My Background 

I was born and raised in MontreaI (1943) and come from a family of artists: two uncles on my father's side and my paternal grandmother. Even (lol) on my first wife's side of the family was her grandfather, Albert Mead Pattison who studied under Arthur Lismer at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts. 

I have been sketching and painting from an early age. I have a good singing voice and can play the piano by ear, so my parents encouraged me to go in to banking ! .....(lol),which I did. While banking gave me a steady income, my heart always leaned towards art:  Classical music, opera and painting.

After my first wife died in 1993 I began painting seriously. My very first painting received honourable mention at the Mackenzie Art Gallery in Regina and my 1st show at the Assinaboia Gallery in Regina saw 19 of 28 paintings sold on the opening day of the show. I was greatly encouraged by John Kurtz owner of the gallery and over the next 4 years had shows in Regina, Saskatoon, West Vancouver, Victoria, and Edmonton. During this time I was accepted as an Active Member of  FCA ( Federation of Canadian Artists). However,  business interests became more demanding and I gave up the gallery circuit and just painted for family and friends.

Since Wendy and I moved to Port Alberni I have had more time to paint and so here we are at Rollin Art Centre in Port Alberni .

I remember when I first started painting seriously for shows I flew to Montreal to see the James Wilson Morrice (1865-1924)  exhibition.  There were 92 painting with a value of $15 million. This was a very emotional and pivotal  experience for me. While encouraged by his family to become a lawyer Morrice never practiced ; then moved to Paris and became an artist. Similarily, I was encouraged to go in to banking as a career while my heart was somewhere else. ... " the heart has reasons where reason does not know." 

Most of his painting are delicate pochades painted as he sat sipping coffee in cafes around the globe ", painting the light" as one critic wrote of his work. He is my favourite artist and the one I look to when I paint too much detail the bane of every artist.

To me art is all about  interpretation of the scene by the artist through his senses. A personal and unique view.

 

There are many works here stretching over years with different styles.

I find painting a struggle and will often go for months or Ionger without picking up a brush or pen and then paint 5 large canvases in the span of a few weeks.While the right side of my brain creates the art the left side keeps things organized. I like to paint the light and I am drawn to scenes where darkness moves into light.

Recently I have been painting using a technique called Abstract Impressionism which allows for much greater freedom of design  colour and form than more conventional styles. Abstract Impressionism speaks more to the artists impressions and feelings about a particular scene rather than the detailled photographic or illustrative aspect.