Story:
It's a month of whimsical wonder at the Foyer Gallery as new creation line the walls and emerge in the cases in the run-up to the annual fundraiser wine and cheese event in the evening of Monday, May 3.
The annual fundraiser exhibit contains over 30 donated works. Come and feast your eyes on wonders of weavings, pottery, painting, photography, jewellery and sculpture.
Sponsors receive an invitation to the Foyer Gallery soir茅e where your name is entered into a draw for these pieces of original artwork valued at up to $600.
This event is the best-kept secret for art enthusiasts in Squamish.
The first works to capture the imagination as folks enter the Squamish Public Library foyer this month are Catherine B茅gin's distinctive, free-spirited paintings that could be characterized as nature gone whimsical.
Angelic fairies, spiritual gardens and celestial bodies are common images in her extraordinary scenes. B茅gin reveals, as some of her vision and experience.
"I like to make space in my life for whimsical encounters of the magic world that is nature," she said. "I like to sit quietly somewhere until the winds create colours in my eyes and on my skin. I like to lie down somewhere in a field and wait to see what I will hear and wait for the sounds to reveal their colours."
B茅gin developed a fascination with the arts at an early age and expanded her interest obtaining her fine arts diploma. She later studied Art Education at Concordia where she was exposed to a wide variety of mediums and approaches.
Whether it has been the art industry, the field of art education, creating paintings or greeting cards, art is the focus in her life. B茅gin is a narrative painter inspired by movement and the blending of the natural elements.
"Creating a painting is often a quest for balance between dynamism and stillness, between the singular forms and the wholeness of the scene, between the surprising details and the grossness of the big picture," she said.
"Recently, I have been visually fascinated with food, especially with how it emerges out of dirt. Especially how, when touching the soil and spending a little time with it, dirt and little treasures transform into these amazing shapes and textures."
B茅gin's paintings project these matters of life, richness, soil and wonderment.
"I have always been fascinated with the spirit of a place. When I paint a place, it's about its' energy."
B茅gin is excited about growth within her watercolour medium, looking forward to a bigger studio space and using it to create a series of gigantic landscapes. She feels bigger paintings emerging.
B茅gin is interested in all aspects of sustainable and self-sufficient living supporting her passion for making and creating whimsy and magic.
