Capitol Hill Dawn - September, 2011
Acrylic on canvas, 60" x 48"
Located at: Private Collection (SOLD)

I'm an early riser and my favourite time is that calm period just after the sun rises. There's a stillness in the early morning and the optimism of a new day that still full of potential. Or maybe I've become misanthropic as I've gotten older, so I like the world best when there are fewer people awake in it.

This painting shows a lovely late-spring morning when Burrard Inlet is calm - see, there's only one freighter waiting to load - and the commuters haven't started bustling yet. There's a green and yellow shade to the water from reflected sunlight and new growth. The distortion on the Ironworkers and train bridges are similar to my earlier, bluer version but I wanted to focus more that special luminescent morning light that the early riser Vancouverites are privileged to behold.

Heritage Hall - September, 2011
Acrylic on canvas, 10" x 10"
Located at: Private Collection (SOLD)

Heritage Hall is located at Main and 15th in Vancouver. It used to be the old post office a century ago, and later the RCMP headquarters way back in the day. Nowadays, it hosts a variety of weddings and craft fairs in its beautiful ballroom. In fact, you can see a wedding or some kind of celebration going on almost every weekend.

So I painted this one to look like a slightly eccentric bespectacled wedding guest, kind of like that one beloved relative everyone seems to have.

The Lee Building - September, 2011
Acrylic on canvas, 10" x 10"
Located at: The Beaumont Studios

There's a Facebook page devoted to former residents of the Lee Building, which is located at Main Street and Broadway. It's a well-known building with a rugged "east side" look and houses many artists and designers, with the requisite hip coffee shops and diners at the bottom.

I painted this one with the slouchy insouciance of a Main Street hipster.

Vanorama Enorma - July, 2011
Acrylic on canvas, 72"x36"
Located at: Private Collection (SOLD)

This is a larger version of my Vanorama painting with more focus on the water and the iridescent quality of the western light reflected in the glass and metal buildings. I love this view. This, to me, is quintessential Vancouver. The bridges, the Oz-like radiance in the setting sun, and the jagged mountainscape backdrop. There's an almost unreal and unreachable quality to the downtown peninsula of Vancouver.

Burrard Inlet - July, 2011
Acrylic on canvas, 30" x 24"
Located at: Private Collection (SOLD)

The customers wanted a painting that captured some well-known landmarks around Vancouver. The elements they like most about Vancouver are the Lion's Gate Bridge, the mountains, the totem poles in Stanley Park, the yellow suphur piles, and the floating Chevron gas station.

So this is a bit of an aerial view with some characteristic exaggerations to fit all the elements in. I've also included the Brockton Point Lighthouse, several freighters, a harbour plane, a departing cruise ship, and even a couple of kayaks. It's a busy painting, but Burrard Inlet is a busy place!

Ivanhoe Night - May, 2011
Acrylic on linen canvas, 10" x 10"
Located at: Private Collection (SOLD)

The first version of the Ivanhoe was meant to evoke the lunchbag crowd of workers that frequent the place. This version, at night, signifies a mattress.

The Ivanhoe is also a very reasonably priced backpacker's hostel a block away from the big Pacific Central train and bus station. In this version , I gave it a decidedly Van Gogh Starry Night look with warmly lit windows and a bit of easy sag to the walls, like a comfortable mattress.

Sun Tower - April, 2011
Acrylic on bevelled canvas, 12"x 12"
Located at: The Beaumont Studios

The Sun Tower is a standard fixture in Vancouver's historic downtown. The distinctive green dome was painted to imitate air-worn copper. When it was completed in 1912, it was called The World Building and was the tallest building in the British Empire at 82 m (269 ft), surpassing the previous record-holder, the Dominion Building located just around the corner. For two years, it was the tallest building in Canada until Toronto's 20-story Optima Business Centre opened in 1914.

This one was painted as if two people passed each other on the street and then cast a backwards glance at one another.

Dominion Building - April, 2011
Acrylic on bevelled canvas, 12"x 12"
Located at: The Beaumont Studios

Located on the edge of Gastown (207 West Hastings St), the Dominion Building was Vancouver's first steel-framed high-rise. Upon its completion in 1910, this 13-storey building was the tallest commercial building in the British Empire. It's just down from the more well-known Harbour Centre.

I painted these two buildings as if they are dancing and swirling in an eternal shuffling minuet.

Skycranes - March, 2011
Acrylic on linen canvas, 60" x 48"
Located at: The Beaumont Studios

This is a view of North Vancouver from Gastown with the Port of Vancouver stevedore cranes in the foreground. The ubiquitous cranes - you see them everywhere in Vancouver - are like dinosaurs flexing across the sky. They make the landscape seem prehistoric.

I added a lot of scaly texture to the sky and made the cranes the only vibrant point of color in the otherwise rain-chromatic landscape of Vancouver. That's how they are: the brightness and the scale draws the eye towards them from the most faraway points.

Vanorama - March, 2011
Acrylic on linen canvas, 50" x 20"
Located at: Private Collection (SOLD)

I planned this one in my head for a while. Vancouver is one of those cities that becomes like Oz when you see the setting sun reflecting off the buildings. At the "magic hour" when the sun sets, the usually unremarkable white and green buildings become uniformly iridescent and beetle-green against the dark blue mountain backdrop. It is a sublime effect reserved for late summer evenings.

I called it "Vanorama" as a pun on "Panorama," and "Vancouver." I know of no building or view in Vancouver that gives this view. It's an imagined stitched-together view from multiple perspectives. You might be able to see all the bridges and mountains and major landmarks if you were hovering above Queen Elizabeth park or False Creek like a bird.

I also used metallic and pearlized paint to increase the reflectivity and add to the glowing effect on the water and buildings. The stadium on the right-hand side is new. It's no longer the BC Place mushroom but the not-yet-finished crownlike construction. The Lions mountains are visible and not covered in snow which indicates late summer. The new Erikson building is there, too, as wiggly as the rest of the buildings wish they were. There's a harmony to these remembered summer nights when the city is embraced by light and bridges.

Color of Industry - January, 2011
Acrylic on canvas, 50" x 20"
Located at: Personal Collection (NFS)

I did this one for myself to match and uplift my mostly mundane black, white, and beige décor at home. This painting is a blend of my two styles: one of whimsical personification and the other of textural abstraction. The cranes are the most lifelike elements in this painting because the cranes are an omnipresent feature in Vancouver, particularly in East Van. You see them from every street and every level in every building. They're huge and easily personified. Many people think they look like an orange-red version of the Star Wars snow walkers.

Vancouver was built on industry. Much of the reverential sculptures around False Creek pay tribute to our industrial past, even though most people would just as soon that past never existed. It took years for False Creek to recover from the industrial sludge that killed most of the wildlife. But in the "Hope" category, False Creek now gets visiting whales looking for food!

Still. It's a hard thing to look back on our industrial past with our present environmental view and not feel squeamish. I remember working for a certain forestry processing place that determined water was okay to re-enter the ecosystem if they threw 20 salmon into the recovery pool and three of those salmon lived. Three.

That said, this one was done with a sort of fossilized texture on the city of Vancouver. The sails look like bones, the cracks in the sky appear to be years of washed-over grime. Meanwhile, the orangey-red cranes persist in chromatology, vibrance, and motion.

First & Commercial - December, 2010
Acrylic on canvas, 40" x 30"
Located at: Private Collection (SOLD)

Vancouver's Commercial Drive is one of the more colorful areas in Vancouver. "The Drive," as it is more commonly known, is what I consider Vancouver's "old school" ethnic neighbourhood with loads of Mediterranean, Latin American, and eastern European stores lining the streets. The theme of this painting is soccer.

Commercial Drive is soccer central and the World Cup usually brings this place to a standstill because it is so full of cheering fans. So picture toilet paper rolls being thrown overhead, exuberance, fist-pumping cheers, and if you look closely you might see a series of hidden flags for Spain, Portugal, Italy, Argentina, Brasil, and France. Hint: look at the newspaper boxes on the street and think of stripes on a flag.

Deep Cove III - December, 2010
Acrylic on canvas, 10" x 8"
Located at: Private Collection (SOLD)

Deep Cove is one of the most picturesque hideaway places in North Vancouver. Probably even North America, but we don't want everyone to know about it! The house is not the focus in this one because everyone always heads for the water, so that's where the eye goes. Deep Cove is a huge boating community and is THE place to find undiscovered secluded little shoals.

Vancouver Sunrise - November, 2010
Acrylic on canvas, 40" x 40"
Located at: Private Collection (SOLD) *Giclee Available

I’ve done variations on this scene before, which is what you see when you’re pulling into downtown Vancouver on the seabus. In this one, I decided consciously use more fiery reds and yellows and fewer blues and greens. I wanted the overall effect to be a bouquet of jewel-toned warmth: sapphire, emerald, ruby, and gold.

As much as I love Vancouver, there are more dull days here than bright ones. You get a lot of mist and an unrelenting monochromatic sense of gray every day when you live in a coastal rainforest: gray days in, gray days out, gray days in-between.

This tribute says that after all the endless damp gray-Gray-GRAY when you get a bright day in Vancouver, it is really, REALLY bright. When you wake up and see a clearing in the rain and feel the sun, it feels like all the Vitamin D in your body sits up and shouts, Booyah!

Port of Vancouver: Cranes and Sails - November, 2010
Acrylic on canvas, 72" x 36"
Located at: Solus Corporate Collection (SOLD)

This is the (clearly exaggerated) view from Harbour Center in Vancouver. The first thing that struck me when I saw the panoramic source photo was the stunning cloudscape and the epic lit-from-within lighting. I do love skies!

But what I really liked was the way the Canada Place sails and the big harbour cranes seemed to be facing off. Both of these elements are iconic fixtures in Vancouver. You can see the cranes from various points along the east side, and the sails from much of downtown and the west side. To me they’re symbolic representations of the east side/west side polarity that exists in Vancouver and how there’s always a bit of tension between the two sides. Isn’t that the case everywhere?

I did a bit of a prehistoric take because those big orange cranes always looked like brontosauruses to me. I made the sails look a bit like the desiccated ribcage of some devoured animal. No overt symbolism intended, of course, but I noticed a lot of pleased grins from the east side folks who have seen me working on this. I kept the palette on the warmer side and eschewed my tendency to emphasize the blues and greens in Vancouver. The ultimate focus, of course, is the pathway in towards the mountains via the water. More so than the duality of east and west is the appreciation for the mountains and the water surrounding our fair city

Holy Trinity Ukrainian Orthodox Cathedral - October, 2010
Acrylic on canvas, 10" x 10"
Located at: Private Collection (SOLD)

This was going to be part of my Main Street series. The Holy Trinity Ukrainian Orthodox Cathedral is located a block west of Main on 10th Avenue.

For the past 15 years on the first Friday of every month, they hold their famous "Perogy Night" where they offer a selection of Ukrainian foods. The food is delicious - each perogy is hand made! - and complete hearty dinners are "cheap like borsch" as my Baba would say. It's so popular that there are often line-ups to get in for what is widely considered the best Ukrainian dinner in town.

This is painted with a few Byzantine touches - notably shiny gold foil and my usual somewhat El Greco-influenced style. I intended to make it look a little like praying hands or perhaps vestments.

East Van Cross - July, 2010
Acrylic on canvas, 8" x 10"
Located at: The Beaumont Studios (NFS)

Ken Lum's light statue, Monument for East Vancouver, is installed at East 6th Avenue and Clark Drive and was part of the Olympic Public Art Program.

In the comments section of a Georgia Strait article about the work, an East Van resident described the significance perfectly:

"I remember the East Van cross for what it was, a ubiquitous symbol of rebelliousness with a shady gang history. For me, the East Van Cross was a tag we would proudly put up in washroom walls as our way of saying, we are here, don't forget about us, and don't mess with us.

Vancouver used to have a much bigger divide between East and West, working class and rich, immigrant and white, and the East Van Cross was a reminder to us that we can still hold our head up and be proud of where we came from. And also a reminder to the kids on the west side, that if you come to our school to play a game and you make fun of us, or our cheap cars, or our cheap clothes, that we will have no problem with letting our fists talk for us.

While I'm glad the more violent associations are gone, I'll always be a proud East Vanner, and I myself have drawn a few of those crosses in different places at different times."

My favorite way to display this one is alongside my English Bay Inukshuk painting for the east side / west side dialectic.

City Centre Motel - June, 2010
Acrylic on canvas, 24" x 12"
Located at: The Beaumont Studios

The City Centre Motel was often used for filming Da Vinci's Inquest, a Vancouver-filmed TV show about a coroner. The motel has had its share of real bodies found within.

There is no "turn down" service here with chocolates left on the pillows. This is an inexpensive motel on Main Street geared towards temporary occupants who hide behind closed curtains and consume food and beverages that don't require chilling.

Wallflower on Main - June, 2010
Acrylic on canvas, 20" x 16"
Located at: Private Collection (SOLD)

Eat, Read, Play: this slice of Main Street shows The Wallflower Modern Diner (since January, 2009), Pulp Fiction Books (since 2000), and Guys and Dolls Billiards (open since as long as anyone can remember - at least the '60s).

The Wallflower serves vegan and gluten-free meals as well as diner-style "comfort food" which appeals to a wide range of eclectic clients. Pulp Fiction caters to the tasteful book nerd in that they never purchase "99% of all sports and business books" but literary classics always make the cut. Guys and Dolls is one of Vancouver's largest and oldest pool halls with a sense of cool that comes from not having changed with the times.

The Cobalt - June, 2010
Acrylic on canvas, 10" x 10"
Located at: Private Collection (SOLD)

Like many of the Downtown East Side SRO rooming houses, The Cobalt Motor Hotel was built a century ago as working men's housing. Nowadays, the 92-room motel generates hundreds of emergency calls a year.

It once had a strip bar and a flashing neon sign that said "girls girls girls" but later the bar was one of the bastion venues for punk and heavy metal concerts, hosting bands like Anthrax, Agent Orange, SNFU, and DOA.

It is still billed as a live music venue featuring live music, DJs, and even comedians on some nights.

Burrard Sunset - June, 2010
Acrylic on canvas, 36" x 36"
Located at: Private Collection (SOLD)

There are days when Vancouver is not all green and blue or gray: some days, like late summer, it can be perfectly golden. This shows Burrard Street bridge with dragon-fiery clouds and temperature tenseness. There is only a week or two every summer in Vancouver when we really *need* air conditioning, but, boy, when we need it, we need it. This is one of those days.

Point Atkinson - May, 2010
Acrylic on canvas, 8" x 10"
Located at: Private Collection (SOLD)

This was a quick little painting that I donated to a fundraiser. Happy lighthouse, primary colors, water and sky. Paintings with touches of red, white, green, and blue are always a hit. It's the Crayola appeal. Plus people seem to like lighthouses!

Yaletown - November, 2009
Acrylic on canvas, 36" x 30"
Located at: My home.

I run this path nearly every day. This was a somewhat difficult scene for me because Yaletown's waterfront architecture tends towards an unremarkable sameness. It is hard to caricaturize or exaggerate such a homogenous view.

But when you consider how the scene represents the majority of the inhabitants, it makes sense to depict the buildings as relatively similar and crowded together. Vancouver, and Yaletown in particular, is a very health-conscious city. On any given morning you are likely to pass joggers, booty-camp classes, and even seaside yoga enthusiasts all striving towards fitter forms no matter how foul the weather.

About.com notes this about Yaletown residents:

Whoever they are, there are certain traits all Yaletown locals share: they love their gyms, their yoga, their weekends in Whistler, their easy access to the area's gourmet food and hip nightlife, and their dogs. Little dogs are de rigueur.

This scene shows a group of buildings clustered off and "admiring" the one building on the left. The sky above is punctuated by thought-bubble heart clouds while the seawall winds sinuously past a drink-umbrella gazebo and some frivolous trees. There's also the Quayside Marina and the classic blue-green shades of Vancouver.

I rarely put people or animals in my paintings. I usually prefer to let the architecture personify the denizens, but I couldn't resist putting in (look close!) several tiny dogs in dresses prancing about. There's something vaguely disconcerting about seeing a miniature terrier wearing both a tutu and a muzzle. Generally, the dogs are pretty well-behaved. Or perhaps just… humiliated. (PS: This commercial cracks me up)

Joe's on Commercial - October, 2009
Acrylic on canvas, 20" x 16"
Located at: The Beaumont Studios

Joe's Café Bar is an unpretentious coffee-sandwich-bar place on "the Drive." You can go there and enjoy watching Brazillian telenovelas as well as camaraderie-filled World Cup games. There is bench seating, Formica tables, fluorescent lighting and lots of kitschy décor. The owners unapologetically shrug off the low-key appearance and say it has a café style "straight out of Portugal".

The building itself is more of a soft peach color, but I wanted to have green and red - the colors of the flag of Portugal - as the dominant colors. The low, slouchy awnings are a bit like Joe's characteristic eyebrows. The "Joes" rainbow-coffee mural juxtaposed with the Commercial Drive road sign is a representative combination and reminiscent of the often optimistic and socially-conscious patrons.

Lastly, one might argue that the wavy, jittery style is appropriate for a place that makes the best cappuccino in town.

Carnegie Centre at Hastings and Main - September, 2009
Acrylic on canvas, 20" x 16"
Located at: Private Collection (EO) (SOLD)

Hastings and Main is the "ground zero" intersection of the downtown east side, Vancouver's oldest and arguably most troubled neighbourhood. There is an unfurtive drug trade that operates at this intersection and in the alleys surrounding this building, the Carnegie Community Centre.

The Carnegie Community Centre began as a public library, but now hosts a number of services and programs for the neighbourhood. There are thousands of people who use the centre every week for anything from HIV/AIDS support groups, Humanities programs, pottery classes and even ballroom dancing. It is one of the most well-attended community centres in Vancouver. The Vancouver Courier wrote:

"Over its 100 years, the Carnegie has attracted thousands of people from all walks of life-fishermen, loggers, addicts, the abused, the mentally ill, the homeless, politicians and the police, to name a few. And no matter how hard life is on the outside, it's clear there's something for most people inside, even if it's just a temporary refuge from hard reality. As Wells puts it, when a person walks through the front doors at 401 Main St., he's on "neutral territory-an environment where there's no intimidation, just a spot to relax.""

This depiction shows the centre with a slightly-askew hat, like the jaunty touques worn by some of the patrons, and with the two front columns bent like praying hands, cupping a flame.

Capitol Hill - September, 2009
Acrylic on canvas, 36" x 30"
Located at: Private Collection (SOLD)

This is the view looking west from Capitol Hill in Burnaby. It has characteristic elements of Vancouver which aren't easily seen from a single vantage point: the industrial buildings and sulphur piles, the sprawl of north shore mountains, the tree-rich tip of Stanley Park, a freighter, a slice of East Vancouver, as well as the Lion's Gate and Second Narrows bridges. Those two bridges are hard to get in one vantage point. To me they represent two sides of Vancouver: East Van and West Van.

On opposite sides of the water, you have the residential neighbourhood facing off against the industrial waterfront. The highlight in the middle plows underneath both bridges towards the layers and layers of mountains. The mountains frame Vancouver and cup it in a constant chalice of motion with the water swirling in the center.

To my mind, the things that really make Vancouver Vancouver are not its man-made landmarks and bridges but rather their setting of mountains and sea, the predominance of blue and green, and the sense that there are endlessly repeating layers beyond the ones we see in front of us. It's the optimistic siren-call of the west.

The Beaumont - August, 2009
Acrylic on canvas, 10" x 10"
Located at: The Beaumont Studios (SOLD)

This is my studio building at 316 W. 5th Avenue, where I work. Or try to, most of the time!

One of my "things" to do with an architectural piece is use abstraction to personify the building so it represents its inhabitants. I had intended to make the building cheerful and welcoming (it is! and we are!) but the treatment came out a little… fierce and demented.

It reminds me of Bruce the shark from Finding Nemo. The clouds look like steam puffs and give it an almost mechanistic or industrial. It looks busy - but cheerfully so.

Kits Point - July, 2009
Acrylic on canvas, 24" x 36"
Located at: Private Collection (SOLD)

This is a bright rendition of the Kits Point "dog beach" where people walk their dogs. More specifically, the white structure at the tip marks Elsje Point, a quiet little spit just down from the Maritime Museum.

The water of Vancouver is more often a dark green than a blue: it reflects the trees that line the shores and is also coloured within by the seaweed and algae. The waves are random but repetitive.

The distinct green-blue Vancouver mountains slouch over a decidedly more colourful English Bay. English Bay is where we hold our annual and much-loved fireworks competition and this point is a prime viewing spot.

The Yale - June, 2009
Acrylic on canvas, 12" x 12"
Located at: Private Collection (SP) (SOLD)

The Yale is located right at the foot of the Granville Street bridge in Vancouver. It's one of those classic bars - everyone who lives here has been at least once.

It's old - over 100 years - which is darn near ancient for the west coast. Some of the most famous names in R&B have played here.

The Ivanhoe - May, 2009
Acrylic on canvas, 10" x 10"
Located at: Private Collection (SOLD)

The Ivanhoe was a bar I often visited when I worked on Great Northern Way. The stylized distortion here is reminiscent of a paper bag, which is sometimes the beverage holder of choice for many of the local denizens.

I like the place. I always felt at home at the Ivanhoe. It is frequented by bike couriers as well as laborers and tradespeople and is essentially a neighborhood pub. It reminds me, still, of the many bars in Kamloops.

Coal Harbour Panorama II - May, 2009
Acrylic on canvas, 30" x 20"
Located at: Private collection (SOLD)

Variation on my first Coal Harbour Panorama one with a more compressed aspect ratio. Stanley Park is vast, yes, but the views across the water always seem closer and more intimate than they actually are. I guess we get used to the space.

Coal Harbour from Hallelujah Point - March, 2009
Acrylic on canvas, 40" x 30"
Located at: Private collection (SOLD) *Giclee Available

This is a dynamic take on Coal Harbour's serene skyline as seen from Hallelujah Point on Stanley Park. The intention is to make it appear as if a fist grabbed the whole view and shook it or gathered it into a bouquet, leaving the buildings pleated and crumpled.

The cranes were almost an afterthought but Vancouver is full of them. These ones here are pointing out of the canvas, which is a no-no according to rules of composition. However, there are enough elements, like the clouds and waves, pointing inwards that it creates tension and adds to the sense of motion. The eye doesn't know where to rest. This restlessness is characteristic of Vancouver itself: the changing snowline on the mountains, the varicolored sea, the endlessly reflecting and erecting buildings, plus all kinds of bodies in motion. It's an active city.

City Hall - March, 2009
Acrylic on canvas, 20" x 16"
Located at: Private Collection (SP) (SOLD)

I lived on 12th and Cambie, kitty-corner to City Hall, when I moved to Vancouver for good almost 20 years ago.

The building has often been portrayed with Orwellian 1984-ish overtones in many paintings and photos. It can be an imposing structure. This take is more playful, with festive fall trees and collapsed wedding-cake architecture. The green light emanating from the windows is the same shade that might be seen in banker's lamps or accountant's visors. The light is late afternoon sharp from the west.

But surely the turbulent clouds on the horizon are not at all symbolic.

Steveston - February, 2009
Acrylic on canvas, 10" x 10"
Located at: Private Collection (MG)

This painting shows the Charthouse Restaurant on the wharf at Steveston village in Richmond. Today, Steveston still maintains the character of a quaint, historic fishing village, with over 600 fishing boats––Canada's largest fleet––calling Steveston Harbour home.

The wharf has a lot of restaurants and shops. If you go down to the docks, you can buy shrimp, prawns, salmon and halibut straight from the fishing boats. Seafood doesn’t get any fresher.

Downtown Granville - November, 2008
Acrylic on canvas, 40" x 30"
Located at: Private collection (SOLD)

I originally conceived this one to be part of a show on Vancouver Neighborhoods. This is looking north down Granville Street at Nelson.

One of my studio mates observed, as I was painting it, that the Scotia tower building on the right looked a little like a female dress form. It does. And the TD tower on the left looks a little like a male in a suit and tie. That was unconscious personification.

But think of high school dances: you know how girls always gather on one side, and boys on the other? It always felt like there was an uncrossable gulf between the two.

So when one considers this in the context of neighborhoods... well, this part of Vancouver has the highest density of bars and pubs and meeting places in the city.

Coal Harbour - September 19, 2008
Acrylic on Canvas, 48" x 24"
Located at: Private collection (SOLD)

This is the view from the top of the Pan Pacific, overlooking Coal Harbour, Stanley Park, and the North Shore. Obviously, some elements have been exaggerated!

VAG - June 8, 2008
Acrylic on Canvas, 20" x 20"
Located at: NSCU Whistler

VAG = stands for "Vancouver Art Gallery" (ah, no, not what one might immediately think when one sees those three letters together). The VAG was originally designed as a courthouse and still frequently plays one in many of the movies and TV shows that are filmed in Vancouver. The gallery contains lots of Canadiana such as Emily Carr and many of the Group of Seven painters.

My memories of VAG are of sitting on the steps in my early 20s, smoking, wearing Doc Martens and too much eyeliner and some silly peasant dress. It was always a well-known meeting point because the vantage from the steps lent itself to excellent people-watching. You were never bored, waiting there.

I painted this one as I remember it best, always late afternoon, early evening, with a golden-pink glow from the lowering sun.

Alexander and Main - May 26, 2008
Acrylic on Canvas, 20" x 20"
Located at: Private collection (SOLD) *Giclée available

Some might consider Alexander and Main to be the bad part of town. It is near the docks in the heart of Vancouver's famous but frightening Downtown East Side. The thing that people don't always notice - especially late at night - is there is a real sense of community here. People know each other. You can hear them holler greetings from open windows.

Yes, the sky is a Van Gogh ripoff. I wanted to make the tones of the buildings warm with vinelike city fixtures. The sky and street are colder and more unstable.

Progression is here.

Planetarium - May 26, 2008
Acrylic on Canvas, 28" x 22"
Located at: NSCU Whistler

One from my running route: this is the view from the Burrard Bridge looking out at the Pacific ocean and down on Vanier Park. Key buildings are the Haida-hatted Planetarium and the Maritime museum. There is also a ubiquitous red-bottomed freighter in the distance framed by layers of mountains and scuddy clouds. Mind you, this is more what the view would look like if one were hovering above and squeezing the whole thing, accordion-like, as evidenced by my more panoramic but less colourful reference photo.

I have yet to see one of the famous laser light shows at the H.R. Macmillan space center. Apparently this is quite the thing to do if you have ingested any of our local hallucinogenic specialities.

I was trying to do something more soothing with this scene, but I guess I just can't do placid and calm. Everything vibrates to me.

Progression is here.

Granville Island II - May 2, 2008
Acrylic on Canvas, 36" x 30"
Located at: Private collection (AB) (SOLD) *Giclée available

Slight variation on Granville Island Morning but a lot more chaotic with the color and, truthfully, real Vancouverites will know that the mountains aren't quite positioned as such in this particular angle. Also, my reference photo was taken in the summer but I wanted more color and snow on the mountains, so I changed the season to autumn and the lighting to late morning.

Nonetheless, the office buildings of the downtown core are uniform, regular, and reflective compared to the bright ex-industrial mess that is my beloved Granville Island community. I live there, my son goes to school there, my gym and community center and gallery are all there. I know this place and all its corners and grooves and rats-nests like the back of my hand. I drove over that bridge every day for years.

This is my third take on this scene. I wanted to emphasize the contrast of the downtown regularity against the neon-bright GI community separated by the lovely art deco Burrard Street bridge.

Progression is here

Heroin Alley - October 21, 2007
Acrylic on Canvas, 30" x 60" (2.5' X 5')
Located at: Solus Corporate Collection (SOLD)

This one was on my to do list for a while. It's a real place, though I'm sure "Heroin Alley" is not the municipal name. The actual alley is right at the start of Vancouver's downtown east side between Hastings and Pender at Cambie, looking onto Victory Square. It is where a lot of addicts go to shoot up. It's a real problem in the DTES.

Aesthetically, I always liked the contrast of the red bricks against the greenbelt and the dramatic lighting in my flukey source photo. The composition seemed kind of symbolic: dark alley looking onto the light, tunnel through to greener landscapes, yada yada. There's a metaphor for surviving or for overcoming stuff. It's still hopeful. As for the whole picture, I can kind of see an anguished face in the building itself.

I've been told these tall verticals are less saleable, but this one just had to be door-sized. So there you have it.

Progression is here.

Science World - September 3, 2007
Acrylic on Canvas, 24"x 18"
Located at: Private Collection (SOLD)

Another quintessential Vancouver scene: Science World, built back in 1986 for Expo, is one of my son's favorite places to go. Then there's the backdrop of BC Place along with Wall Center (far left) and the ubiquitous Scotia Tower. Science World is now known as "Telusphere" due to corporate sponsorship, but hopefully that does not extend to painting titles! It'll always be Science World to me just because I always want to lisp when I try to say "Teluthpere."

The things I liked about the source photo were (1) lots of blue, (2) lots of rounded shapes, and (3) lots of Crayola color that I could emphasize in the posters.

There's a lot of up-and-down tumbling movement to this one, like hyped-up kids on sugar. There you go: no deep meaning, just fun. Kind of like a field trip, perhaps!

Progression is here.

Vancouver Rowing Club - June 24, 2007
Acrylic on Canvas, 36"x 36"
Located at: Private collection (PC) (SOLD)

When I saw the source photo, I knew it had tremendous potential. However, the source photo was taken about 25-30 years ago, and the Rowing Club today is not a reddish brown anymore. Today, the building is very dark brown with white accents. I thought about being anachronistic but then figured it's just too recognizable a building, so I better update it. Thing is, the reddish brown made for a better, more colorful composition. So I guess I kind of kept it, now that I look at it, though I was planning to update it.

The picture I had in my head just did not want the building to be a dark chocolate brown. It also wanted to be filled with bright 1980's style boats, so I left those, too, including the colorful tarps. They are much brighter than the bland white ones that park there today.

The only message about this painting, if there is one, is this is a place where people have celebrations: they get married, they have anniversary parties, they celebrate life here. The clouds look like balloons, the trees look like birthday candles, and the boats and water have all sorts of confetti color in them. It's just happy, that's all.

Progression is here.

Sulfur Piles - May 26, 2007
Acrylic on Canvas, Triptych, 54" wide (18" x 3) x 36" tall.
Located at: Private collection (WP&CB) (SOLD) *Giclée available

Commission piece. These are Vancouver's famous Sulfur Piles. I know a lot of people here get bugged by the intrusion of industry on nature, but it's really a quintessential Vancouver scene caught on one of those perfect late-afternoon winter days. There were a lot of things I immediately loved about the source photo: the contrast of the mountains, the lines, and how the machinery mirrors them but is really kind of dwarfed by them. I loved the touches of extremely bright color in the freighter and the sulfur itself (I'd been dying to break out this tube of fluorescent yellow!) Plus I'm better with man-made objects: give me a pure nature scene and I'm meh, but throw in some machinery or some buildings and I seem to do better. And the freighter really is called "Wisdom Line" - how perfect.

I did it as a triptych because there was a lot to focus on and I wanted to get the sense of panorama in there. One thing I changed with my style was breaking away from the longer, looser brushstrokes. This one has a lot of shorter choppy Van Gogh-y brushstrokes to capture the snow on the mountains and the weird little highlights you get in winter. Also, I avoided putting on any accent clouds in the sky just because the middle plane is busy enough.

One last thing: a fascinating sulfur fact that I discovered is that sulfur = brimstone. I always wondered what brimstone was. It always seemed to be associated with hell and punishment, e.g. hellfire and brimstone, Revelation 20:10: "And the devil who deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and brimstone, etc." Interesting that Vancouver is kind of a major clearing house for it. It's also considered to be a major alchemy ingredient. I was a little concerned about the brimstone connection until I read this one: "In alchemy the names given to the three essentials are Body, Soul, and Spirit, or respectively, Salt, Sulfur, and Mercury." So I guess in alchemy, at least, sulfur also symbolizes the soul. That's a relief. And one more stretch o' meaning: as a very lapsed Catholic, triangles always used to symbolize the holy trinity for me - Father, Son, HG, and all that. Okay, I'm just getting carried away now. It's not that deep - but you've got to admit the sulfur bit is interesting!

Kitsilano Neighborhood II - February 8, 2007
Acrylic on Canvas, 30" X 24"
Located at: Private collection (CB) (SOLD)

This is a redo of one of my more popular ones: Kitsilano Neighborhood. Comparing this one with my earlier efforts, version II does seem brighter. I remember staring at it and going, "But it looks just like the other one; usually I like to improve on what I've done!"

Thing is, I guess it's the subtle improvements that help. I've learned a bit more about how to make colors screamingly bright. In this one, the bushes are yellow, which gives it more of an every-crayon-in-the-box feel. Otherwise, it's the same crowded, bright houses and slopy bridges. Movement and instability - characteristic of Kits.

Progression is here.

Vancouver Core - January 7, 2007
Acrylic on Canvas, 36" X 30"
Located at: Private collection (SOLD)

This is the Lonsdale Quay/Seabus View of Vancouver based (very liberally) on this Vancity Core shot.

The classic Vancouver elements are the sails of Canada Place as well as the Sears (Harbor Center) tower on the left. I took a lot of liberties with the overall architecture as well as with the colors, which I wanted to be crayon-bright for some reason.

Sad story on this one and a good lesson with acrylics: I was *almost done* back in early Dec. and was just sanding down some of those annoying acrylic bumps that develop. I decided I would rinse the dusty residue off faster in the sink: who knew the acrylic would peel off in SHEETS like that?

So this is actually the second version of the same painting since I accidentally and entirely rinsed off version #1, which I suspect was a cosmic statement that it just wasn't good enough or something. Anyway, here it is, repainted, recolored, and now I can go on to the next, whatever that is.

Progression is here.

Lion's Gate Bridge - December 18, 2006
Acrylic on Canvas, 30" X 24"
Located at: Private collection (T&SS) (SOLD)

My holiday project. Everyone always takes photographs of Vancouver's very iconic Lion's Gate bridge from Prospect Point, which is that reddish rock there on the right. However, the view from West Vancouver is much more interesting because you get the city of Vancouver in the background, framed by Ambleside park.

The painting is hanging in a place with fairly neutral decor (beiges and natural woods). I asked if I could "go more colorful" and they agreed, so I did.

I kind of like all the wiggly bits in the picture - the seawall and the vertical and horizontal lines of the the bridge. Meanwhile, the trees point up and the clouds push down.

Progression is here.

Granville Island Morning - October 21, 2006
Acrylic on Canvas, Triptych, (3 x 18" wide X 36" tall), so 54" wide X 36" tall - or 4'6" x 3'.
Located at: Private collection (TW) (SOLD) *Giclee Available

This one is a variation of Granville Island 21. The customer had a lot of yellow and green decor. I had taken several panoramas of this view back in August, but I wanted to do an autumn version to get more reds into the picture. I also changed the time of day to early morning (see how the light is coming from the right). There are some metallics, so parts of the painting glow when the light hits it.

When I drive over the Cambie Street bridge in the morning, I always notice the soft, warm light hitting the buildings and the green-and-yellow cast to the water, so it's representative. The trees are just turning color now, so my inspiration was just looking out the window.

I like how the buildings are taller and more willowy than in my earlier version. They kind of remind me of flowers, turning towards the sun, while Granville Island is all crazy and bright. I wanted to emphasize the contrast of Granville Island and the Vancouver cityscape a little more. I think it worked a little better with this one.

Here is a brief progression with my planning notes.

Granville Island 21 - July 30, 2006
Acrylic on Canvas, 36" x 24"
Located at: Private collection (DMB) (SOLD)

More fun with local neighborhoods! This is a picture of the edge of Granville Island as seen when walking across the Granville Street Bridge.

The usual twisty buildings and slightly exaggerated bridge. I gave it more of a Thalo green cast than I've done before, though. All in all, it has a very shades-of-Vancouver palette. I think what I was trying to capture, though, was the contrast of the bright crazy buildings of Granville Island compared to the relatively serene cityscape of downtown. I could have made Granville Island brighter and more bunched-up, but for now - I'm still getting used to using that bright a shade of yellow!

Here it is In Progress.

False Creek - June 4, 2006
Acrylic on Canvas, 36" x 24"
Located at: Private Residence

Another local neighborhood scene. I like this style, with the wiggly, exaggerated buildings and cartoony outlines. It's almost like doing a caricature. Then again, neighborhoods often have just as much character as people do, so distorting, abstracting, and overemphasizing the features just seems to bring out more of what people like about it.

This one focuses on the characteristic Vancouver traits: blue-green buildings, water, mountains, all kinds of different vegetation, and a crane 'cause it's always under construction.

Kitsilano Neighborhood - March 5, 2006
Acrylic on Canvas, 30" x 20"
Located at: Private collection (KZ) (SOLD)

This is an example of making everyday scenes interesting and extraordinary through warped perspective and bright cheerful colors.

I like the everyday stuff, scenes and images that people recognize because they walk by them everyday. Sometimes, there are days when something just ordinary becomes absolutely beautiful, due to whatever effects of light or season or one's own mood. That's what I was trying to capture with this Kitsilano neighborhood. Here's the progression.

It's a street in Kits on 7th Avenue between MacDonald and Stephens. I used to live near there about a decade or so ago. This is a picture for my brother's place: he lives just behind the red tree, actually. There's a wall in his place that needs a painting - a wide expanse that you see right when you walk in the door. So, I guess my goal was to create something cheerful that you see right when walking in the door - after just having seen the real thing outside.

One viewer noted that the interesting points are: why is that one house red? (I didn't invent that, it really is) and why would someone make their house red when all the other houses are blues and greens? And why does that one house on the left not have white trim? Again, that's how it is. He also liked the sloping staircases, which reminded him of bridges. I like them too - it gives the painting some motion, some instability. That's also characteristic of Kits.

I think my favorite thing is the sky (of course) and I like the autumn tree. It wasn't autumn when I took the picture, but I've seen Kits in autumn. To me, this is one of those ephemeral September afternoons where everything is crisp and clean and bright and the trees are turning colors. The stage only lasts for about a week in Vancouver before the rain starts!