www.markpenneygallery.com

PRESS RELEASE

Fish, Ships, & Lost Treasures
Art Exhibition
March 6 – 16th, 2010

From Saturday, March 6th to Tuesday, March 16th, the Mark Penney Gallery in Ucluelet welcomes the whales with the Art Exhibition Fish, Ships, & Lost Art Treasures.
The gallery, located in Whiskey Landing, is “a place you discover by accident,” says owner, Mark Penney. “The gallery, like Ucluelet, is a real hidden gem.”
A gem of an art exhibition it will be with world renowned artists such as Canadian icon and National Gallery artist, Ken Kirkby, who was the first artist to have an unveiling in the House of Commons, Physicist and painter Rob Elphinstone, Charles Churchill Villiers and well known local artist, Marla Thirsk, are just a few of the acclaimed artists releasing new work.
Many know Marla’s work from her local mural work on the West Coast and as the creator of the ‘Art in the Gardens’ festival held each September at the Tofino Botanical Gardens, not to mention being a driving force behind ‘Artists-in-Action’ during the Whale Festival.
“I was really honored to be asked to showcase my new series at the Mark Penney Gallery,” says Thirsk. “This series, was inspired by old photographs from the 1930’s to 1960’s that my mother had. As my mum passed away 25 years ago, it will be quite a poignant moment for me.”
Modern artist Charles Churhill Villiers, son of famed inventor Amherst Villiers and relation to Lady Veronica Milner, regrets not being able to personally be at the show as he is beginning a gallery tour in England, “but my heart will be there.”
“The series that I will be showcasing at the gallery has not been seen before. I did the work, Mark printed it. I had the series framed, crated up and sent to England for an exhibition there, but it got lost in transit and traveled the high seas for awhile, before finally being returned to Vancouver Island, where they remained unopened and un-exhibited,” adds Villiers.
The irony of the exhibition’s name, Fish, Ships, & Lost Art Treasures, was not lost on Villiers.
“It seems appropriate,” says Charles. “I love Ucluelet and the West Coast…what a wonderful place to release my own lost treasure.”
Other artists include such famous names as Joan Larson, Peggy Burkosky, Bruce Muir, and more.
The Mark Penny Gallery will be open, 7 days per week, 10 am to 5 pm.
Free Admission. For more information, visit www.markpenneygallery.com for a full list/biography of artists, and a preview of some of the art.

I managed to enter a few photos into the Winter Wave Photo Showdown
I’m really looking forward to seeing the other entries, I know a few people who’ve entered the contest.

I caught a glimpse of royal blue matte and metallic silver frames to be used when I dropped of my entry at The Info Centre at Whiskey Landing, the exhibit should look pretty sharp with an impressive line up of local photos.

Event Results: The event was fantastic, and attendance was very good.

Congratulations to Wayne Barnes, Jeremy Koreski and Marilyn McEwen, everyone was absolutely blown away by the photos.
I was surprised at how many of the photos were taken along the wild pacific trail as opposed to the classic beach wave shots taken in the Park. I’m also excited to see the addition of another great Whale Festival event in Ucluelet.

Kunamokst, a collaborative mural project with paintings contributed by some 200 artists was unveiled recently. (recent post)

Rob Elphinstone is one of the participating artists. There are many talented artists from this region, what an interesting way to show them. Best, I felt is the meet the Artists page, a brilliant way of getting introduced to a few artists I wasn’t familiar with an reacquainted with some I hadn’t seen in some time.

www.canadarides.ca
Joan Larson has launched a new website featuring her RCMP musical Ride Series of Illustrations. The pastel illustrations are amazing, and like the illustrations themselves, the new website is nearly complete.

I’ve watched people reach out to touch the horses and applaud as the men and women of the Ride paraded before them. I have seen and felt the special sense of what it is to be Canadian when I watch the Musical Ride. These horses and riders are uniquely Canadian and it was my goal and passion to produce a series of paintings that celebrate their pageantry and Canadian Heritage

~ Joan Larson

Kunamokst – Coastal Inspirations Mural Mosaic Unveiling

Coast and Trees 12″x12″ Oils, plate 81 of Coastal Inspirations Mural Mosaic by Rob Elphinstone

For the last year and a half over 200 of some of Canada’s finest artists from along the west coast have collaborated to create a stunning 12 foot x 21 foot mural. The mural has been invited to be officially unveiled as part of the 2010 Winter Games. It is comprised of 231, 12 inch x 12 inch original paintings that when all the images are combined together a united image comes to life. There are no digital effects and the artists did not know each other or know what the united final image would be. It is a mural about unity through diversity – a great symbol of the Olympic ideals through art.

Kunamokst – Coastal Inspirations Mural Mosaic combines artists as young as 16 years old to artists as old as 91. Nanaimo artist, Rob Elphinstone, has contributed a piece entitled “Coast and Trees”. There are first nations artists, world renowned artists, French Canadian artists and artists from various regions along the coast. World renowned first nations artists like Roy Henry Vickers and April White contributed to the mural. As did Iconic Canadian artist Robert Bateman. Many other of the 200 artists, have been featured on the world stage as well. Special guests artists include California world renowned whale muralist WYLAND and California muralist Judy Baca.

Mural Links-
www.muralmosaic.com/kunamokst.html

Winter Games web page
westvancouver.ca coverage of the mural

Kunamokst – Coastal Inspirations Mural Mosaic

Mural Unveiling Saturday, February 13th, 2 p.m. – 4 p.m.
West Vancouver Spirit Square – an official 2010 Celebration Site
West Vancouver Community Centre (Art Studio), 2121 Marine Drive, West Vancouver.
On Display from February 13th – February 28, 2010
10 AM – 5PM Daily, until 9PM Friday and Saturday.

Congratulations to all Island Artists who participated, among them: Rob Elphinstone, Elissa Anthony, Roy Henry Vickers, Gordon Henschel, Mark Hobson, Rohanna Laing, Peter Lawson, Martin Machacek, Christina Munck. What a great project

For 10 days during Whale Festival, March 6th – 16th, we’ll be exhibiting a group show consisting of 6 artists with special ties to Mark Penney Gallery.

Welcome the Whales, as they migrate past Ucluelet and join us for an Art Exhibition at Whiskey Landing featuring some of the area’s finest artists…

Inspired by history and the Art of Vancouver Island, this exhibit showcases Fish, Ships and Lost Art Treasures; the fish of Nile Creek – realist paintings by Ken Kirkby, a lost print series by Charles Churchill Villiers, the actualist paintings of Rob Elphinstone, a preview of Joan Larson’s Musical Ride Series, an exciting portrait series by Ucluelet’s Marla Thirsk. Whales, fish, and scenery by Bruce Muir, and more…

www.pacificrimwhalefestival.com
24th Annual Pacific Rim Whale Festival – March 6th-14th, 2010

The Whale Fest posters have started to appear … with great anticipation. This year
Angie Roussin ( of Pina ) is the featured poster artist. She grew up in a commercial fishing family and has opened her shop here in Ucluelet, having spent some fishing seasons here. I like her graphic inked design work, it’s playful, very finely rendered and I think quite a strong contemporary look. I’m also fond of her paintings.

Last year Shannon McWhinney, a long time local Art teacher designed the poster in a pencil crayon illustration.

Congratulations Bobby and Jill, who got themselves married on New Years Eve.

Vingo.ca Your guide to Vancouver Island Life

There’s  a photo contest on at www.ucluelet.travel

I’d like to say I had some good shots to enter but the fact is ~ it’s been flat calm since the contest started. Not to worry, I’m sure we’ll get a few good days in before the Feb 15th deadline.

I’ll bet there’s going to be some people out on the beaches enjoying some storm watching …  I’m looking forward to seeing the photos caught by some of this area’s talented and well equipped photographers.

Play Rock-Paper-Scissors for !0% off. Anything in the gallery.
(It was a popular promotion last year so we’re running the same deal this fall.)

It’s a fun night for locals to stop by for a little wine and cheese. Take in some great art. Most businesses in town have some special sale or promotion on for the evening.

The Story of Nile Creek Salmon Enhancement Society, and their work restoring Vancouver Island streams, narrated by artist, Ken Kirkby.

The Nile Creek Salmon Enhancement Society has an official website of their own to raise awareness, but I’ve uploaded this from a DVD that the group has produced. YouTube requirements called for 10 minute clips, so it’s posted here in 2 parts.

More…

Artist, Colin T Bell is glad to have a website of his own to showcase his work on-line.

His new website www.colinbellart.com has recently been launched. A fellow-member of the Calgary Artists’ Society recommended an artist specific web service, and it seems it was a good fit. It’s a modest start of just a few pages, but overall the design and the photo galleries are simple and clean.

Colin Bell is a very capable painter in any medium. He’s recently painted a couple of pieces referencing my photography of the Wild Pacific Trail. I’m flattered, the paintings are stunning… here’s a peek.

“Paul should be congratulated on a book which gives an authoritative, overdue account of an extraordinary man.” ~ Lord Montigue of Beaulieu (in the forward of ‘The Man Who Supercharged Bond’, a biography of Amherst Villiers authored by Paul Kenny)

The extraordinary story of artist Charles Churchill Villiers’ father Charles Amherst Villiers has recently been published. I know Charles to be immeasurably proud of his father’s accomplishments, and of him as an artist and painter.

Amherst made a profound break from rocketry and engineering, to pursue painting; his very first portrait was of young Charles, the portrait sitting resulted in the two spending a great deal of time together and seems to have influenced Charles deeply in his identity as an artist.

Ian Flemming was a close friend and neighbor to the Villiers family. In 1962 Flemming commissioned a portrait which appeared in a limited edition of ‘On Her Majesty’s Secret Service’. A young Charles’ childhood stories are credited to the formation of ‘Chitty-Chitty-Bang-Bang’ the children’s book, and later hollywood movie, which is undeniably based on the Villiers Family; Charles, sister Jane, their father the inventor and of course the fabled race car rebuilt as a flying car.

Amherst Villiers and his son, Charles in the restored Bently

At age 11, under his father’s guidance, Charles began painstakingly restoration of a Villiers blown Bentley, that had been given to him by Flemming. The car upon it’s completion, won the Concourse D’ Elegance at Pebble Beach, California.

Amherst Villiers began began his career in design engineering by souping up Brescia Bugattis, he went on to develop Superchargers for Bentley and Rolls Royce. He designed the Napier-Campbell Bluebird in 1927. He left the group to work on a gyroscope design and to calculate a rocket trajectory to reach Mars, by that time Bluebird had broken the land speed record.

As a professional, portrait painter, he was known to take his artwork very seriously, pursuing it with a single minded determination. He studied under portrait painter Pietro Annigoni in Florence, and later worked on restoration of renaissance masterworks in a monastery in Majorca. As an artist himself, his son Charles studied painting under him in Spain.

Amherst Villiers paintings are very highly regarded; a portrait of Ian Flemming, along with a stunning portrait of legendary race-car driver, Graham Hill, are on loan to the National Portrait Gallery of London.

I’m excited and looking forward to reading this book. It’s available online at the official website www.themanwhosuperchargedbond.com

Photos of The Olympic Torch Relay as it visited the west coast of Vancouver Island, the Olympic Flame arrived this afternoon in Ucluelet where it left on foot, running with an excited group of locals along with it toward Tofino.

It’s not very often you witness a hero born, but today local surfer Peter Devries, of Tofino, won Canada’s first major surf competition in grand style.

Congratulations Peter, and sincere thanks to all who participated – it was interesting to see surfers contending with water much colder than they’ve used to.
Cold water surfing is a challenging sport, and it was a pleasure to watch the international surfing pros display their talents here in Canada’s surf capitol.

The O’Neill Cold Water Classic event is a really big deal for the Canadian surf scene and a total validation of local surf culture.

http://www.oneill.com/cwc/canada/news/finalsnews

Pacific Rim Arts Society, is having a local Artists showing. ‘Wave Art Show’ runs October 26-27-28 (in the Harbour Lounge) at Weigh West Resort, 634 Campbell St., Tofino.

More…

www.marlathirsk.com Marla’s new website
http://marlathirsk.blogspot.com/ Marla’s blog

I always enjoy it when artists drop by the gallery;
Marla Thirsk let me know she’d revamped her online presence recently.

An updated website and an ongoing blog showcase her most recent and very exciting series of ‘beauties’ styled after 1940s and ’50s era post cards and old photos.

There’s a lot of self exploration in these pieces and a fresh approach to portraiture for Marla. Her experiences with fabrics, sculpture and multimedia have directly impacted her painting. Each painting observes and details patterns and textures, the way memories are built with each detail recorded with individual importance.

I hope to show some of these new series pieces in the gallery, here’s a sneak peek;