The Sam

This summer I am exhibiting with my friend Sarah Neilsen in an art show in Alert Bay, BC. We are exploring themes of 'homecoming', and I am scrambling, or rather will be scrambling in a few months to get all my work done. In the meantime, I am making art as it comes to me. 

My angle on the show is to connect my experiences of community in my neighbourhood, the Downtown Eastside, with the small town community of Alert Bay. The two places are intimately tied together, and I am finding many bridges and metaphors to play with. For example; tides, water, floating houses, transience, migration, and homecoming.

Last month my dear friend passed away. This is something you will get used to if you live in a small community where health issues, addiction and lower life expectancy are prevalent. But it never gets any easier. I had been playing with the idea of using the wax bones for a sculpture, but nothing was working. When I heard about Sam, I went into shock. I looked at the bones and imagined them in a rowboat, floating away from me. 

Alert Bay is a very small island. There are at least three cemeteries and sacred burial grounds on the island. The reminder of death is so visual and present. Some may find this morbid, but I find it sobering and grounding. Both communities have learned to live amidst the loss.

So Long Sam, beeswax, ceramic and acrylic paint, 2015

Alert Bay

The Nostalgia of Food

Hey, I'm in an art show this week! 

Housework Artwork

The first in a series of embroidered 'home' cliches.

Homey, hand embroidered on found linen, 2014

Derelict Buildings

Alert Bay, graphite and gesso on parchment paper, 8''x10'', 2014

There are many things that captured my heart when I was visiting Alert Bay. The wild, northwest landscape. The ocean in all its mystery; sometimes as calm as glass and other times violently thrashing. The people; being welcomed into homes and re-aquainting myself with small town life. Eating fresh salmon everyday...

But what made my heart ache (you know when you see something that resonates so deeply with your sense of beauty and loveliness that your heart hurts) was the buildings on stilts. I won't call them abandoned... Maybe it was the romance and intrigue in wondering what the town was like in its glory days.

All I know is that derelict buildings, especially the ones that have "lost" to nature, will always have a place in my heart. 

Eastside Culture Crawl #3!

Swing by my studio to say 'hi' during the Eastside Culture Crawl! In addition to seeing my face, you will also get to purchase authentic J-Hawk lino-cut prints, experience a sweet installation, and meet/see my studio mate's artwork (Maria Gaudin, painter and sculptor). Hope to see you there! 

450 East Hastings- just look for the red door. 

Back to painting

Evelyn, acrylic on canvas, 8''x8'', 2014

Why have I never done this before? I love black and white painting. Who needs color anyway?

Remnants and Shadows

I haven't made a fully immersive installation since art school. This piece is still in process; it is the developed version of 'Reliquary for a memory' that I made two years ago (the pallet fort with a lace tablecloth thrown over it). It's not perfect, and I'm struggling with the sewing machine and making clean seams, but last monday I was ecstatic with the progress. 

The Storyteller

The Storyteller, ceramic figures, book, flags, 2014

In progress

DEAR LIFE

Please come see the OBAC's second exhibition ever! See below for our statement.

Alice Munro has mastered the craft of saying a lot with a little; and consistently captures an essence of Canadiana in person and place in her numerous short stories. In her most recent collection, Dear Life, she allows the reader to witness subtle yet pivotal experiences of her characters' lives within a familiar Canadian landscape. Munro constructs vignettes that seem to be like significant links in domino chains of events-- coming of ages; accidents; close encounters-- though we as readers are left behind at the end of each story to imagine the fallout. 

Munroʼs stories are not expansive or epic, yet when magnified they reveal rich symbolism paired with characters whose complex networks and personal histories intersect. This is the material that the participating artists have drawn on to curate this collection of work.

The Open Book Art Collective seeks to create a visual/literary dialogue with art objects that are both informed by and informing the literature. Each individual artist has applied their medium to two short stories from Dear Life, exploring broader themes of recollection, place, banality and nostalgia. With painting, encaustic, drawing, sculpture, photography and textiles; Dear Life is a sensitive exploration into what it means to be human as envisioned by Nobel Prize Winner, Alice Munro.