Artist Statement

September 24-October 7, 2020
Visual Space Gallery, 3352 Dunbar Street, Vancouver
Exhibit: Noon–5 PM daily, Wednesday and Friday Noon-8 pm

Installation Views
Return to Island Paintings III

Gabriola Harbour, 2020

What is it about islands that triggers such feelings of wonder and romance? That you look out on water in all directions? That you are seemingly cut off, sheltered from the world? That you are free to indulge and enlarge a fantasy of romantic hideaway with a special lover, or a restorative individual refuge where you can learn great wisdom or prepare to do great deeds? To me, whatever the sequence of sensation, synapse and synthesis, islands represent magic.

I will continue to paint islands and from islands, but this will be the final exhibition in this series on Island Paintings. I expand the two series View from the Ferry and View from the Spit begun in Island Paintings I & II. I have added two additional series to the mix: Bamfield (View of Deer Group Islands) and Gulf Islands with Arbutus (the oft-promised paintings of Gabriola, Mayne, Salt Spring and Saturna).

I hope that in these days of a COVID-altered existence, when one cannot travel freely or easily to one’s favorite island, wherever it may be, that you can take a vicarious pleasure in my painted reactions to these most wonderful islands in British Columbia.