I’m a collector of local art — not because I want to fill every available space on my walls and shelves, but because I like what the artists in our area are producing. And what better venue to view fine art that the Images art show and sale on Nov. 21 and 22!
All your favourites will be on display: Karen Arrowsmith’s elegant watercolours of mountains, valleys and Kootenay Lake, Ute Bachinski’s vibrant pastels of valley grandeur and detailed watercolours of garden produce, and Gunda Stewart’s wood-fired pottery, with exciting forms and glazes you can envision on your table. Eileen Hirota will display her richly surfaced intuitive semi-abstract paintings, and James McDowell will impress you with his eclectic and heartwarming painted subjects in oil and acrylic.
Elaine Alfoldy will delight you with her colourful “farm lady” images and landscapes painted within our valley in watercolour. Andy Alfoldy will be there with his evocative watercolour landscapes and depictions of life, both human and animal. Carol Schloss will show her colourful pastels of rural life and landscape, captured beautifully by her experienced eye.
Andrea Revoy is the guest artist showing with Images for the first time. Viewers are delighted her whimsical and happy creations. Be ready to really enjoy and consider her well-designed detailed clay works.
I’m happy to say I own work by many of these artists. I learned a lesson about purchasing artwork several years ago, when I fell in love with a Phyllis Margolin watercolour at a Crawford Bay gallery. Thinking I was too poor to buy it, I left it there, hanging on the wall. Someone else has it now and is enjoying the autumn moodiness of it, the hues of gold and rust and the stormy Kootenay sky. I made a bad decision that day and I’ve always regretted it.
Try not to make the same mistake. Visit Images at Rotacrest Hall and open yourself up to the prospect of owing your own piece of original art.
Images runs 9:30 a.m.-5 p.m. Nov. 21 and 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Nov. 22.
—BY ELAINE ALFOLDY