LISSA ALEXANDER
Buoys float Margery Blom’s boat.
The local artist has had an infatuation with marinas ever since she arrived in the area a year ago from Manitoba, and there’s something particularly interesting about colourful, floating buoys, she said.
“I love the floats. They just bob like Christmas decorations — the more floats on a boat the happier I am,” she laughed.
Blom’s oil paintings of local marinas are currently hanging for sale at The Gallery @ Qualicum Art Supply in Qualicum Beach.
Blom has always had a keen desire to create art. In fact when she was 10 years old she decided she was going to quit school and pursue art full time.
“I thought ‘that’s it there’s nothing here for me’, until my mother said ‘you know you can go to art school, the University of Manitoba has that but you have to finish school first’,” she recalls.
So she relented. She graduated and went to art school as planned at the U of M. After graduation she worked at a small gallery before deciding to use her artistic creativity as a hair stylist. She worked in that field for 14 years and then headed back to school for a degree in education, after which she taught hair styling plus a number of academic subjects.
Throughout this time Blom was also painting and doing whatever other crafty things she could get her hands on. She fell in love with ceramics after making a painted Christmas tree ornament and when a ceramics shop came up for sale, she jumped on board. She became a certified ceramics teacher and also taught painting and other art at the studio.
Blom decided to make the move to B.C. last year so she closed down the shop. Although she’s dabbled in pottery, jewelry-making and other art forms since she’s arrived, today her main focus is on her painting. She has always painted the outdoors and nature, so it didn’t take long for her to discover her love for marinas.
“It’s the serenity, the water, the reflections, the boats — they tell a story,” she said. “Especially the working marinas where fishing boats are — there’s a whole life in there.”
Her paintings, made with water-based oil paints, at The Gallery @ Qualicum Art Supply include Schooner Cove, French Creek, Beachcomber and Fanny Bay marinas. Port Alberni and Comox marinas are also in the works.
Blom is a member of the Oceanside Community Arts Council and has some work at the McMillan Arts Centre in the member’s gallery. She often fills in at the studios located at The Old School House Arts Centre (TOSH) and brings her paintings along with her, and she’ll have a piece in TOSH’s Members Show from Sept. 8 to Sept. 28.
The Gallery at Qualicum Art Supply is located at 206 W 1st Ave.