Alfred LeBlanc
Artist-in-Residence

Photography has been a life-long hobby, practiced as much as possible in Cape Breton. I have drawn on 40 years of photography for a book of black-and white "Portraits of Cape Breton". Twenty of the photos have been enlarged/framed and will be on display. I will be available to sign books, share stories about the photos, and talk about what I’ve learned about getting authentic portraits.

Alison Gayton

Alison Gayton makes pottery to hypnotize and fascinate you, while soothing and complimenting the adorability of the animals we love. For over twenty years she's been behind the wheel, with clay to the elbows making each functional work iconic. Her sculptural work is personal, figurative and evocative. Now she does all that and more in glorious Hampton.

Alison supports Sculptural Arts and Literacy communities in Southwestern NB by making, teaching, exhibiting and demonstrating art through her business, Alison Gayton Ceramics.

https://alisongayton.com

Bob Hunter

Just by chance while on holiday shortly after I retired, I was introduced to the craft of making and turning segmented bowls. I found I really enjoyed working with the different woods. It is a challenge to cut the segments to the exact size and then design the rings and layer them to come up with the design. The combining of native and exotic woods to develop unique designs and then using the lathe to shape the bowl gives me a feeling of accomplishment. I have cut and processed some of the wood that I use in my pieces. There are no commercial patterns or pre-manufactured pieces used.

Browz (Constance Intounas)
Artist-in-Residence

Throughout my artwork, eyes often symbolize people, emphasizing our shared ability to perceive the world. Yet, even when observing the same object, each person's interaction and viewpoint can differ greatly. This diversity of perspective fascinates me—it shapes our identities, reveals our values, exposes our vulnerabilities, and guides our aspirations.

My art is a reflection on growth, compassion, and navigating a world filled with diverse individuals, where chaos and beauty intertwine seamlessly. I am drawn to the idea of strangers coexisting in the same space, contemplating what it means to be human and alive.

Carole Lulham

I have practised the ancient art of mosaics for over twenty years, focusing on interpreting natural environments that surround us, and using natural and salvaged materials.

My outdoor work includes garden stakes, wall hangings, garden pendants, obelisks and spheres.The outdoor work is designed to withstand our challenging Canadian climate, using materials, adhesives and bases that can handle freeze/thaw cycles.

My indoor work includes glass-on-glass mosaic vessels, and mini green wall hangings made of preserved mosses and natural artifacts I collect during my local hikes.

It’s important for me to connect with people young and old, so I frequently teach mosaics and run community programs to foster mental well-being, build community murals and connect people.
I connect strongly with the natural and plant world. In previous years, my career was in agronomy
and horticulture, working with agricultural producers and in post secondary institutions. I worked across Canada with green roofs and green walls. For this show I have created a series of mini green walls, made of 100% natural materials.

Catherine Pyfrom

Growing up in the Bahamas, I spent many incredible hours on the beach and in the ocean. My family would spend school vacations out on the boat, often not seeing other people for days at a time. This close connection to my tropical home has always inspired me.

Even though I live in Atlantic Canada now my art is still imprinted with the tropical flora and fauna of my home country of the Bahamas. Living far from the tropics, painting has become my refuge, and my studio has become my therapy during hard times. The vibrant colours and the brilliant blues of the Bahamian ocean are my happy place and are always with me when I paint. That happiness and connection are poured into every piece I create.

I generally strive for photorealism in my art with my subjects ranging from tropical flowers to breathtaking birds. Often, I travel under the waves to bring to life the fish, turtles, and rays that call the ocean their home. Working with acrylic paint on canvas, I have also experimented with acrylic pours in recent years as I find this technique provides unique background movement inspired by the islands.

Cheryl Robichaud

My paintings reflect things I love - family, nature, animals and wildlife. Growing up with the Bay of Fundy as my backyard playground, and travelling across country with family camping, inspired me to love nature and all its surrounding. Painting gives me peace and relaxation, and being lost in the canvas bringing my subjects to life. I love bringing happiness to others, painting their memories and things they love as well.

Chris Schmitt
Artist-in-Residence

The boundaries between human, machine and nature are tested in Ottawa-based artist Christopher Schmitt’s artworks. On first glance, they look like cityscapes rendered digitally, or prompted through Artificial Intelligence (AI). On a second look, these large-scale photographs are, in fact, real circuit boards positioned in a way to give the illusion of space and scale. Painstakingly positioned and skillfully lit, the images blur the line between minuscule and immense, real and imagined, physical and virtual, in a way that’s both beautiful and philosophical.

Do androids dream of electric sheep? Do they create art and culture in the same way humans do? Do they listen to opera? In Schmitt’s image AI Opera House a photo of a computer circuit board casts the illusion of a built structure for such a place. The ‘building’ sits among other seemingly smaller homes in a microchip street, but is void of people. Perhaps it is a street designed for other computer intelligences. Or perhaps it exists to house our avatars, our virtual selves listening to AI-generated music. Perhaps there is no distinction anymore. There are no answers to these questions, just warnings and attempts to pause and think about such things.

For his dragonfly piece, Chris took photographs of the collection at the Canada Science and Technology Museum (Ingenium). After photographing dozens of innovative artifacts, he painstakingly assembled these images into montages that mimic dragonflies. He used jet engines to form the body and the tail, lighthouse fresnel lens for the eyes, a gyroscope for the head, and a magnetic core memory board for the wings. This artwork is a reflection on humanity's pride in its technological achievements and a reminder of the extraordinary resilience of nature.

http://cjsfoto.ca

Colin Hugh Smith

My paintings are about the simple pleasures of looking, which can change mood or attitude and touch the heart. Celebrating the arrival of spring, or flowers on a summer’s day, in exuberant or tender harmony, my paintings are praised by owners and loved, so I’m told, as they translate memory into visual experience.

Elizabeth Vickers

Elizabeth Vickers is a talented stone carving artist based in Saint John, NB. With a passion for transforming raw stone into captivating works of art, Elizabeth's creations reflect her deep appreciation for nature and the beauty found within it. Her intricate carvings capture the essence of her subjects, showcasing her meticulous attention to detail and artistic vision. Through her art, Elizabeth aims to inspire and evoke a sense of wonder in those who experience her accomplished stone sculptures.

Jake Levin

I started photographing birds in earnest in 2014, making a few trips down to Florida with some rented equipment and eventually purchasing a camera and lens second-hand. Things took off from there, and I've been behind my camera ever since. Whether I'm in a local park with the friendly black-capped chickadees, or in the mountains of Costa Rica looking for quetzals and rare tanagers, I try to create images that convey to the viewer just what I see in birds, and why I think they're so special. To me, birds truly are living works of art, and bird photography is at its best when it captures those same qualities, the enduring beauty and timeless wonder that keeps drawing us to birds. My goal, at the end of the day, is an image that never loses its "wow" factor, something that instantly explains, without words, why I pressed the shutter button in the first place.

Jeneca Klausen

Jeneca Klausen is a New Brunswick jewellery artist. Her work is shaped by the surrounding Bay of Fundy coastal aesthetics, which she responds to intuitively and sensitively through her jewelry designs. She draws from the raw, natural beauty of local resources, forming an intimate connection with the landscape from which she derives her philosophical approach to production. She uses gemstones sourced from small dealers, as well as local stones carefully handpicked and ethically extracted, to respectfully represent the elegance of sustainably sourced natural materials. Combined with recycled gold and sterling silver, objects are imbued with the powerful vibrations of nature, radiating an energy that extends to the wearer.

Judith Baxter

Born in Saint John, New Brunswick, Judith Baxter studied art at Vocational School with Ted Campbell and Fred Ross. However, it has been far too long since school-days to blame or credit my teachers with my artistic results. “Basically self taught and by intuition I’ve even had to ask how best to clean my brushes!”

Judith is recognized both provincially and nationally as a museum and built heritage advocate and local sage on community heritage issues. As an artist/writer she is recognized for four books; ‘The Magic Seagull’ with Roberta Lee (illustration), ‘845 A Pencil Sketch Tour of the Kingston Peninsula’ (which captures the elegance and winsomeness of old barns and houses in rural NB), ‘Life & Times of Eliza Cox Carter’ with Beth Quigley and editing ‘Clifton Royal: The Wetmores and Village Life in Nineteenth-Century New Brunswick’.

Judith’s work has been collected and exhibited both privately and publicly.

Over the last few years Judith has been inspired to turn her attention to painting natural landscapes with a focus on water, rocks and sky. Working in oil, the new work is rich in detail, movement, and is imbued with a deep sense of place.

https://www.facebook.com/JudithBaxterfineartGallery/

Karen Butler O'Brien

I am a watercolour artist who grew up in a rural community in southern New Brunswick. My childhood home being an area rich in inspiration has resulted in many of my subjects reflecting the beauty found in nature.

Drawing has been a passion of mine from a very young age and when growing up I had the wonderful opportunity to attend many workshops facilitated by my late uncle and prominent local artist, Ray Butler. This is where I developed a special interest in watercolour. I continue to learn new things about the medium and am influenced by many of my favourite artists: Ray Butler, Carl Purcell, David Taylor, Jim Kosvanec and Joseph Zbukvic.

My palette is limited to a variety of transparent watercolours, allowing me to represent a scene with as much luminosity as possible. It is always an experimental process. I like to keep my paintings fresh-looking with minimal details. I plan a scene keeping in mind shapes, values and colour. It is important to me that the viewer sees my interpretation of the scene.  Although it is not an easy medium to master, I do like the unpredictability of watercolour and the pleasant surprises it creates.

I enjoy plein air painting because it challenges me to think about what pieces of information to leave out in order to simplify the subject and develop my own unique style. Most of my work however, happens in my home studio and sharing what I have learned from others is most rewarding.

Larry Merritt

My love of nature, both flora and fauna, is my inspiration and my passion.The colours, movements and intrinsic details of the subject matter challenges me to provide my own artistic representation and/or interpretation of the subject. I love to create a 3D depth of field for the subject. With this process, it may take me three months or more to complete a painting to my satisfaction. I have used ink, pastels and watercolour but settled on acrylic paint as my chosen medium. I continue to experiment, using various techniques, to further explore how to present the subject as realistically as possible in my own interpretation.I continue to follow the idea of "Conceptual Abstract" that I studied at the Art College.

Marc Eagles

My art is a realistic representation of landscapes, historical sites or abandoned buildings. When I was a young man, I used pen and ink to create works but when I became disabled last year and my Mother-in-law encouraged me to get back into my artwork, I decided to try painting. I work in opaque watercolour on paper or canvas. Watercolour artists Betty Safran, Indu Varma, and John Amos were inspirational to me in my youth. I was also extremely fortunate to meet Alex Colville, who encouraged me to continue with my art.

I want my paintings to speak to people who view my work, allowing them to step into these moments in time. I am hoping, though everyone will not recognize each location, my works will have the ability to bring back fond memories and warm feelings of times gone by.

Nicole Allen
Artist-in-Residence

There is pulse, a field of energy within the world of the garden that invites us to connect with the ephemeral. By deconstructing form and embracing spontaneity and experimentation in my work, I allow the materials and colours to guide me as much as I guide them. This relationship results in pieces that are both intentional and organic – a reflection of the interplay between control and surrender.

Sheila Howell

I have chosen the term, "Expressive Realism" to describe my main painting style. Most of my work has an element of realism, but sharing a feeling is more important to me than copying what I view. I want to express to the viewer "why" I painted a subject. I want people to see and feel what has inspired me. My inspiration can be as simple as a happy feeling, or I will often paint to self-sooth.

I do enjoy working in several painting styles and experimenting with different materials. Lately I have been exploring encaustic painting as well as cold wax medium and hope to do more oil painting in the future.

My future goals include painting and studying in different countries to help expand my personal style of expression.

Susan Wall

What am I about? Well, I am an artist that has a vast love of nature, animals, and structure. My choice as to what I will paint is derived from a feeling within my soul when I see a scene, a certain pose of an animal, or a building or structure that grabs my attention. Colour, emotion, freedom, and a deep sense of emotion, are something that I aspire to create.

As an artist, I give of myself and put myself out there for all to see with the hopes that there is an appreciation of my talent. That is all we can do as an artist.

Sydney Allen
Artist-in-Residence

My art practice is inspired by photography, a lifetime of extremely vivid dreams and
nightmares, and reflections on growing older. I use a variety of forms of digital manipulation to
create complex collages, which I then use as references for my works. Through my art practice,
I aim to document memories and abstract feelings in a visual sense, providing no shortage of
confusion and chaos for the viewer. I task the viewer with deciphering their own interpretation
of the events pictured, through the layers of images and people in each work. I prioritize
communicating a feeling of nostalgia to the viewer, regardless of whether the works’ origins
align with the viewer’s lived experience. I infuse my creations with a sense of absurdity and
humour, occasionally contrasting with my pieces’ subjects.