Eastside Confidential

If you are looking for an immersive and thought provoking entertainment experience, come to Oppenheimer Park for the HomeGround Festival this Thursday ( February 9) and check out Eastside Confidential: Walking Through Shadowland. I had the privilege of collaborating with several artists from the Downtown Eastside. It will be unlike anything you have ever seen! 

The show will run at 5:30, 6:30 and 7:30 and is located in the alley on the west side of the park. 

Painting Nablus

I haven't painted in such a long time. Sharing a studio with painters reminded me what I was missing. Here's a process shot of recent work. In 2010 I painted a series of building facades from the Downtown Eastside, most of which have been demolished or renovated. My traditional palette is Canadian grey. Bright colours are not natural for me. 

I found this building while wandering through the old city of Nablus in Palestine. I read about Jalal Aslan Tile Factory months before and accidently stumbled across it. Jalal Aslan is the last of it's kind. Why am I drawn to paint pictures of endangered buildings? 

A full heart

 A heartfelt 'thank you' to everyone who came by my studio for the Eastside Culture Crawl. I feel so affirmed that I'm going in the right direction with my artwork, and I cherish all of the amazing conversations and vulnerability that was shared this week. Stay posted for the next event!

Wreckage and Resurrection

Wreckage and Resurrection is a series of assemblages that were shown in 'The Signature of All Things', an exhibit inspired by Elizabeth Gilbert's novel of the same title. 

These pieces took a lot more work than I anticipated. I thought long and hard on how to fit the different elements together, but it didn't click into the week before they had to be finished. The rocks, dried flowers, boat and the bone allude to my own childhood collections. 

Throughout the novel, Alma is burdened with external expectations, repressed desires, heavy responsibility and her husband’s secret life in exile. The specimens under glass follow the arc of Alma’s progression from overwhelming grief to finding her way.

Moss had the temerity to begin luring the forest back to life. It is a resurrection engine. A single clump of mosses can lie dormant and dry for forty years at a stretch, and then vault back into life with a mere soaking of water. (169)

The materials used in Wreckage and Resurrection are incongruent - lace and ceramics coupled with dirt and bones; pluralism of the known and the transcendent. The dried flowers and bones reference vanitas, a highly symbolic art form exploring mortality mainly used by the Dutch still life painters of the 17th century. In each of the sculptures, lace plays an integral role in adorning, obscuring and uncovering the figure. 

The Signature of All Things: An Art Show

The next big thing!

And a poorly photographed detail of one of my pieces for the show...

Foraging and artmaking

This week I am working on three assemblage/sculptures for OBAC's art show at VanDusen Gardens. Usually I have a good creative flow in the studio but yesterday was a bad day. Sometimes nothing works and you have to bike to Stanley Park to forage moss. Then things will be better. 

Diaspora

Diaspora, ceramic tiles found in the Holy Land, 2016

How to blend in

I wore this dress during my artist residency in March. I considered wearing it every day but later decided that it wasn't comfortable enough, and I wasn't that committed to the performance part of the art project. I designed the dress to be plain so that I could blend into the landscape. The belt is hand embroidered with a quilt block shape has appeared intermittently in my work for the last five years. It references my Great Grandmother, the woman who taught me to sew and whose footsteps I followed to Israel and Palestine. The buttons are souvenirs carved from olive wood that she purchased forty years ago.

Below are screenshots from the video I'm editing: the Dead Sea, Masada and a farm outside of Bethlehem.

The Significance of a Journey

This month my artwork is featured in the newly minted ceramic studio and gallery, Hello World! Stop by to also check out Linda and Nicole's amazing ceramic work. So thankful to be a part of this!

The Significance of a Journey, photo collage and carving, 60''x67'', 2016

Artist Statement:

In March I attended a month long artist residency in Israel/Palestine. During my time, I apprenticed at a wood carving shop in Bethlehem. I was inspired by the many broken carvings that were shelved to be fixed for later. Olive wood brings to mind ancient generations, resilience and peace, while ironically harvested from a land that is infamous for its conflict. The figurines represent characters from the Old and New Testament in the Bible, some of which are also recognized in the writings of Judaism and Islam. Each carving is significantly flawed. There is a violence in these images, but they are also achingly human. These were ordinary people who were called into extraordinary and extreme circumstances. The stories they represent involve risk; leaving the relative comfort of the familiar for a promised (yet uncertain) future. The carvings are broken, they express a yearning for something better. One day they will be fixed.

What elements fuelled the mass exodus (or conversely exile) of nomadic groups in the ancient land of Palestine, and are those reasons any different from what is happening today? I am interested in applying ‘exile’ and ‘exodus’ to modern day issues of migration, deportation and nomadism. An increasingly relevant topic during our time as countries are emptied and borders are more defined.

Soldier Boy, olive wood and string, 8'' tall, 2016

In the House of my Pilgrimage

Please join Sarah and I at our opening next week! This is the show we exhibited in Alert Bay exactly a year ago. The work explores themes of home, transience and displacement. Hope to see you there!