Greetings, my name is Nadina Tandy and I am thrilled to have been the inaugural ‘Artist in our Midst’ artist-in-residence supported by the Sunshine Coast Arts Council and Sechelt Downtown Business Association. The vacant storefront in downtown Sechelt in the BMO building was generously provided as a working artist’s studio with plenty of room to explore and develop ideas with the goal of community engagement through art.
At the beginning of the March 2020, I brought my selected art supplies to the place I came to call Studio S. Starting a new project always has a few false starts, but once I’d established my routine, I was on a roll. I worked 5 days a week drawing strange and fantastical images on the windows and bringing my dreamlike collage creatures into reality for people to stop and view from the street. Little did I know that the project would coincide with the push for isolation and social-distancing in order to combat the Covid-19 virus. Unwittingly, I created an art exhibition in isolation, yet, accessible to all, for people to view safely from the street.
I took over the sunshinecoastarts Instagram account to share my work and progress from Studio S for a little over one week. I created engagement and some added followers on the SCAC account. The IG takeover also boosted my own followers. I even had curious visitors tap on the window from learning about the location on IG. While a closed studio, I found creative ways to connect and engage with the community visually.
The studio was a good fit for me and I was able to focus, explore and develop a series of collage works. Several opportunities emerged from the collage work I created in my artist-in-residence. To mention a few outcomes ~ ‘Collage Characters’ a Zoom session was developed and implemented for grade 3/4 Langdale Elementary class to make their own collage to be display in their school library window. I was also contacted by North Vancouver, Artists for Kids Gordon Smith Gallery as a featured artist along with Karin Bubas for AFK at Home video hosted by artist and educator Amelia Epp. A thrilling invitation for Artist-in-residence at AFK Gordon Smith Gallery is being planned for Spring 2012. There was a social-distancing interview with Rik Jespersen for the Coast Reporter and countless interactions with people looking through the window at the art I was making. My finial contribution and leave behind was to enlarge a few select collages and wheatpaste them to cement BMO wall on Periwinkle lane.
Thanks to all for the support to explore and build new work. Having a studio space that was unfamiliar woke up different muscles and this is an important part of creative growth.
Regards, Nadina Tandy
