When Mylene Dayrit-Kubicek teaches kids how to paint or draw, she usually starts with a simple question: What do you think this subject feels like?
Cotton candy is an example she gives. She gets her students to imagine its sticky, sugary texture in their hands and replicate that sensation with layers.
It’s an experiment Dayrit-Kubicek tries often with her home learners in Cloverdale and to School District 43 students taking the Art a la Carte after-school lessons offered through Place des Arts, where she’s been on contract.
Dayrit-Kubicek flips through her portfolio to demonstrate some of the work she’s done with her students — all easy designs with bright, bubbling colours.
She carries it into her own artwork, too.
In her home studio in Coquitlam, which has a view of Our Lady of Fatima Church, Dayrit-Kubicek paints in vivid acrylic and watercolour hues, sometimes incorporating mixed media elements.
“I don’t really have a style,” she said, touching the landscapes and still life scenes she has on the tables and walls. “I do whatever. I use my imagination.”
Three of her new images — titled Island, Birdie and Holy Mother, Holy Son — will be in this weekend’s Art Focus Artists Association fall show in Port Coquitlam.
It’s an organization Dayrit-Kubicek has enjoyed since she signed up three years ago, with the aim to branch out into the Tri-Cities and learn from other artists.
Since then, the Langara College-trained graphic designer has taken on key roles for the club. She became its webmaster and created a new digital portal (artfocusartists.wixsite.com/afaa). She also designed its fall show poster.
A UBC psychology graduate, Dayrit-Kubicek also regularly attends the club meetings but shies away from its weekly art drop-ins “because I socialize too much,” she said with a laugh. “I don’t get anything done because I’m always talking.”
These days, Dayrit-Kubicek is turning her attention to urban scene drawings. She shows a pencil sketch of her duplex in south Coquitlam. With graphic design, she said, she feels constrained by the screen but, “with painting and drawing, my hand is free. It flows naturally.”
The 26th annual Art Focus Artists Association fall show opens Friday at 7 p.m. with a reception in The Outlet at Leigh Square (behind Port Coquitlam city hall) and continues Saturday and Sunday from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Oil, watercolour and acrylic paintings plus mixed media and sculptures are available. Musician Jamie Bonk will entertain.
