The Pear Tree

Archive for the ‘Artist Studio Tours’ Category

It’s hard to know where Kelowna artist and jewelry maker Lori Mairs’ studio begins and where it ends. Being an artist who favours natural materials – she is especially partial to shed antler, bone, wood, clay, steel and paper – Lori’s work space frequently extends beyond her little sun room studio and into her yard and the surrounding Woodhaven Nature Conservancy she takes care of.

“I have a real respect for nature and the earth,” Lori told The Pear Tree the morning we dropped by for a tour. “I feel in harmony with those things.”

Hired by the Regional District of the Central Okanagan as a security contractor (in lay terms the park caretaker), Lori resides in a little cottage near the front of the 8.7 hectare conservancy. The home, originally the summer house of former Kelowna Mayor Harry Raymer, dates back to the 1930s or ‘40s, she estimates.

In the eight years she’s lived and created art and jewelry there, Lori has filled the space with her creative impulse, giving the wooded garden immediately surrounding her an enchanted appeal.

Sculptures large and small can be seen nestled into the brush or perched on stumps or rocks, adding a whimsical character to the place.

Because of the size of some of her sculptures, Lori does much of her work outside in the summer months. Working in such an atmosphere, surrounded by lush foliage and wild flowers, Lori’s creative juices flow.

“I am inspired by this park. I’m inspired by the raw seasonal changes that put me in the position of having to pay attention. I’m inspired by the creatures, the flora and fauna – this richness that goes on, living here in this wonderland.

“I work with what is in sympathetic union with the wild. So to be connected to the wild so deeply and richly, it can’t help but work.”

Adding to the sentiment, Lori is acquainted with some of the deer who’s antlers she finds, naturally shed. One doe, in particular, has brought three sets of babies to her pond to drink.

“I have history with the critters and the trees,” she said.

While she does the heavy, messy work – cutting with a saw, welding or sanding (which can be dusty) – outdoors, Lori does most of the fiddly stuff – such as sanding, polishing and assembling her Public Bone jewelry – in her little studio.

It is here that she pulls out the beads and silver and jewelry making tools to turn her natural treasures into wearable works of art.

A favoured form of expression for Lori is inking patterns on the bone she uses for jewelry.

Lori explains that she is drawn to bone in her fine art and commercial jewelry business because she loves to work with things that are in sympathetic union with the body.

“Bone represents the core of who we are,” she said. “It’s the only physical thing I’ve found so far that can describe a metaphysical state and talk about archetypal form and the human condition.”

While sculpture and jewelry are Lori’s professional creative expressions, she also paints – “just for fun” – and has some of her work hanging in her living room (above).

Of course, during the warmer months of the year, Lori prefers her outdoor living space (above), using it to entertain, relax and think about her next project.

Coming up this summer for Lori is a three month show of her artwork at the Regional District offices at 1450 KLO Road in Kelowna. Shadow Boxing will show from July through September.

Smaller Than A Breadbox: The Works, will be in Edmonton June 26 to July 7.

For the Woodhaven Eco Art Project this summer, Lori will sculpt live in the park July 10 (date subject to change). She is also involved in a short film about the conservancy, due out next summer.

In the mean time, her Public Bone jewelry is for sale at Funktional, 447 Bernard Avenue in Kelowna, at Wine Valley Accents, 13222 Kelly Avenue in Summerland, and here.

- Story and photos by Lori-Anne Poirier

Playful, colourful paintings line Wanda Lock’s art studio walls, from ceiling to floor. We’ve come to visit at a good time, she tells The Pear Tree when we remark about it. In a few months the walls will be bare, the artwork shipped out to show in galleries. But now, like a garden in early summer, it is all abloom.

There is an unmistakable element of primary school nostalgia in Wanda’s artwork, complete with blue lines reminiscent of a notebook and studied cursive or stamped messages.

Such “old-school” details are also evident in her studio. An old banker’s chair here, a makeshift desk created from a couple of trunks stacked one on the other, and collections of vases, jars and urns repurposed as brush, paint and pencil holders.

Wanda and her husband, Greg Buchholz, moved to their Okanagan Centre home in 1996 and built the studio, connected to the house but with it’s own, separate entrance, a year later.

She maintains several of what she calls “zones” in the creative space. The small sitting area (with the banker’s chair, above) is where she thinks things through – sometimes with a cup of coffee or a glass of beer to help her out.

“This is where I sit and hang out,” Wanda explained.

The centre island (above) is her stamping and drying zone. And just beyond it (also above) is her corner desk, by the windows, where she likes to station herself to draw.

“For me, the view is important. I need a view,” she said.

Wanda’s second-storey studio looks down over her garden, and out beyond to the lake and mountains. She points out that the sliding doors, which quizzically open to a drop-off, will one day lead to a deck.

Just a few steps from Wanda’s main work zone, she has a small station set up for her children, Thomas, age 8, and Simone, 6, to flex their artistic muscle. The drawing, above, was done by Simone. The blue trunk (above) once held Wanda’s father’s horse shoeing equipment. Wanda and Greg rescued it from her parents’ barn a few months before the barn caught fire and burnt down.

Other objects d’art were collected from yard sales, boutiques, secondhand stores and hand-me-downs from friends and family, as well as on her travels.

Wanda spends most of her mornings in the studio – except in the summer, when she’s more likely to be found down at the beach with the rest of her family. The summer months are her time to catch up on her reading, and develop artistic ideas. It’s not uncommon for her to fill four or five sketch books in that three-month period.

“Last summer a lot of UFO and cauldron shapes came up. I don’t know where they came from – they were just in my head, I guess. I think of it as a snow dome. Stuff flies around my head and as it settles I pick and choose stuff,” Wanda told The Pear Tree.

In the fall, after she empties her studio of all of the preceding year’s work, Wanda hits the studio again, drawing her ideas on large pieces of paper before applying them to canvas. She likes to work on paper first because she finds it less intimidating than canvas (which the galleries prefer).

During the winter months Wanda starts putting her ideas to canvas and her walls begin to take on their whimsical character again. The paper, on the other hand, gets stacked and banked. Every now and then, Wanda finds creative ways to unload it. One of her favourites was the time she invited a large group of friends and acquaintances round and said they could trade a bottle of wine for a paper painting.

“I got rid of 66 pages that day,” Wanda laughed.

While she likes the look of her painting-covered walls from a purely aesthetic point of view, Wanda said she really does it to give the oil paint a chance to dry, as well as to keep focussed.

“I always work in a series from January to June every year, and the works I produce need to feed off each other. The paintings need a chance to chat. So I surround myself with them,” she said.

Wanda is currently showing her work at Evolution Contemporary Art Gallery in Canmore, Alberta, and at The Front Gallery in Edmonton.

- Story and photos by Lori-Anne Poirier

Many artists consider their studios to be sanctuaries of creativity, but few have as literal a claim as Lake Country artists Jim Kalnin and Lois Huey-Heck. Since 1991, the two have both worked and lived in a repurposed church, drawing inspiration from its history, architecture and spiritual roots.

“Both of us have a spiritual focus in much of our art, that’s always been there. It’s part of who we are. And it fits hand in glove with why we bought the building,” Jim said.

The husband and wife team – Jim is a recently-retired art professor from the Okanagan campus of the University of British Columbia and Lois is the recently-retired president of publisher Wood Lake Books – had been house hunting for some time. They were looking for a home with studio space for each of them but finding nothing that suited them in the tight market of the day. Finally, they spotted the little church for sale in their real estate agent’s big book.

Despite its remote location, tucked into the hillside on the far side of Wood Lake, Lois had seen the church several times while driving by and was already smitten with it. As soon as they saw it was available, they wanted it.

“It was a lovely day, the day we went to view it, and there were Irises out in the yard, I have a fetish for Irises, and they have featured in my artwork,” Lois said. “When we came in, it was all set up and ready for worship. There was a rose quality of light coming in from the upper windows (above) and I could have just cried.”

The church, St. Mary’s, was an Anglican church, consecrated in 1931. Jim and Lois attended the last service and deconsecration and moved in a few months later.

While the church kept or divided among their congregation most of the old pews, Jim and Lois were allowed to keep several. One is currently stationed in the kitchen’ breakfast nook.

Much had to be done to the place, in the way of renovations, to make it livable. Being a small church, there were no showers or laundry facilities and only a partial kitchen. They also needed to make modifications to create bedrooms – for themselves and their son, who still lived at home at the time.

They’ve kept what was the sanctuary in tact. The main part, where a congregation of worshipers once sat, is now a dining room and living room, with a piano in the corner where it may have once sat to accompany church song service. The small area where the altar would have once been is now a small library or reading room.

Lois and Jim decided early on not to have a television in this room, out of respect for what it once was.

While it is now a home, and has been for almost 20 years, Lois says that there’s still a reverence that can be felt in the place, and not just because of the arched windows and layout.

She notes that it is a place where people once came to pray, to sing, to worship, to mourn, to marry and to baptize their babies.

“It feels, to me, like a First Nations prayer stone. You hold the stone when you pray, and they believe that the stone keeps the vibrations of all the prayers of the people who use it,” Lois relates, explaining that she feels something similar in their home.

While much of the influence of living and making art in a former church is subtle, it sometimes comes out in more obvious ways, such as this painting of Jim’s (above), which features a collaged addition of windows photographed from their home.

Jim’s studio is in the basement, which once housed a Sunday School.

He works right on the walls, and had to put up gyprock because they are all cement.

Small adornments, such as this collection of feathers, help to personalize the space.

Lois works upstairs, in a room that was once part of the church’s meeting hall. Because of a need for more rooms, it was divided into three rooms – an office, a studio and a bedroom.

The natural light that comes into the room through the arched windows is beautiful, and the view of the lake and hillside captivating.

Lois considers herself a pack rat, and falls back on her occupation as an artist as an excuse for saving found things such as unusually shaped scraps of metal or fabric, as well as old photographs and postcards.

While the two studio spaces were created primarily for fine artwork, Jim and Lois are both writers as well, and have tucked themselves away in their respective studios to write, as well as paint.

Together, they wrote The Spirituality of Art, one in a series of 10 books published by Northstone Publishing, an imprint of Wood Lake Books. Lois was also one of four writers who contributed to The Spirituality of Sex, and Jim wrote The Spirituality of Nature.

Of course, their working space is not confined to their studio alone. Outside, among the pine trees and wild flowers, below the broad sky and beside the sweeping view, Jim and Lois can also be seen applying their creative souls to canvas.

While it’s a little corner of the earth they feel very blessed to call their own, they are loath to claim ownership of it, spiritually.

“I feel like we’re just caretakers of this place,” Lois said.

For a closer look at some of Jim’s work, visit the Vernon Public Art Gallery before May 18 to see his current show, One Planet.

-Story and photos by Lori-Anne Poirier

When Carrie Harper started looking for an art studio to set up her Pear Workshop two years ago, she visited a long line of warehouses, basements and dark spaces during her hunt for the perfect spot.

Then she met fellow artist Kendra Smith, who had just moved into a spacious, well-lit room above Kelowna’s downtown Starbucks, on Bernard Avenue. Needing a studio mate, Kendra invited Carrie to share the spot and the two became fast friends.

“As soon as we met we were bosom buddies. We’re like soul mates,” Kendra said.

“When I walked in here I didn’t even have to think about it,” Carrie added, explaining that the space was what her mother would term “a favourable environment.”

It’s easy to see how an artist could fall in love with such a room. Two large windows that run nearly from floor to ceiling let plenty of north light in. North light’s bright but soft qualities make it ideal for painters to work with since it has all the colours of light in it. The dark wood that frames the windows, and the small window seat, give the place the character of an old soul.

A sign on the outside of the building dates it to 1913, making it one of the original buildings on the main street.

It’s undergone many incarnations in that time. The previous occupant, a goldsmith, did some major renovations on the room, removing the drop ceiling to reveal a much taller one behind it. He also refinished the wood floor and, according to the girls, put some heart and soul into the place.

While he found the lack of traffic up on the second floor to be a problem for his business, Carrie and Kendra love that it gives them quiet time to paint, without being too far removed from the bustle of the downtown.

“It feels good in here,” Kendra said. “The vibe is really good. It really does make me feel like it’s easier to get in the zone.”

In addition to the architectural touches that give the place character, such as the embellished radiators, the old, solid wood door with brass hardware and the arched alcove that help to make the two artists feel more creative, they deliberately keep the studio low-tech.

“When we come here there’s no TV, no phone, no computer. Just a place to paint,” Kendra said. Her recent purchase of an iPhone has made it hard to enforce, but she still sees it as a place to escape to and create.

For times when she’s lured outside the studio to paint, her painting suitcase – once belonging to her great-aunt – is ready and waiting.

Carrie works on a water colour

A shelf by Carrie’s desk houses a treasure trove of brushes and small art samples.

Carrie grew up in an orchard and picked the pear as a symbol of her work because she likes its curvaceous femininity.

Kendra painting at her desk.

A veritable rainbow of colours alight on Kendra’s palette.

- Story and photos by Lori-Anne Poirier

I first encountered Kelowna artist Emil Nagy’s (pronounced Nahj) home studio a couple of years ago, when I interviewed him for a story in the local newspaper. If I were an artist, I decided, I would want exactly this studio. Despite being quite talentless in the fine art department, I would certainly find the impulse to paint if only I had such a space to inspire me.

It was around that time that I conceived of the Artist Studio Tours idea. Wouldn’t it be wonderful, I thought, to feature the work space – the place so many creative ideas are born and nurtured – of some talented Okanagan artists? For indeed, some have designed their work areas to be a work of art in and of themselves. So, starting now and throughout the coming year, The Pear Tree will feature one artist studio a month. We hope you find inspiration for yourself in the design and atmosphere they evoke.

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Emil’s love for the past, and its influence on his work, are obvious upon stepping into his open, two-level studio. Housed in a spacious corner of his 1922 heritage home, the studio continues the theme of his artwork – bringing the past into the future.

Adorning the walls, and stacked vertically on the floor, are paintings of old buildings, often in modern settings, vintage cars, old trains, treasured possessions and people from Emil’s past.

Setting them off is an enviable collection of old things – many with an interesting sentiment or story behind them.

“I like the idea of something from the past coming into the present.” Emil said. “I connect to the past because that’s where we came from. I always bring in something old and something new. That kind of defines me.”

While his collection of old and antique furniture and accessories add charm to the room from a design point of view, they’re not just a collection of attractive-but-useless things. Most of the furnishings have appeared, or are destined to appear, in his paintings – which makes them that much more treasured to Emil.

The early primary school desk (left) came from Emil’s wife, Phyllis Nagy’s, old school near Battleford, Saskatchewan. While Nagy can’t say whether or not his wife once sat in this desk, he says there’s a pretty good chance she may have. Certainly one just like it. They acquired the desk about 30 years ago after the school did a big clean-up.

Behind the desk stands an old wine cabinet that Emil got on a trade in 1970. Just in his second year as a high school art teacher at the time, Emil made an exchange with the school custodian: one of his original paintings for the period cabinet. The trade saved the cabinet its legs, which would likely have been cut off.

(Above left) An old metal jug finds a new purpose as a receptacle for brushes. “I’m always recreating,” Emil said.

(Above right) A hint of colonial charm is added to the mix with these potted plants in the window, and an old, model truck.

The studio’s upstairs loft.

Emil made this collection of clay cars and trucks to use as 3-D models to paint from. “I think my forte is on canvas,” he said. “To me, sculpture is like child’s play – like Plasticine.”

A shelf over the studio door sports more clay sculptures, including a lantern, a trolly and a lady called “Drawers,” Emil’s interpretation of a Salvador Dali figure.

This ornately carved cabinet is actually a sewing machine, once belonging to Emil’s Aunt Pearl. Dating back to 1906, Emil says it’s his favourite piece. “I gave her a couple hundred dollars for it, and she thought it couldn’t be worth that much.”

Some tools of the trade.

A license plate, found on Emil’s dad’s farm, found its way into this 3-D painting.

Emil found this c. 1940s desk at a lumber store, destined for the scrap heap. It now houses his paints and equipment.

The artist at work. Behind him hangs a portrait of his father at the age of 97. His dad was close to 100 years old when he passed away, and Emil is sentimental about the likeness. “I think I got my dad’s expression just the way he was,” he said.

Emil stands in front of a vaguely Baroque-influenced painting he created, featuring members of his family. In the centre, in blue, is the artist himself.

- Story and photos by Lori-Anne Poirier