Hello everyone. I'm posting the information sheet that I will have available for people who come by on the studio tour. This is particularly for my friends at long distance who can't come. I hope a little bit of the spirit of my contribution comes through.
Welcome to my ocean!
My basement art began with wanting to transform our ugly old oil tank and voila the”yellow submarine” was launched. Some children visiting from England provided the fish. Then my attention turned to our rusty old freezer...an ice block with penguins and polars bears seemed the perfect solution. Now everything in the basement looked rather dull (even though I did have my album covers from the ‘60’s on the walls) so I came up with the idea of making an “ocean” and having myself, friends, and family all contribute paintings. We had a ball doing it!
I moved on to the guest room and created a "room with a view" from our favourite hotel in the south of France. Then on to scenes from my favourite city in the world (Paris, of course) in my studio. In my kitchen I’ve tried to recreate a little bit of the spirit of Provence with my tiles, floorcloth, and paintings.
Much of the furniture is from the Oak Bay Dump Exchange area (my neighbour, Chris, finds many treasures there for me), thrift stores, and throw aways from friends. It’s really satisfying to take something ugly that no one wants anymore and tranform it.
How it all began...
Since I never got beyond stick figures in school, doing anything artistic wasn’t on my list of around a thousand things I might do after I retired from teaching. It's unfortunate so many of us turn off this pleasure of creating art so early in our lives when we think that/or told that other kids actually have a natural talent for this and we don't. My friend, Carole, got me involved in doing mosaic tiles and I found I enjoyed playing around with colour and design so took the plunge to do some Absolute Beginner courses. Alesha and Jessica at Island Blue were such encouraging teachers that I haven’t stopped since.
And now
It’s given me tremendous pleasure to give my creations to my friends and family. These same friends and family have been urging me for quite a while to sell my work so this Studio Tour is my first foray into the commercial. Mary, who is helping today, was particulary persistent. I have had such joy out of this unexpected tangent that I am thinking of writing a book to encourage others to explore their creativity. My working title is “Have a ball creating art without talent, training or effort!”
Thank you for coming and I hope you have enjoyed your dip in my ocean and your petit voyage en Provence. And above all, think of buying some paints and having fun!
Janice S.
