Even before you step foot in the Ann Kitching Gallery, you can smell the new exhibit.
In fact, from the moment you enter the Port Moody Arts Centre, the aroma of roses intertwined with evergreens and tropical flowers hits you.
The show — titled The Living Palette, which opened last Thursday — is something of a wonder, a display of visual and floral art that evokes all five senses.
The concept of marrying botanicals with oil and acrylic paintings came early last fall for Port Coquitlam’s Kimberly Blackstock and Brenna Quan, a fellow Burnaby North secondary alumna.
Quan, who previously owned a flower shop, got reacquainted with Blackstock about a year ago via social media and, over the summer, took one of her painting classes at PMAC.
Seeing they had similar styles and presentations, Blackstock suggested they partner for an installation at the St. Johns Street facility.
By the end of October, their application to exhibit was in.
Then came the shock: Could they be ready for a March 2 opening?
“I thought, ‘No way, that’s too early,’” Blackstock said. “We both had young kids and so much on the go.”
Still, despite the time crunch, the artists took on the challenge. Blackstock created nearly 40 new works and Quan studied each of her seven groupings to match the visual shapes and forms with fresh botanical textures and scents — giving Blackstock’s art a 3D punch.
For example, to compliment her A Capella oil painting of roses, Quan juxtaposed it with light and dark pink roses in silver vases, bamboo sticks and mirrors above.
For her three round 16” tangerine canvases, titled Spin, Twist and Whirl, Quan went tropical, flying in dark red and orange anthuriums from Hilo, Hawaii, and sharp greens.
Quan also went foraging locally and took her neighbour’s tree stump to enhance Blackstock’s Samba, heightening it with a lily tree.
On the north wall, her pair of acrylic on wood panels — titled Jazz and Bebop — were rooted with empty white frames, crossing yellow and green anthuriums horizontally to break the vertical flow.
But, on the feature wall, which carries the exhibit and artists’ names as well as Blackstock’s 60” by 36” acrylic masterpiece, titled Sing, Quan chose simplicity by placing a bouquet of pink roses and ferns at its base.
That wall is punctuated at the south corner with images of deer. “We wanted to have something playful there,” Blackstock said. “We needed it to have a light tone.”
In the centre of the room, the pair placed a bench backed with a plaster and permanent botanical installation, called Being Still. That’s where the artists hope guests will sit down for a little bit and admire the details of the exhibit, and listen to the soft music piped in via a small boom box.
“It’s one of our best,” PMAC curator Janice Cotter said of the display. “It takes my breath away. It would be a wonderful backdrop for a wedding or special event because they’ve got everything right here.”
Cotter is also in awe at how quickly the artists put the show together — mostly without Quan seeing Blackstock’s paintings in person.
“We would send each other texts at 2 in the morning because that was the only time we could communicate without our children being around,” Quan laughed.
She added, “This was the first time we have done anything like this and it’s been a wonderful opportunity to experiment with different materials and pushing the limits of creativity.”
@jcleughTC
