Tokens of love

For centuries, women were confined to the quiet corners of art history, permitted to paint flowers, but not politics; beauty, but not meaning.  Floral painting was considered decorative, delicate, and safely domestic.  It was never meant to be serious. Never meant to be powerful.
In Tokens of Love, I reclaim the flower as both subject and symbol..on my terms.  Each painting in this series is based on real flowers gifted to me by loved ones: small, intimate gestures of care and connection.  These are not anonymous still lifes, but portraits, not only of the blooms themselves, but of the people and relationships they represent.
By returning to this historically “feminine” subject with intention, complexity, and emotional depth, I challenge the notion that flowers are trivial.  I render them with scale, presence, and reverence.  In doing so, I resist the long-standing devaluation of women’s experiences and women’s work.
These are not passive blooms.  They carry memory, grief, resilience, joy, tenderness and love in all its layered and often unspoken forms.
There are unapologetically personal.
They speak to the power of small things held close.
They honour the quiet radicalism of care.
And they insist that intimacy is not weakness, but strength.

Soft as a Rose, oil on cradled board, 6”x6”

Tokens of Love, Solo show at Ruth Upjohn Gallery, Women’s Art Association of Canada, 23 Prince Arthur Ave. October 8-18, I will be there Fridays and Saturdays. I would be so pleased to see you there.