Art in Isolation
Various Artists
During Vancouver's temporary citywide shutdown, those who ventured into the city's core discovered that art had replaced many storefront windows. It was a reminder of hope, humanity, and the transformative capacity of art. While uncertainty loomed, creatives filled spaces and hearts with evocative imagery and beauty, giving voice to our common experience. As the Dal Schindell Gallery's first online-only exhibition, Art in Isolation features five local Vancouver artists who continued to create in uncertain times. Though their work differs, parallels emerge as the artists reflect on making art during a pandemic.
To inquire about the purchase of work exhibited, please contact [email protected].
OLIVIA DE FLEURIOT PERRY
Title: Untitled (Mothering)
Work In Progress
Medium: Stocking, yarn, and thread
Olivia de Fleuriot Perry is an artist and a mother who interweaves the performative gestures of motherhood in her soft sculptural forms, consisting mainly of fabric, yarn, and thread. She uses her own maternal experience of constant repetition to create small repetitive gestures of piecework.
De Fleuriot Perry earned her MFA in 2019 from Emily Carr University (ECUAD) as a recipient of the SSHRC Master’s scholarship (2018). She will be a part of a group show at the Fort Gallery, in Fort Langley, BC, in April 2021. De Fleuriot Perry is currently exhibiting work in an online show, Home-works, curated by Spilt Milk Gallery, Edinburgh, UK. In April 2019, she exhibited in the MFA Thesis Show at ECUAD. In 2018, she was a part of the SSHRC funded Leaning Out of Windows group exhibition at ECUAD. She exhibited in a group show Lobby Art Project at the Chilliwack Cultural Centre in BC, in 2017. In 2015, de Fleuriot Perry was a part of a two-person show, Art On Demand 1:3, at The Reach Gallery Museum, in Abbotsford, BC; and a solo show, Cityscapes, at the Langley Centennial Museum, in Fort Langley, BC.
“I start sewing at the dining room table while my child naps. As I sew the fabric stretches and tears. A piece of yarn pokes through. My hands hold the yarn in place methodically looping back and forth. The same action repeated tirelessly, mindlessly. I sit and loop. I slide my hand through the stocking as the fabric calls to be inspected. My body becomes the piece. The yarn gently moves as I twist my wrist changing form, adapting to the imposed stress of movement. The loose threads find their place after each sway. My child cries, and my body responds.”
Davi Rabelo
Title: Recent Explorations in Printmaking
Medium: Linocut, Vancouver 2020
Davi is a Brazilian pastor and graphic designer. Married to Fernanda and father to Levi and Tomás, he is in his final year at Regent College, finishing the MA in Theological Studies with a concentration in Christianity and the Arts. His studies have been focused on the need to foster a better appreciation for the imagination and visual arts within the Protestant tradition. Davi will present a feature exhibition in the Dal Schindell Gallery in Spring 2021.
“In the first weeks of this pandemic, at the end of each day, our family would go for a short walk to visit the community garden. With our kids, we would admire the flowers blooming and the vegetables and fruits starting to grow in the early spring. Even though we were surrounded by uncertainties and anxiety, the beauty and life of that garden was a reminder that God was still actively nourishing his creation. Borrowing symbolic elements from iconography, this linocut print was made as a personal reflection that Christ (ICXC) is the one who creates and ultimately sustains our lives. These strange times reveal our frailty, the brokenness of this world, and our need for a real hope that recognizes and confronts the deathliness that haunts us. Yet, there is still beauty to be found in God’s garden.”
Geoffrey Feng
Title: Wedding
Medium: Oil on canvas
Size: 36" X 36"
Geoffrey Feng is an artist currently living and working in North Vancouver, Canada. Feng is recognized for his oil paintings. His work is a combination of small and large scale paintings of scenery in British Columbia that bring to light historical events of his native homeland, China. He strives to voice his reverence, praise, and gratitude to the precious love that dwells among all creation through his life-long dedication to art.
Feng has 8 years of professional learning experience from Fine Art Academy of Xi’an in China. After obtaining a Bachelor Degree of Oil Painting from the Academy, he worked as a graphic artist in Shenzhen for many years before he moved to Vancouver, Canada in 2007.
“During the pandemic, I still painted everyday in my studio. It seemed as though nothing changed in my daily routine. However, the knowledge that the pandemic took lives everyday created an invisible influence. It made me think my art was so feeble.”
JULIA SODERHOLM
Title: Looking and Listening
Medium: Oil on canvas
Julia Soderholm was born in Ontario and attended Redeemer University, receiving a BA in art in 2013. She also holds a B.Ed from UBC with a focus in art education. Now based in Vancouver, her work has been shown across Canada. She works primarily in oil, with a focus on perceptual painting exploring themes of memory and place. Julia’s practice includes making plein air paintings that later inform her work in the studio. Julia is a full time art teacher in Vancouver, where she has spent the past few years designing and implementing an elementary school visual art program. In Fall 2021, Julia will present a solo show in the Dal Schindell Gallery.
“This past Spring, I read Philip Larkin's poem describing the greenness of budding trees as ‘a kind of grief.’ Painting the shift of seasons in the quiet world around me became an act of solace in the early days of isolation. As time passes, looking at trees continues to energize hope in me, despite uncertainty.”
AMY STEWART
Title: Lost in Strange Beauty
Size:40" X 40"
$1,650.00
Vancouver-based artist Amy Stewart has been drawn to the interconnections of art, play and nature since her childhood in 108-Mile House, British Columbia, where she spent most of her time outdoors. That first northern home continues to dominate much of Amy’s current artistic world. The memories of childhood and nature shape her adult imagination, and they are reflected in her paintings’ rich textures and vibrant tones. Her pieces are often inspired by the feelings that come both from the natural world and from engaging fully in her community and with her loved ones. “I paint how I feel and who I am,” Stewart explains. And that sense of humanity—the private experiences of suffering and celebration—are evoked by her canvases’ unique explorations of colour, which range from exuberant bursts of brightness to contemplative reflections on darkness.
A constant passion, painting became more central to Amy’s life during her years of working with at-risk youth. She began producing her own art as a means of processing the disturbing experiences she witnessed professionally.
Inspired by her artist grandmother, who taught Amy watercolour and a range of stylistic techniques, Amy is an observer of her environment. Interested in how anxiety, depression and happiness impact our lives, her art transforms good and bad life experiences into colours and shapes. Amy expresses herself through painting, creating art as a mode of personal discovery.
Amy lives with her husband and daughter and paints from her studio on Granville Island. Her art has been sold internationally, and frequently hangs in galleries around Canada.
“Painting kept me feeling steady during the beginning of the pandemic. For me, painting has a meditative quality, allowing me to find a sense of peace. I am more grateful than ever to be an artist during this difficult time.”