1. When and how did you become involved in art?

I’ve been drawing and creating for as far back as I can remember, but I think my big push into becoming “an artist” was probably when I was in Ontario, playing in bands in the early 2000’s. I had been creating logos, promo designs and album covers for my own bands and branched off into doing work for others that we played with or knew in the scene. I also started selling prints of my drawings at shows, before branching off into painting and graphic design. A few years later I decided to attend the Ontario College of Art & Design, majoring in Drawing & Painting, with minors in Art History and Material Arts.

2. What mediums do you usually like to work in?

My paintings are all done in acrylics, which I often accent with markers and aerosols, and my drawings are often a combination of graphite, ballpoint pen and conte chalk. I sometimes like to throw in found objects like seashells, encyclopedia pages and other ephemera and I employ Adobe Photoshop both for graphic work and digital preliminaries of concepts.

3. As an artist, what do you draw inspiration from?

That’s a pretty broad scope. My own experiences and interests often come in play through metaphor or reinterpretation. Some influences that I draw elements from when creating include wildlife, surrealism, Art Nouveau, science-fiction, the supernatural, history, music and wordplay.

4. Can you talk a bit about the EnVision Gallery?

EnVision Gallery was initially opened 20 years ago by a co-op of Mayne Island artists, who each promoted their own work through it. In the years since, it had been mostly run by Darrell Perfumo of West Coast Gnomes, who made contact with a plethora of other artists from around BC, ranging from pottery, jewellery, paintings, photography, woodwork, textiles and more. My partner Kat Ferneyhough and I both have extensive backgrounds in all manner of artistic mediums and purchased the gallery from Darrell 5 years ago when the demands of his own work started to really take precedent (every artist’s dream). We continued with several of the artists who already had work featured there, have taken on 30 new artists since taking over, and are always keeping an eye out for new talent. We currently showcase the works of 75 BC artists, focusing mostly on Mayne and the Southern Gulf Islands. We enthusiastically took it upon ourselves to support artistic efforts within the community and have been involved in the Southern Gulf Islands Arts Council, the Mayne Island Fall Fair, the Chamber of Commerce and Festival Active Pass in different capacities to name a few. Two years ago, we started curating and hanging work at the Springwater Lodge, with rotating shows every two months, either focusing on 1-2 local artists at a time or themed group exhibitions, which have been received very positively on Mayne.

5. When did you come to the Gulf Islands?

I had been visiting Mayne for about 15 years before making the move out here. My partner’s mother, Jen O’Shaughnessy had moved out several years prior and ran the Dragonfly Gallery Art Supplies store and we had come to visit several times and absolutely fell in love with it. I grew up in Southern Ontario and for a brief period, the United Arab Emirates, and had involved mostly in working screen-printing jobs, attending college, and playing in bands before making the move; still think it was the best decision.

6. What about the Gulf Islands has drawn you to staying here?

There is a wonderful, kind & welcoming community here and it’s a fantastic place to be an artist. We don’t have to ever go far to be out and about in nature and surrounded by beauty. Personally, I like the pace as well, it’s fairly quiet and laid back and doesn’t have the energy of living in a city. The island has been very accommodating and I’ve been able to skirt the line of making art that people here seem to appreciate while also being a little out there. Now that we have EnVision Gallery, I’m here for the long haul.

7. I am very interested by your surrealist art depicting animals. Can you talk a bit about those paintings and your ideas around those?

Surrealism has always been my favourite form of expression, as it takes something familiar and explores the possibilities of what it could be, either by concept, shape or a desire to draw on the bizarre. I’ve employed several works which involve animals whose heads have been replaced by human hands, underlying the connection our touch has had on the ecosystems we all rely on to survive. I’m fascinated by the breadth and diversity of animal life on the planet and find there’s an endless well of new creatures and concepts to explore. While not all of my work dealing with surrealist takes on wildlife, it certainly is a theme I keep coming back to.

8. What about the workshop are you looking forward to?

I’m looking forward to meeting new artists and like minded people who appreciate natural beauty and form and want to spend some time exploring its intricacies. Even though the islands are fairly well-connected I still don’t get over to our neighbours often enough and it’s nice to have the opportunity to spend some time making art with others who are equally enthusiastic about it.

An interview with Pender Island artist Susan Taylor—

Like many people on the Gulf Islands, Susan Taylor came from the city in search of a quiet, simple place in which to create. “I had planned to stay for only a few months,” she tells me. “That was in 1997; Pender Island became my home.”

Two years after this transition, Susan and her partner Frank Ducote opened up The Blood Star Gallery and brought their love of art to the Pender Island community. The gallery is named for Susan’s favourite intertidal creature, the seldom seen Pacific Blood Sea Star. Which is fitting, because Susan’s art tends to focus on the seldom seen aspects of life. In close-up paintings of fruits, vegetables, sea shells, creatures, and microscopic life, Susan explores a realm of art inspired by the flora and fauna of the Salish Sea and beyond.

“My art has always been a close look at nature,” she tells me, and this interest of hers is especially captured in the paintings she has done of marine plankton, two of which she has submitted to the Web of Life art project.

Plankton are small, often microscopic organisms found inhabiting bodies of marine and fresh water. They include members of multiple kingdoms and phyla, including diatoms, protozoans, small crustaceans, and the eggs and larval stages of other animals.

“In 2019, I read the following: every second breath we take is thanks to plankton. I was immediately captivated and needed to learn more. After some initial research, I discovered what an alternative universe this microscopic world truly is! The infinite variety of shapes and forms of these organisms is a virtual gold mine for me as an artist.”

In her series The Importance of Plankton, Susan has depicted various plankton in acrylic paints on wood panels. Painted against a black background, the plankton are numerous and have a rather jewel-like quality to them, which wonderfully captures the magic of plankton’s sheer variety of shapes and sizes. Not only are they an endless source of inspiration for Susan (in one of her painting’s descriptions, Susan points out that there are estimated to be one million types of plankton in the world’s oceans), she also has a very important reason for depicting these little organisms:

“So much of the focus of environmentalism on the Gulf Islands is about protecting the resident orcas, the salmon and now, even herring. The knowledge I now have of the importance of plankton as the base of the ocean’s food chain has inspired me to contribute to the awareness of how integral it is to all life in the oceans and to humans as well.”

Susan’s art certainly draws attention to these overlooked, critical components of our Salish Sea ecosystems and we are very excited to have her work on board the Web of Life project! Because plankton include multiple groups of life, including plants and animals, her painting has assumed a place at the very heart of our interactive data visualization: representing life itself! 

Thank you Susan, for sharing your love of plankton with us.

In this workshop, participants wove together science and art in a study of jellyfish, anemones, comb jellies and sponges.

The workshop began with an introduction by Roksan Kohen-Parfitt, and moved into Andrew Simon’s presentation, in which he introduced participants to the Web of Life project and dived into a study of the phyla Porifera, Cnidaria and Ctenophora. Then, we dove into the art! With Roksan advising those who had art-related questions and encouraging artists as they created their work, we had a meditative and fun time bringing these phyla to life on paper.

We look forward to future WoL workshops focusing on the diversity of life forms known to the Salish Sea! If you’re interested in this project and would like to contribute art to our interactive data visualization please contact: Justine Apostoloupolos at justine.apostolopoulos@gmail.com.