a percentage.
• 37:36
  Cameron McIntyre: Add it up. I I think there's about I'm I'm thinking there's about 20 paintings and about 25 carvings.
• 37:43
  Katie Burke: Okay.
• 37:44
  Cameron McIntyre: Roughly.
• 37:45
  Katie Burke: Yeah. And then in there for the decoys, are there any so is everything new, or did you pull stuff that you already had or things from your personal collection? Is it all?
• 37:54
  Cameron McIntyre: Well, I'd say about 95% of it are things that I made this year. Okay. And I did end up taking a pair of my personal rig mallards, which are kinda near and dear to my heart because I've I've used them all over the place and, you know, and I I tend to kinda get attached to them. But but I've had so many different people want to know if I would sell a pair of those, and I've always said no. And I just thought, you know, I'm gonna take a pair of those out.
• 38:24
  And I I took what I consider probably the best ones, honestly, and put put those in the show. I made those back in 2016, I think, and they have been god. I used those in South Carolina, North Carolina, Virginia, Maryland, Illinois, Arkansas, Mississippi, North Dakota, Montana, Saskatchewan. So, yeah, I've they've traveled around. Yeah.
• 38:51
  And they're and they've got the wear and tear to prove it. Yeah.
• 38:55
  Katie Burke: They've seen a lot of ducks. They've also been in the museum. Right.
• 38:58
  Cameron McIntyre: Yeah. And yeah. When
• 39:01
  Katie Burke: Oh, it was a while ago. Yeah. Early early days.
• 39:03
  Cameron McIntyre: Quite a quite a while ago.
• 39:05
  Katie Burke: Yep. Unless that I I don't think it was that long after if you made them in 2016, it wasn't that long after you made them because Yeah. I think
• 39:12
  Cameron McIntyre: was about a year later or
• 39:13
  VO: so.
• 39:14
  Katie Burke: Because that was, like, the first exhibit I think I put together.
• 39:19
  Cameron McIntyre: Right.
• 39:19
  Katie Burke: We opened and Paul Tudor Jones put some of his stuff when we first opened because, honestly, he just used this as, like, storage while he was building a house. So he Smart guy. Yeah. And then he took it when the the mouse was ready, and those would those cases, like, was you and George and Marty. Yeah.
• 39:36
  And that was the first thing that I put together. I guess that was the fur my first thing I curated. Wow. Oh my
• 39:42
  Cameron McIntyre: god. That's pretty nice.
• 39:44
  Katie Burke: I never even thought about that. But, yeah, that would've been the first thing I put together. But, yeah, I remember that because you were not it it was like I asked you right before duck season, and you were like, ah.
• 39:54
  Cameron McIntyre: Yeah. Because I you know, how a carpenter's house is never finished and a mechanic's car is never fixed and all well, it it took me forever to finally build up my own personal rig of decoys. Yeah. And as a matter of fact, there's a pintail here that I made this. I bet you I made that thirty years ago for myself to hunt with, and here it is, you know, all these years later, and it's never been finished.
• 40:20
  Katie Burke: And never made the cut? Yeah.
• 40:22
  Cameron McIntyre: So Poor thing.
• 40:23
  Katie Burke: So do you use like, since let's talk about that a little bit because you have all these heads behind you here, and you have this one. So you're keeping them, obviously. I mean, some of them.
• 40:33
  Cameron McIntyre: Some of them. Yep. Some of them.
• 40:34
  Katie Burke: So what's the what's the method behind that?
• 40:37
  Cameron McIntyre: The method behind
• 40:38
  Katie Burke: The the wanting to keep stuff and Well that that you might necessarily
• 40:42
  Cameron McIntyre: ones that I that I hunt with. So, I mean, I made those for myself to hunt with.
• 40:47
  Katie Burke: No. But the ones obviously that you didn't finish. Like, why The ones
• 40:50
  Cameron McIntyre: I didn't finish. I mean, that one's worthy to me of being finished. Everybody that comes over and sees this is, man, you should paint that, which I I can't really explain it. I'm I'm sorry.
• 41:02
  Katie Burke: Well, like, what about, like, the heads? Like, you Yeah. The throwaway heads. Yeah. I've got
• 41:05
  Cameron McIntyre: a bunch of unfinished or well, like, they're not unfinished. They're reject heads. Yeah. For one reason or another, they just didn't. Something about them wasn't up to par, but they're too good to too good to throw away, but not good enough to
• 41:21
  Katie Burke: So why not throw them away?
• 41:23
  Cameron McIntyre: I mean, I've given away several of them, but sometimes I'll I'll see enough of a spark in one of them. I'll remember what my original intention was. Yeah. And then I can use that reject head and fix all the things about it in a new carving Okay. That went wrong on the
• 41:41
  Katie Burke: Yeah. Yeah. No. That makes sense. I don't that's an I don't know.
• 41:44
  Do you think other carvers is that unusual to you that you use that? Or I think I've never heard of anyone.
• 41:50
  Cameron McIntyre: Well, I think at this stage, you know, I mean, you would think that I'd be good enough at this by now to not have rejects, but I I still do. You know, same way with my paintings. I guess, in theory, I should be better than I am by now. But but I don't have a problem with it. You know?
• 42:08
  If if something's not not working out, I just Throw it. I don't I don't I don't want my name on it.
• 42:13
  Katie Burke: Yeah. And I guess was it also, like because you you mentioned it that, like, you have, like, a spark that wants to that you want to do something. So, like, in that process, is it also something, like, it's not going with, like, what you were imagining or how you were thinking it would work? Like, is Yeah.
• 42:31
  Cameron McIntyre: That that happens a fair amount. You know, I'll I'll stand up real quick and
• 42:37
  grab a few drawings here.
• 42:38
  Katie Burke: Yeah. Hold on. A few A few drawings. A few drawings.
• 42:43
  Cameron McIntyre: But yeah. So, anyway, these these are some of my drawings, and I'll just this is very informal.
• 42:50
  Katie Burke: But Well, that's why we're here.
• 42:51
  Cameron McIntyre: Yeah. I'll just We like it. Start, you know, drawing some crazy sketches of of things and, you know, some of them I'll I'll like them. Some of them I won't. But this I think this Brandt here ended up being part of the inspiration for one that's in my show.
• 43:09
  Katie Burke: Yeah.
• 43:09
  Cameron McIntyre: Yeah. You know, there's a kind of an earlier version of it, and some of these I I like. Some of them I don't like. You know, I find quotes all the time. Here's one by Andrew Wyeth who says it's not good to show too much artistic ability.
• 43:27
  You have to fight technique, not let it take over. Yeah. You know? You don't wanna kinda be an automation of yourself after a while.
• 43:36
  Katie Burke: Yeah. That's what I was kinda getting from you when you were talking about yeah. Like, it
• 43:40
  Cameron McIntyre: does apply. You know, drawings and, you know, I'll just get an idea, and I'll draw one version of it and like some things, not like other things. And then finally, this is kind of the last version, which I like better than the other two. And, you know, I just I sketch on pieces of notebook paper, whatever just happens to be laying around. And so, you know, that's how the ideas kinda kinda come to me.
• 44:07
  Yeah. These are some hunting decoys I was drawing. I was thinking of some sort of
• 44:14
  Katie Burke: Feeders.
• 44:14
  Cameron McIntyre: Surface feeders and maybe some that even had their heads mostly underwater. Yeah. And I just I have, you know, thousands of these things.
• 44:24
  Katie Burke: And do you keep most of it?
• 44:26
  Cameron McIntyre: Yeah. I That's cool. There's just an idea. I was trying to work out the composition of some I think this was Mike's bird before I ever even started on. I was just drawing this up in my mind.
• 44:41
  Yeah.
• 44:41
  Katie Burke: You
• 44:41
  Cameron McIntyre: know, how are five or six birds gonna work on a plaque? Yeah. There's a hunting style pintail I was gonna make at some point. So, yeah, I just I've got sketches everywhere.
• 44:53
  Katie Burke: Well, yeah. It's interesting because it's that's one of the great things about, like, getting to come and be in your studio and other Carver studios. We get to kinda have that inside look.
• 45:02
  Cameron McIntyre: Right.
• 45:02
  Katie Burke: So let's go back to the show a little bit because I do wanna talk a little bit more. We talked some about your paintings before, but let's talk a little bit more about kinda some of the ones that are in there. Yep. Do you have any in particular that you would like to kinda talk to about the story behind or anything like that? Like, I people are familiar with your decoys.
• 45:23
  Like, that Yep. That's what you're known for. But let's kinda I kinda wanna highlight a little bit, especially since we have the footage Yeah. From earlier, some of these paintings that you've done.
• 45:32
  Cameron McIntyre: Okay. Well, yeah. I mean, every painting in that show was inspired by living here at the farm.
• 45:39
  Katie Burke: Yep. Well, is it the name of the exhibit, like, the farm? Is that
• 45:42
  Cameron McIntyre: what it Portrait of a Farm.
• 45:43
  Katie Burke: Portrait of a Farm. Yep. Yeah. Thank you.
• 45:45
  Cameron McIntyre: And, you know, some of them are are things that I see just looking out my window. And I've I've I've found that if you if you stay in one place long enough and look at it all the time, that you'll start to see some some possibilities and some beauty that you that that you just won't see.
• 46:03
  Katie Burke: Well, it changes.
• 46:04
  Cameron McIntyre: Yeah. It changes and
• 46:06
  Katie Burke: Things grow. Things die. Things change.
• 46:09
  Cameron McIntyre: Yeah. And one reason that I would in my my kinda my art teacher that I first studied with William McCullough down in South Carolina, he he cautioned me about plein air painting, especially contests. He said, you know, you you should never do that. He said that is not what painting is about. And I'm not I mean, I've seen some brilliant plein air painters that can go to a place that they've never been before and sit down and paint something beautiful.
• 46:40
  But for me, I have to build it up in my mind for a long time before I can do anything worthwhile with it. And so he kinda cautioned me. You know, he said, you know, don't do that. And and I I agree with him. You know?
• 46:56
  So so I would never enter a plein air painting contest. I, you know, just don't that's just not not me. Yeah. But but having said that, a lot of my paintings, especially the smaller ones, they are what you would consider plein air paintings. I mean, I've taken my easel out in the field and set up and and painted them out in the marsh or, you know, in the woods.
• 47:20
  And almost all of them, I would say, without a doubt, probably every single one of them, I have worked on them in the studio. You know, the next day, I see things that I could change a little bit. So, I mean, it's I have reworked them a little bit. Yeah. The bigger paintings, they start from a small sketch, and then some of those, I might work on them for two years just changing you know, adding things, taking things away.
• 47:50
  And, yeah, and there is a a painting in the show. It's called Russ's Cedar. And and what that painting I got to be good friends with a fantastic painter named Russell Chatham, and he was from Montana. And I met him back in, god, I think maybe 2008 or '9, and we sort of I don't know. I I mean, we kinda hit it off.
• 48:15
  Even on that very first visit, he gave me a painting that he had painted back in 1969 on the on a on the Piazzoni Ranch in California. But after we got to be friends and he would send me letters and we'd write back and forth, he I sent him some pictures of my farm one time, and one of them was a cedar tree that's in my front yard. And he painted a beautiful painting of that cedar tree, and I think it was called winter juniper. And it was a snow scene, and I would have loved to have had it, but it was way, way out of my price range. But I was just I was so honored that he, you know, painted a tree that's in my front yard Yeah.
• 49:00
  That later on, I painted that same tree in the springtime kind of on a misty morning. And as a tribute to him, I I called it Russ's Cedar.
• 49:10
  Katie Burke: So Did you so I'm guessing how did you meet him? Did you
• 49:15
  Cameron McIntyre: I went out to Adele and I went out to see Yellowstone National Park, and I knew he was living in the area there. And I contacted him ahead of time and told him we were coming out there. And he said, sure, you know, stop by. And, you know, I told him I was painting and, you know, that I'd seen his paintings in a book and they I just was blown away by them. And, anyway, went went by to see him and he spent the whole day with us.
• 49:44
  He took us to his house. He was you know, took us in the bedroom. He was pulling huge paintings out under from under the bed, taking them out on the porch, dusting them off. He'd he'd you know, I was driving in in this rental car, and he'd say, you know, do you have time to, you know, to go? I said, I've got all the time in the world.
• 50:02
  So he drove us around, show us where he painted different landscapes, and took us to his printing. He he had a a printing company at that point and went in there, and he gave me all sorts of books and papers he'd written, just all sorts of things. And and and then in 2015, he was back in California, and I was incredibly fortunate that he invited me to California, and I flew out there. That was the first time I'd ever been to California. And I stayed with him for a week, just the two of us, and we'd get up every morning and go to his studio, and he would show me everything there I ever wanted to know about painting and and then some.
• 50:48
  Katie Burke: Yeah. That's amazing.
• 50:50
  Cameron McIntyre: It was amazing. And and one of the incredible things is we were there one day and I said I said, hey, Russ. I said, you know, I've never seen the Pacific Ocean. I said, would would it be possible to go down there? You know?
• 51:03
  I said, I can go by myself. You know? He said, oh, no. No. He says, hop in the in the van, and we'll we'll go down there.
• 51:08
  So he drove me down there, and on the way, he pointed out lots of places where he had painted. And when we got there, I I said, do you mind if I just run down on the beach? I'm gonna dip my dip my toe in the in the ocean just to say I've done it. So I I I I did that. And about two or three months after I got home, FedEx pulls up with his big wooden crate, and he had painted a a painting of the Pacific Ocean right there where I dipped my toe in the water and and gave that to me as a gift, which I just couldn't believe
• 51:42
  Katie Burke: it. Yeah. That's super special. Yeah. That's amazing.
• 51:45
  Cameron McIntyre: And then the the very last part of the story that I think is also incredibly means a lot to me is when he was getting really close to the end of his life, he sent an email and asked me he said that he was getting ready to take that boat across the big water to see the rest of his friends and family, and he asked me if I would send him a few canvas backed ducks to eat because he wanted to have that as his last meal. Oh, that's So I sent him those ducks, put them in a cooler, and, you know, like, overnighted them, and that was the last I ever heard from him.
• 52:23
  Katie Burke: That's beautiful. So that was
• 52:25
  Cameron McIntyre: just I'm very fortunate to Yeah. To meet someone like that.
• 52:29
  Katie Burke: Yeah. That's really beautiful. It's funny that the place like, people ask me all the time about like, they think my job is cool Right. Because I get to do this. I'm like, well, that's it's not the decoys and the art and stuff that makes my job cool.
• 52:43
  It's the people that I get to meet. I get to meet so many really neat people through this job.
• 52:47
  Cameron McIntyre: Right. Yeah. I'm sure you do. And and, you know, it's obviously the people that made the decoys and the art. Yeah.
• 52:54
  And some of those old guys, we can never know know them, so they do live on through their art.
• 53:00
  Katie Burke: Yes. And that's so special to be able to, like, have that piece of them and stuff. Yeah. No. That's great.
• 53:06
  I love that. Thank you
• 53:07
  Cameron McIntyre: for sharing. Yeah. That was, one of the highlights of my life, without a doubt.
• 53:11
  Katie Burke: Is there any other thing that we wanna mention before we go about the show or anything? Or do you
• 53:15
  Cameron McIntyre: wanna end there? Any other questions you have?
• 53:18
  Katie Burke: I haven't planning it, but we we would go on forever. Yep. So we probably we could end it right there. But, yeah, thank you for doing this and thank you for sharing. I look forward to seeing, what they I bet those, your rig pair go for more than you think they're gonna.
• 53:32
  Cameron McIntyre: Well, that's all out of my control.
• 53:34
  Katie Burke: We'll find out. But, yeah, I can't wait to see it. I was really excited to finally get to see your paintings in person, so that was a highlight for this trip. So
• 53:41
  Cameron McIntyre: Well, great. I hope I hope they lived up to your expectations.
• 53:46
  Katie Burke: And more. Great. So I appreciate. Thanks, Cameron, for doing this with me. Sure.
• 53:49
  Thank you, Cameron, for coming on the show. Thanks to our producer, Chris Isaac, and thanks to you, our listener, for doing wetlands and waterfowl conservation.
• 54:00
  VO: Thank you for listening to the DU podcast sponsored by Purina Pro Plan, the official performance dog food of Ducks Unlimited. Purina Pro Plan, always advancing. Also proudly sponsored by Bird Dog Whiskey and Cocktails. Whether you're winding down with your best friend or celebrating with your favorite crew, Bird Dog brings award winning flavor to every moment. Enjoy responsibly.
• 54:22
  Be sure to rate, review, and subscribe to the show and visit ducks.org/dupodcast. Opinions expressed by guests do not necessarily reflect those of Ducks Unlimited. Until next time, stay tuned to the Ducks.