The Pandemic shut Yellowknife down in March 2020. However, we knew our small size was a real advantage. We obtained permission from our CPHO to take the gallery on house-calls! In April and May, folks contacted us via social media to book an appointment. We rolled up to their house, condo, or apartment. It was a safe, isolation-friendly, and intimate way to view art! Some neighbourhoods organized block-visits too. We might just be the only gallery that didn't once close down during the pandemic!
For these gallery house-calls, we showed Conversations with Clouds; the art of Shelley Vanderbyl, born in Hay River NT but living in Comox BC (and paintings of organics by emerging YK artist Becki Petersen). Shelley makes plaster frescoes. She adds layers upon layers of plaster, then scrapes parts away until a satisfying image emerges. She paints tiny paintings inside vintage medicine tins - 'dispensing' them to viewers as good medicine - offering solace and comfort. Her series of cloud paintings was informed by by her husband's stories. He's a search and rescue pilot, and these small oil studies depicting views through fogginess and clouds are about the struggle we often have to 'find' and connect with one another. Shelley's work is restful, and many found it therapeutic.
