Fir, Cadboro Bay
July 31, 1932, Pencil Sketch 17½" x 12"

Weston’s drawings reveal a glimpse as to how he saw the elements of nature in their raw form, before they were transformed into paintings, using design and composition.

"Mist enshrouded mountains, rocky shorelines with the open sea, hoary old trees heavy with moss, glaciers shining in the sun… the tender growth of fern, foxglove and skunk cabbage – these and many more reveal the very soul of nature as the artist saw it."(58)

He exhibited drawings for the first time at one-person show at the Vancouver Art Gallery in September, 1934. The selection was mainly preliminary sketches for larger works, and some paintings were also on view. The drawings showed "his love of the twisted trunks of trees in exposed windy positions, and of fallen forest monarchs."(59)

The reviewer of this exhibition also commented on Weston’s interpretation of his subjects. "In his depictment of peak and pine he goes sometimes into imaginative idealism, in an artist’s conception of things as they should be."(60)