Avis Rasmussen - Paintings from Provence

Preview Saturday, October 13, 2007 10 am - 5:30 pm

(work subject to prior sale)

Opening Reception Sunday, October 14, 2007 1:00 pm - 5:00 pm

Artist in attendance; Elizabeth Ely, harpist

Exhibition continues until October 31, 2007

Avis Rasmussen grew up in the 1940s in a large English country garden overlooking the shore of the ocean near Sidney, British Columbia. Subsequently, her plein air sketches tend to depict the world as a garden in which both the natural landscape and urban spaces are expressions of humankind's need to gently cultivate nature into art.

In November 2006 Rasmussen exhibited several small paintings at Winchester Galleries in Oak Bay that she produced in Umbria, Italy, last summer. This October she will show four watercolours and seven oils that she produced during a three week painting trip to the south of France. The exhibition includes paintings of gardens, markets and sidewalks in the cities of Aix En Provence and Menton. As well, she produced quick studies of Mont St. Victoire, views of the historic architecture of Avignon, and sketches of the Mediterranean coast toward Monaco.

While her Italian sketches captured the earthy colours and abstract patterns of the hilly Umbrian farmland, Rasmussen's new paintings pay homage to the natural bright pastel colours and atmospheric perspectives of this area of France that has been made famous by several generations of artists since the era of Paul Cezanne and Vincent van Gogh.

Brian Grison, July 2007