Judging by their very different artistic styles, you might not be able to tell that Virginia Moon and Vicky Paradice are sisters.
The comparison is made easy by their first exhibit together that features work from just the two of them. It’s now up at the Gallery at Qualicum Art Supply (206 First Ave. West).
Moon’s work is clearly fairytale-inspired, and is a re-telling of her own life, she said, featuring her own friends and family (sometimes Paradice).
Paradice’s work uses found objects such as leaves and other items from nature, as well as her own nature photography, a plaster compound and much more to make multimedia pieces that look to feature texture.
Yet, despite those clear differences, the show is about their shared artistic journey together, said Moon.
“We’re actually each others biographers,” she said, in that they know the stories behind each-other’s work.
Moon’s paintings are a recreation of scenes from her own life, interpreted in a fairytale theme.
“We all can draw from our background, and being Celtic, I realized growing up with fairytales is really how we were told stories, and I consider myself a storyteller, so I think it was kind of natural for me to use some of the symbolism of fairytales,” she said. “I often use, for instance, little red shoes which symbolize no place like home, things like that.”
There are also gnomes, some of which represent her husband, and his friends. “Because he and all his biker buddies all look like gnomes,” said Moon with a laugh. “I get inspiration from them.”
Texture is sometimes also part of Moon’s work, but not is a direct way. She said, being self taught, there are plenty of mistakes made along the way in the course of making a painting, so she’ll just paint over her mistakes.
“There could be about five paintings under that one,” she said, pointing to one of her pieces on display. “I use all the mistakes as the underlying texture and story.”
“And I’ve seen every stage,” said Paradice with a laugh.
Paradice works in a much different way. She uses plaster compound to create texture in some of her work, and often incorporates leaves, bits of trees or flowers, and imprints of lace or other materials.
“Then I just do layers and layers and layers of a dry brush technique,” she said, applying thin amounts of paint. “Some of them have up to 16 layers of paint on it.”
However, if something goes wrong for Paradice and she’s not liking what’s being made, she’ll either scrape it all off and start again, or give the board to Moon to work on. There’s a pair of pieces that show this sharing process in the exhibit.
Asked what she likes about incorporating texture and found elements, Paradice said, “I always think of like artifacts, you know, something that you would maybe find in Egypt that’s been covered up for thousands of years. So that’s what I’m always trying to make it look like.”
For Moon, she said she hopes that viewers of her work find that story in it, and that it resonates with them. Though she adds that “it’s been really wonderful to know that there is somebody out there who knows what those things mean,” she said of her sister.
For Paradice, she said she just hopes that her work evokes a reaction in the people who see it. “I don’t really have any deep feeling except I’m always happy when I’m doing it,” she said of her work.