‘West Coast Contemporary Abstract Paintings’ Public Artwork Installation is complete. The final project document is available for view here. This is a large scale hand-painted Portuguese tile installation of Deb Chaney’s west coast abstract artworks at the Crest Adera Developments Property located at East Eight Avenue and Lonsdale in North Vancouver, BC, Canada. Each panel is 16’ x 10’ and will be covered in tile artwork manufactured and hand painted in Portugal by Viuva Lamego of Portugal.
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The Inspiration Behind the Chosen Artwork
The original paintings were from my Little Gems Series which are paintings I do for fun, for practice, and for demonstration in workshops with students.
The ‘Take it Away’ series paintings chosen for this installation were created with acrylic paints, corrugated cardboard, and vine charcoal. They were tremendously enjoyable to paint and are infused with that creative joy. In the case of these particular paintings, the titles came from and were inspired by the process of their creation. During the painting process I would add and 'take away' the cardboard elements which guided the paintings dominant elements/marks. Notice how the last piece, Take it Away IV has no texture ... as it was all 'taken away'.
Each original painting entitled ‘Take it Away, Take it Away II, Take it Away III, and Take it Away IV’ is 9" x 12" mixed media on heavy coldpress 300 lb watercolour paper.
The colour and energetic meaning of the artwork is important, and as follows. The dominant colour is turquoise which embodies the feeling to be both simultaneously invigorated and calm, similar to that experience we may feel when enjoying the west coast rain forest of Lynn Valley in North Vancouver.
The secondary colours consisting of umbers/light brown/earth tones offer the energetic frequency of reliability, stability, and comfort. The feelings of being home, synergistic to what mother earth offers us here with our home on this planet.
Manufacture and Painting of ceramic tiles at the Viuva Lamego Factory Studio in Portugal
Based in Lisbon, Portugal and founded in 1849, Viúva Lamego’s name is a reference for tile lovers, and consists of a team of technicians and craftsmen with a long standing history and passion for excellence in working with artists world-wide to professionally bring their artistic creations into beautiful hand-painted public artworks. You can find public installations of Viúva Lamego in collaboration with professional artists all over Europe in castles, metro stations, public parks and art museums. In our process of collaboration, Deb Chaney and Viúva Lamego have worked together to achieve the desired colours and effects of the tiles, from an initial agreement of the painting installation schematics with Adera Development team. After the colours were chosen and approved, Viúva Lamego began their process by creating unique hand painted terracotta tiles, faithful to European creations of the 17th and 18th century, to match the project’s specific desired colours, tile sizes and shapes, and drawing schematics of the building wall installation. The tiles have been historical shown to keep their colour and physical integrity, durability, for decades and are easily cleaned simply with water.
Social Media posts with regards to the progress and happenings around this public art installation can be located on Instagram via the hashtag #VLWestCoast.
The Artist would like to thank the Lori Phillips at the City of North Vancouver, Bruce Walther, and Infrabiz Inc for their help and support during this project process.
