...THERE'S SOMETHING ABOUT LOUISE

Hello gentle readers, I thought I might give you a little background about me, and my work....


Picture it. 2003. Toronto East B.S. (Before Starbucks). It was the best it times, it was the worst of times.  Actually, it was pretty much JUST the worst of times. For although I had a 33" waist and sun-kissed blond highlights in my thick wavy hair, life was not so great! I was living in a tiny 2 bedroom apartment, in a little 3 story walk up called "Louise" (No, seriously! It was literally carved in stone on the outside of the building - although I always thought of her as less of a ‘Louise’ and more of a “Lester”). Louise, built in 1937, barely had any heating and was far away from the downtown club scene that I loved so much at the time! I was working full time for an evil mural conglomerate that was bent on world domination, and they were feeding slowly on my soul. On the weekends, I began experimenting with my own paintings (in between the drinking binges!) I remember at the time, I didn't have an easel so I stapled canvas up on the wall, yes, that’s right renters, directly onto the plaster walls in the spare bedroom! Louise didn't seem to mind. I am not sure if it was Louise’s influence, but at the time I was super hot for all things Deco. It was the simple lines of the architecture, and graphic quality of the artwork that lured me into researching more about the retro-style. Being a muralist, I was used to doing tonnes of research and spent many hours at the reference library, looking through books for great ideas. Yes kids, I said BOOKS. For those of y’all too young to understand, think of books as a sort of a tangible representation of the content you now find through Google on the world wide interwebs. Sufficed to say, these first paintings, were very literally based on Art Deco stained glass. At the time, I thought it was a stroke of brilliance. Now, in retrospect, meh! But, here is the great thing about painting. A painting career is not unlike, say, a trip out east on a train. It is more about the journey than the final destination. All that research lead me to my next series of work – The Fairytale Series, which actually was kinda good! (More about those in a later post.)  I got these Deco pieces (and several others) done in time for my first exhibition.  And although the blue one was bought on opening night, unfortunately it was bought by Husband. I am not sure why Husband liked it so much, but to this day it hangs in the guest room of our little house. Although it makes my eye twitch, and my nose wrinkle when I look at it,  it serves as a constant reminder of how far I have come, and reminds me of those special, times at Louise. The End......
What do you think...interesting little story? Wanna hear more?