You’re out for a run, bundled up to ward off the cold. Your heart rate is soaring and you’re starting to feel like you could take on the world. The endorphins aren’t letting you down. Local artist and former Camosun student and Nexus contributor Jean Oliver says painting gives her this same sense of invigoration. She says that she often paints in nature—on the beach, for example, or at Beacon Hill Park—and people love it.
“They’ll be walking by with their dog or something and I’ll be painting, and they’ll want it,” says Oliver, who got an associate degree in Creative Writing in 2013 and one in Psychology in 2014. “I’ve actually had a few commissions that way—they like what I’m doing, and later on I’ll do them a painting that’s sort of to their living-room colours.”
Oliver’s latest show, Murmurating, is named after what birds do to fly with cohesion and not hit one another.
“Painting art is kind of like murmuration,” she says. “I really find that interacting when I’m creating is quite inspiring, and then if I need to work hard I come into my studio and don’t talk to anyone while I’m working.”
Coming up with ideas is not an issue these days, says Oliver; the challenge lies in “channelling and focusing.”
“I’m just really comfortable with either painting over a piece of crap, or cutting the canvas up entirely,” she says. “Sometimes you can’t paint over, because the image comes through the ridges and things from the previous disaster.”
Oliver gets inspiration from Emily Carr, who also painted in nature a lot. Oliver has been working outside since she was young.
“As a child, I always sketched and did watercolour outdoors and Emily Carr was kind of my invisible friend. Her teachings have always been something that has inspired me,” says Oliver. “One of the things she urges is painting outdoors. There’s a spontaneity to the piece that you can’t get in the studio in a controlled environment.”
In the past, Oliver has worked indoors, using photographs as her inspiration, particularly when she had her kids to look after. She says she got bored with it and put it aside for a long time, but now she’s back in nature, where she works best.
“The idea that you’re dealing with the elements is invigorating,” she says, adding that being outdoors is reflected in the piece. “The pieces are rougher; they’re not tidy, controlled pieces.”
The people who consume the art play an important role, too, she says. She says the idea of murmuration extends to humans, as well. If we move as one, and support one another, we will help each other.
“We’re all connected in this grand conversation,” she says. “An artist without art lovers, without people to see our art, people to talk to about our art—it’s just pictures. Creating is a layered thing, and that’s why I love the idea of murmuration, where we can all move together as a community and support the artist and at the same time increase our own mental health.”
Oliver has struggled with mental-health issues for much of her life. She is one of the founders of the Pandora Arts Collective, a mental-health project that started up 12 years ago.
“That was a place for people to create without boundaries,” she says, giving as an example of a boundary the time limits imposed in similar programs offered by the government.
Oliver’s dedication to the project comes from her own experiences. She knows as well as anyone how important art can be.
“I do it,” she says about painting, “because if I didn’t, I would go crazy.”
Murmurating
1 pm to 4 pm Tuesdays and Thursdays, February 6 to 27
Opening party 1 to 4 pm Saturday, February 3
Free, Little Fernwood Gallery (1923 Fernwood Road)
littlefernwoodgallery.ca