Bear River Artworks season opening on Saturday, June 1, 2024 marks the tenth year since a group of local artists opened a cooperative gallery in Bear River, Nova Scotia.

I attended the very first meeting back in 2015 and joined without hesitation. I was eager to find a venue for my paintings and to help develop a member-directed community project. I also wanted to meet the wonderful people who bought my paintings and who created their own bonds with a piece of my art.

But even after ten wonderful years, I still worry at the beginning of May that I won’t have finished enough paintings in the autumn and winter to hang. But, surprise, every year when it comes time to varnish and name the babies, I find that I even have a few extra!

This year’s crop of paintings is almost entirely flowers.

The one exception a the huge double painting of sumach trees.

It is a thrill to paint live flowers, but I am severely limited in the winter to forced tulips, forced forsythia branches from our enormous bush and potted geraniums. All of these made their way into some of these new paintings. 

The remaining paintings were developed from a group of floral paintings that had been neglected until this winter and spring when I finally finished them.

Every artist has her own unique approach to painting. Bringing my easel inside from the centre of a living, moving garden and surroundings is a difficult transition at first. Painting from memory, from sketches and from my photos is a completely different way to work.

I must shift my concentration away from the living world and the outside elements to a static one. So, I use the opportunity to focus on learning more about the mediums (oils vs. acrylics vs. sketching) and color theory.

When I’m not able to get inspiration from Nature, I look for it in the work of other artists. I revisit and add to my collections of artists’ paintings on Pinterest. In this way I ‘discover’ so many new living artists along with new-to-me works from long-gone artists. I learn a lot about what I like in a painting and am able to step back and to take a critical view of my unfinished paintings that got ‘stuck’ and, hopefully, inject life into them.

The greatest way to learn is by doing, and there is a lot to learn. I am very fortunate to be able to paint in this beautiful corner of the world.  And I’m grateful to be a part of a group gallery with supportive colleagues. It is truly wonderful to be part of a small gallery where I can exhibit my paintings to people who are interested in what I do and to those who have helped me pursue my passion by buying my artwork.

Bear River Artworks Gallery is open in June from Thursday to Sunday, 10-4pm.  We plan to extend the week by 1 day for July, August and September. Hours will be posted on our social media.

All the artists take turns managing the gallery and while there is a schedule, there is no set day that I work. I will be there June 1, 7, 15, 21, and 30th from 10am until 4pm. If you would like to visit me in the Gallery or in my home studio, please contact me.

The other artists are jewellers Larry Knox and Laurel Strachan, painter Crystal Pyne and photographer Gary Fraser. They would love to meet you too!