Featured Artist: Lezlie Winemaker

Richmond Hill Studio Tour is awesome!!! I look forward to exhibiting at the show each year! First of all, getting to spend the weekend with such talented artists, share ideas and actually get to see their artwork is inspirational. Boynton House has such character and it's a beautiful location, full of light, and a wonderful place to show off our art!

It's great to have the community come out and show support. I must give credit to the amazing staff and volunteers that make this weekend such a success! I have participated in several other studio tours and it is unheard of to have the Town be running the show. Plus the dedicated people that volunteer so much time to make this event a success are invaluable!

I have met so many fellow bead lovers whom I look forward to seeing every year! Some of them have become true friends! I became instant friends with one couple in particular after meeting them at the show. It was meant to be because of the instant laughter! I knew we were kindred spirits! After all "laughter cures everything"!!!! They have even gone so far as to get my son into an amazing apprenticeship program with an great future!!! The conversations with the different people I meet are diverse, interesting, entertaining and you get to learn something new each day!!!

 

I have been creating my entire life! I started with beading as a child when my grandmother gave me a brown paper bag filled with beads to play with. What a treasure! I wish I could see into that bag today?!?!? As a teen, leather was my medium. From vests, to lampshades, I did it all. I attended art school where textiles and metalsmithing came into my life. I spent many years after graduating creating leather, metal, and enamelled accessories. In 1993 I was reading an art magazine when I saw the amazing beads of Loren Stump and Pati Walton. Their beads took my breath away and I actually gasped!!! I knew I had to do this. It took me 4 years to actually amass enough information to feel confident in lighting up the torch for glass in my home, especially since I had young children to protect! 2 months before giving birth to my 4th child I lit that torch for the first time, and I have never looked back!

Glass is my true passion. It is my meditation, a silent journey, melting, twisting, layering, squishing, blowing and sculpting, with glass rods to create one of a kind miniature worlds in glass! Each bead and object has a life of it's own. People bond to a bead, image, colour, or story that has a special meaning for them. The feedback I receive is so gratifying. People tell me they get stopped every time they wear their bead. What can I say...glass is shiny and we are like the crows, always attracted to shiny things!!!

Lampworking or flameworking is an ancient technique from Murano Italy, that was passed from father to son for centuries. If they divulged the secret they could face death!!! It has only been for the past 25 or 30 years that people worldwide have figured it out, adopted their techniques and shared their glass. To watch a maestro from Murano transform glass into the most beautiful and life like figures, dancing, moving, expressing, is like watching a dance unto itself. It is simply awe inspiring!!!

Recently I have had the honour of making "cremation beads" for families that have lost a loved one. They tell me stories of their loved ones, favourite colours, and symbolism that remind them of the person, and I create a special memory bead which actually contains their ashes encased within the bead!!!

Although my main focus is glass, I still continue to create in any medium that strikes my fancy. I still love the leather and metals, but you will always find a piece of glass on it! I love learning and experimenting with different materials. Because of my vast knowledge (and many years of experience) I teach a lot. My classes range from lampwork to metals, enamelling and leatherwork, to beads and even macrame!!! (I know the macrame dates me, but it's new and fresh approach!!!) I am limited to the size of glass objects I can create because I have to keep it hot with a torch, so I fall on my other skills to create finished jewelry and larger sculpture! I have just acquired a mig welder and am teaching myself to weld flowers etc to showcase my glass. Sometimes I feel like a mad scientist!!! Creating for me, is my life source...like breathing is for most!

The studio tour is just around the corner and I look forward to seeing you all there!!! Until then, I will be melting something.....

Featured Artist: Andrea End

 
Memorable Moment at a past Studio Tour,

Seeing my grade 6 teacher.
Although Gloria is on my contact list I had not seen her in over 20 years. I was speaking with some studio tours guests when I turned around and there she was in front of me. It was lovely to catch up and be able to show her what I have been up to!

Three Facts about my work.

1. Why Landscapes? I love to be outside in the forest or by water. (Mountains would work too, there just aren’t any in southern Ontario) Its restful, calming, simplifying.
2. Why gouache? I love colour, shapes, shadow and light. Gouache allows me to paint these shapes in the landscape clearly. No washes, no moving paint around on the board.
3. Why 3 colours? I keep things simple. I paint using the 3 primary colours, and white, mixing whatever colours I need in my paintings. Each colour I use is a combination of those 3 primaries, it feels like one colour that I can pull into various directions.

It feels like the Studio Tours is just around the corner. I am looking forward to meeting with people and seeing and hearing their reactions to my work.

Featured Artist: Kate Liubansky

 Tell us what you are most looking forward to about this years Studio Tour

I look forward to meeting people with different artistic backgrounds and experience. I'm excited to get feedback from visitors about my photos and frames, as well as my theme and overall concept. I also look forward to hearing other people's interpretation of my images and the connections they make based on their personal experience.

Photo by Kate Liubansky, Taken afar - Shot in Borer's Falls Conservation Area, Hamilton, 2014

Tell us how you got started in the world of art and who inspired you.

I began exploring my artistic side in 2012 after many years of wanting to start. I have always been inspired by nature and the environment for its beauty and detail, for its life and inhabitants, for its strength and wisdom. Photographing wildlife and landscapes came very naturally to me, as well as discovering the photography of architecture and the people that are part of the environment. Using natural wood when building frames for my photos is also inspired by nature and allows me to highlight it even further.

My art is about telling stories through photos, framing these photos in natural ways and ensuring that these stories live on forever.

 Photo by Kate Liubansky, Tree Swallows - Shot in Tommy Thompson Park, Toronto, 2014

Featured Artist: Laurel Douglas Shugarman

Born Laurel Douglas....known for years in York Region as “Dr. Shugarman”.....so still using both names, Laurel Douglas Shugarman. (sorry, it’s a big mouthful) Almost 20 years ago, I decided that I had always been defined by one external or another, geography, profession, marriage, parental status,.....so decided it was time to become a kite without a string....and see where the wind would blow me. I ended up in Austin Texas at a wonderful spot called Laguna Gloria. An old mansion, converted to museum and art school, where peacocks ambled along the banks of the river. I took my first art classes there....and knew that this was what I wanted to do.

The practice of medicine is a very extroverted pastime and the practice of art is just the opposite....solitary, introverted and contemplative. How blessed am I to have this balance in my life. I used to be a doctor who did a little art, now I am an artist who does a little medicine. I have been a student of art for the past 20 years and will be a student of art for the rest of my life. The path has led to the Haliburton School for the Arts, The Toronto School of Art, the Academy of Realist Art, the studios of some wonderful painters in San Miguel de Allende, Jonathon Williams, Donna and Tom Dickson, Britt Zeist, and most recently mixed media with Jane Dill. 

My first mentor and inspiration was a wonderful Canadian painter named Jean Townsend. Jean died in 2006, but had always encouraged me to go to San Miguel de Allende and join the art community there. I finally took her advice and have been wintering there for about 10 years now. Many of my paintings reflect my Mexican experience.

My work is varied. My oils and watercolours are largely impressionist realism, and I have started producing giclee prints of some of the pieces that have proved more popular. I have been doing ink on ricepaper for several years and have recently incorporated that technique into the mixed media pieces, which combine calligraphy into the mix as well. Always, always, the goal is to find beauty in the ordinary. I look forward to sharing what I do with you at the Studio Tour. I am very excited as this is my first year participating. I am trying to finish several new pieces for the Tour. With art cards, photo prints along with the originals, there will be something for every price range.

Featured Artist: Ona Kingdon

Hi Everyone. Here are three fun facts about how I work:

1. Many people say people’s dreams are a way of ordering, processing and filing away events that happen in their daily lives. I do dream a lot, I guess because I have such a vivid imagination, but painting is my method of ‘filing away’ things that I have seen or done or that happen to me or those around me.

The idea for ‘Spinning a Tale’ began one hot summer’s day when I visited our local pioneer village. My subject was a volunteer who was an excellent storyteller. She told us a tale of how the wool would have been shorn, collected, washed, spun and turned into blankets or clothing in days gone by. Later, as I painted, I wanted to incorporate not only her actually spinning the wool but also include at least part of her story. 

The painting not only won an award earlier this year in an International Exhibition but also sold to a woman in California who got in touch with me. I loved hearing her tale as she excitedly told me about her father the spinning wheel that she remembered them having when she was young.

“As a child we had an antique spinning wheel in our home in New England, and my father told us a "tale" about it. There was some deep red staining on the wheel, and the story he told was of a pioneer woman spinning at her wheel as an Indian approached shooting her with an arrow. The staining was her blood as she lay across the wheel, dying (as the tale goes). Of course I believed every word, and that spinning wheel held such mystery and romance for me. I have been looking for a spinning wheel ever since, and finally have found it. I believe I was meant to find your beautiful painting. She now hangs in the perfect spot where I can see her all day long as I move about my house.”

2. I do not use white paint at all when I paint. All the whites that you see in my paintings are the white of the paper so I have to plan where I want my highlights to be and keep those areas clean of any paint or lift the colour back off the paper by gently using a magic eraser, a brush or by scratching out the highlights.   I often use several of these methods in each painting I do.

‘Mind the Step’ Transparent Watercolour by Ona Kingdon.  I am often amused by the Ducks the visit the ponds in our area. They seem to forget that they can fly sometimes, especially when they encounter tricky things like steps.  This painting sold just before the Studio Tour last year when someone saw my publicity for it.  

3. Mosquitoes and all things small and flying seem to have a magnetic attraction to my paintings as I am working on them. I often work in watercolour using a technique called ‘wet on wet’.  Basically I wet the paper first with clear water, and then the wet paint is applied to this. For a while after each layer of paint is applied the few centimetres just above the painting is just the sort of damp microclimate that tiny insects like. This isn’t a problem until one of them decides to rest on the painting itself. The surface tension of the water on the paper is very strong for a small insect. In fact usually it is too strong for them to escape so they are trapped there until the paper dries. I can’t swot them or I get an added gruesome tail tale splodge on my painting so I end up picking them off oh so carefully with tweezers and then, if needed, rewetting the whole area again and smoothing out the pigment unless I think I can get away with it. Now I will have you all looking really closely at the smooth background washes on many of my paintings to see if you can spot any insect signature footprints as well as my own signature 

You are the Sunshine of my Life’. Transparent Watercolour. This was a commission that I did for 2 very special people to celebrate their 40^th wedding anniversary.

Tell us about your most memorable moment that has happened in a previous studio Tour

When I had a Ted themed exhibition last year, I asked each of my visitors to choose the Ted painting that they could most relate to.  There was much laughter in the room as they each selected and compared their choices with friends and family. It was lovely seeing people of all ages finding a personal connection to the paintings. Many enjoyed sharing their connection with me too.

This year my theme for the tour is going to be based on our senses. My section of the tour will be designed to encourage visitors to discover the art through many senses not just our sight.  So come and visit me at Boynton House on Richmond Green on the 17^th 18^th or 19^th of October and see how many of your 5 senses you end up using or see being used in the paintings or drawings. There will even be nibbles to tempt your sense of taste and music to listen to as you look around.  I often use music as an inspiration for my paintings or to help me set the mood as I paint. Maybe you can identify which music I listened to for some of the pieces on display.

Ona

www.onak.ca

2014 Studio Tour Brochure

Hot off the press, here is this years brochure

Featured Artist: Masha Toosi

  
Mahsa Toosi always had a passion about drawing and painting. She achieved a Master’s Degree in Graphic Design. Being interested in drawing and painting from early on, she draws from her imagination to express her feelings. Karim Nasr, a famous Iranian artist, is her most important influence.

 
Mahsa is taking part in Studio Tour for the first time and is looking forward to connect with new people in order to promote her artworks.

Featured Artist: Daniela Anzil

 

 

Tell us about your most memorable or funniest moment that has happened in a previous studio Tour.

The tour is such an enjoyable experience because of the interesting people I meet.  My most memorable moments are working on specific pieces of jewellery for people I have met on the tour.  For example, one lady loved my work and asked me to design a necklace and bracelet set for a vintage dress she had just purchased.  She brought me the dress, together we chose a colour scheme and I sketched a design.  She was thrilled with the end result and I loved the experience from beginning to end.  Another time, a lady brought me a watch that belonged to her father and asked me to "reinvent" it.  The watch was a gift her mother gave to her father before they were married.  On the back of the watch face was an inscription and date, 1918.  I was so honoured to work on such a sentimental piece.  I included a picture of it.

Also give us 3 interesting or unusual facts about your chosen art form or the materials you use or the way in which you work.

People are usually surprised that my work is done by crocheting wire.  The process itself is interesting.  I simply use a crochet hook and jewellery wire, then I crochet.  It is similar to knitting.

I approach each piece as though I am creating artwork.  I have a background in fine arts so its instinctual to consider complimentary colours, contrasting textures and tones, the symmetry of the piece and other factors that make the jewellery I create so visually pleasing.

 

My work is international!  A lady who had purchased a unique silver crochet sphere necklace was wearing her piece at a market in Croatia.  A couple of people stopped her and asked where she got it.  She gave them my contact information and they contacted me to purchase some of my pieces!   I was very excited.  It validated the uniqueness of my work.

Featured Artist: Irina Zaretchnev

Tell us what you are most looking forward to about this year Studio Tour

I’m always looking for the feedback about my creations. It’s exciting to see how my pieces of jewellery look when tried on – after all, it’s wearable art, as my fans say. Of course, I like compliments, but when it comes to the critiques – it’s even more inspiring because of the challenge and opportunity to make my jewellery even better.

Tell us how you got started in the world of art and who inspired you.

I am the younger partner in the mother-daughter team behind Alira Treasures. My mom was creating jewellery for over a decade, and about 4 years ago I joined her. I tried it, liked it, and stuck with it up to this day. With every piece I make I get the thrill of working with natural stones and of bringing something beautiful to this world. I am a self-taught artisan who loves to experiment with different styles and techniques, though wire wrapping and wire crochet have always been my favorite. 

Irina Zaretchnev

Featured Artist: Don Downer

What is your most memorable/ or funniest moment that has happened in a previous studio Tour:

Parking to unload in front of the Heritage House in Richmond Hill last year was a bit precarious. The trees in front of the house were loaded with huge butternuts that kept raining down all around us in the wind as we moved pictures inside. We moved our cars out of "danger zone" as soon as we could. The next morning, the sidewalk was laden with fallen nuts which we had to sweep up to clear a safe way for our guests!

Can you give us 3 interesting facts about your chosen medium or the materials you use or the way in which you work:

I enjoy taking pictures of flowers almost more than anything else because they don't fly away before you can take their picture and they don't turn and walk away showing only their backside.

I enjoy taking pictures in nature because it gets me outside all the time and you never know what you're going to see next.

I always take at least two, and sometimes three, cameras with me wherever I go - you just can't have too many cameras.

Featured Artist: Wendy Cho

 
Tell us about your most memorable/ or funniest moment that has happened in a previous studio Tour

Last year a young art lover came by specifically looking for me. He picked a couple of pieces and asked if I would take a picture with him:)

His mom took the photo of his purchases with me, it was such a special moment !! To see such a young person interested in art, reminds me why I started down this journey.

Also give us 3 interesting/ unusual facts about your chosen medium/ art form or the materials you use or the way in which you work

At first glance, most people think I paint with acrylic or oil paints to achieve the grainy effect in my work. At closer view, one can see that stippling effect is actually the texture of the paper I use. It's one of the unique properties of using this medium. It gives a tactile visual to each piece. It invites you to look closer.

My subject matter is mostly my animal babies at home. AKA all my pets! From frogs, cats, dogs, an albino hedgehog and even an "alligator" in my basement...or maybe that was just a dream? :)