New Solo Exhibition for Deep River Painter Sheila McGregor

The Pontiac Artists’ Association will feature contemporary landscape artist, Sheila McGregor, at  The Stone School Gallery in Portage-du-Fort, Quebec. This solo exhibition, “Intro/Outro”, will begin with an opening reception on Friday June 21 from 6:00 to 8:00 p.m and will be open on weekends from 11:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. until July 21. The Friday vernissage will provide an opportunity to meet the artist and listen to selections from the music team of which Sheila is a member.

Sheila’s sweeping and luminous works are inspired by time she spends hiking and canoeing throughout Ontario and Quebec, often with her husband Rob and their two border collies, Cooper and Finnegan. Subtle skies, majestic trees and calm waters are frequent subjects in her vivid and expressive pieces. Sheila begins her work “en plein air”, in the natural light and atmosphere of the outdoors and then completes her expansive pieces in her studio in Deep River, Ontario where she has resided since 2009. Sheila is constantly amazed at the natural beauty of this area; it is this awe of creation and its Creator that infuses her work with joy and meaning.

Her show, “Intro/Outro” focuses on her latest work which highlights Sheila’s fascination with the parallels between music and painting; she has recently taken up drumming and plays with a group at her church. As the title of the exhibition points to the beginning and end of a piece of music, Sheila usually chooses to work in the light of early morning and close to dusk at day’s end. In both painting and drumming, it is “the in between space that excites me,” Sheila states. There is a rhythm to Sheila’s brush as she builds layer upon layer of acrylic paint. As she works, the negative space between her subjects becomes important; the background has its own story as it frames and shapes the positive space. Similarly, as Sheila’s hands beat out an ostinato, the silence between each pulse of the rhythmic pattern is equally essential to the beauty of a song. 

As a painter, Sheila believes that her purpose is to “bring encouragement to the discouraged and beauty to the broken.”  Art and music have brought encouragement and beauty to her own life. Growing up in numerous foster homes, Sheila and her brother were finally adopted. However, the most difficult upheaval happened when Sheila was separated from her brother and “unadopted” as a young teenager. Art classes and kind-hearted Visual Arts teachers provided a sense of belonging and worth to Sheila. This helped carry her through these stormy years and eventually to a more encouraging place of reconciliation with her adoptive parents. 

Though she didn’t grow up with her biological father, she remembers his drum set and his musical talent. To find herself drumming and to see musical aptitude in her three children has helped restore beauty to broken relationships.

Sheila began her formal training with professional artist Jane Bonnell, studying Art History, Figure, Still Life and Landscape Drawing. She has bolstered her artistic repertoire by exploring printmaking, fibre art, pottery and artistic design for theatre. In 2014, Sheila was chosen as an Artist in Residence by the Pontiac Artists Association. Her most recent studies have been with the Art Business Academy of Arizona. Sheila has shared her work throughout the Ottawa Valley in both group and solo exhibitions. Her paintings can be found in private collections in North America and Europe. More information about Sheila McGregor and her work can be found by contacting the artist at 613-639-9604 or Sheilamc5@sympatico.ca. To learn more about the Pontiac Artists’ Association, explore their website at artpontiac.com.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Upcoming Solo Exhibition for Local Landscape Artist Sheila McGregor

DEEP RIVER, ONTARIO - 01/19/2018 

The Deep River Library Arts Committee will be featuring an exhibition by contemporary landscape artist Sheila McGregor opening February 3rd, on view until February 24th. The solo exhibition Look Up, features luminous pieces such as Majesty, Mr. and Mrs. Wonderful (pictured above), and Winter’s Eve, showcased this summer at the Deep River Town Hall as part of Canada’s 150th Celebration. The artist will also be debuting her most recent pieces, inspired by en plein air work produced over the summer and further developed in her Deep River studio during the cold winter months.  

Working en plein air is a process Sheila is grateful for, as it connects her to the scene she’s painting. Sheila loves to combine her love of the outdoors with her passion for painting, and is continuously in awe of the glory that resonates within the natural world. She is especially drawn to trees, “the giants of the forest,” and the way they gracefully reach to credit the Creator of their beauty, even urging us to “look up” and do the same. This fascination with trees is evident in the lively and iridescent rendering of Sheila’s pieces. Her work has a glowing depth to it which Sheila says is produced through layers upon layers of thoughtful strokes of paint. She likens this to a depth of character in people cultivated over layers and layers of time and trial, not unlike her own life story. 

Part of Sheila’s childhood story has been featured in Woman’s World Magazine and on the front page of a newspaper published in Dallas, Texas.  Growing up in foster homes, Sheila changed schools over a dozen times, and found herself in the difficult place of being officially “unadopted” at a young age. Finding a healing place in expressing herself through art, she now has a desire to share her paintings as “encouragement to the discouraged, and beauty to the broken.” Working within nature has been important to Sheila’s artistic process, as a way to feel connected to the story she paints. Much like taking in the beauty of one of Sheila’s large-scale