A Poetic Wanderer

Studies in England with a Master weaver, Theological studies at Trinity College, Bristol, a sojourn at the Banff Center, an exchange term in Italy (Medieval art) and, not least, a boring BFA from Calgary, Alberta are the precursors for my residency at the Vancouver Island College of Art.

My visceral response to colour, a talking relationship with wind in the trees and, a mystifying symbiosis with the ocean (from where we all come) become my own muses. My work might stand as metaphor for all these AND – I just love fooling around with materials.

The richness of world travels to places as diverse as Nepal, Israel, Japan and Papua New Guinea established in me a world view and a buoyant, joyful appreciation of our tiny blue planet and it’s inhabitants. – J. Luna

This is my mothers artist statement. Today she turns 78 years young and next week is showing, along with 5 other accomplished artists, some of what I consider to be her most exciting work as an artist to date.

Joyce Luna has always been a force majeure, yet at the same time, she has unleashed that compulsion more like Leonard Cohen than Robert Plant—note by note, poem by poem, in a voice that can quietly bring you to your knees.

Her childlike exploration of the world vis a vis her place in it, never seems to be quelled by fear of failure. Instead, it is the fear of non expression that propels my mother into new worlds and environments where she is often an outlier – the young mother with 6 children, the mid aged artist with a massive talent and a tiny chip on her shoulder, the elder stateswoman who ignores her failing body to seek out other like minds in the search for knowledge and self expression.

I don’t know that Joyce Luna always aspired to be an artist but she certainly aspired to be more than a wife and mother.

And for that I am grateful.

The family home was a living canvas for artistic expression and my most vivid memory growing up was when my mother was working as a textile artist. The giant loom in the corner was a spider that beckoned tiny fingers to its web of pedals, warp and weft. Clouds of marigold infused wool became the landscape outside our panorama of living room windows. Industrious women chattered like birds as they wove the yellow candy cotton into threads of gold.

The accumulation of years has robbed my mother of her physical agility, stripped away her nouns mid sentence and softened her indignation of a world still reigned by gender inequality. But. The accumulation of years has honed her eye, heightened her 6th sense and strengthened her resolve to leave a mark beyond a biological one.

And for that I am grateful.

It’s a Saturday Thing | Aug 28 to Sept 7 | Slide Room Gallery, Vancouver Island College of Art, Victoria | Opening Reception Aug 28th 7 to 9 pm