Isolation Art at the Stanley Milner Library

Way back at the end of 2021, a call for artists was sent out from Edmonton Public Libraries for an exhibit of work done while the world was locked down during the Covid-19 pandemic.  Like so many of us, the travel constraints put in place to reduce the spread of the virus gave me an excellent opportunity to reconnect with my art, and I jumped at the chance to show people what I'd been up to.

Over two years, I reconnected with my love of making art. I experimented with watercolours, acrylics, ink, and graphite.  I built the hollowaystudio.com site that you're visiting right now, and I tried my hand at print-on-demand platforms for my pop-art material.  I found great local printers to reproduce my work, and I tried a ton of frame and mat combinations until I figured out what really made my drawings pop.  I began selling my work online, and at Two Whales Coffee Shop in Port Rexton, Newfoundland.

While my ability to travel and find inspiring subject material during this time was severely limited, I traveled back in time as I sifted through years of photos I'd taken on my visits to Newfoundland and on road trips throughout Western Canada.  

Out of thousands of photos in my files, a few dozen caught my interest.  I've always been fascinated by small wooden buildings: the textures of weathered wood, the reshaping of form by the elements, and the resilience of these humble structures to withstand the patient and persistent march of time.  

I began drawing. 

First in graphite, using tone and shading techniques to capture the qualities of light and texture, and then in ink.  I traded my pencils for technical pens with nibs and fine as sewing needles.  The constraints of my small sketchbook forced me to choose what details to show, and what to edit out.

In the end, the process of trying, failing, succeeding, and learning is what drives me to make art.  I started my lockdown drawing journey with no goal other than to consistently "do the work", as Steven Pressfield puts it.  As the drawings started to pile up, I saw a definite style emerging.  I learned to render materials and wood grains, applying architectural linework techniques to emphasize outlines, details, and depth.

When the call for artists came out, I knew there was enough material in my portfolio to put together an exhibit, but I needed a theme to tie everything together.  I pulled together four images that showed not just that I'd created art during the lockdown, but images that expressed my personal experience of the pandemic.

Near/Far

​Covid-19 shrunk my personal sphere of existence down to a tiny dot.  Conventional notions of distance and time were replaced by isolation and uncertainty.  Travel restrictions kept me close to Edmonton, where I used the time to reconnect with my art.  Near/Far reflects my pandemic experience: isolation, boredom, discovery, and hope.

Elliston Shed
The pandemic changed everything.  My yearly pilgrimages to Newfoundland abruptly stopped.  Elliston Shed represents the people, places, and culture of my childhood home, now very Far away.

Wabamun Barn
As the pandemic intensified, carbon-copy days eroded the remaining structure of pre-Covid life.  I began exploring the areas Near home.  Wabamun Barn resulted from a road trip taken to relieve the monotony of "the new normal".

Vanishing Point
I spent months exploring the places Near me.  I discovered that the small wooden buildings of the West were not all that different from those of the East.  Vast green fields, vast blue seas.

Golden Sauna
Pre-Covid, a weekend trip to British Columbia would not have seemed that Far.  After travel restrictions started to relax, a few days away made a world of difference.

As the last of the snow melts and the pandemic appears to be fading away with it, I'm grateful to have had the opportunity to turn the constraints of the past into a body of work that will inform and inspire my future art and travels.  I'm looking forward to redefining what Near and Far mean to me in a post-Covid world.

Isolation Art runs from January to March 26, 2022 at the Stanley Milner Library in Edmonton, Alberta.

​-Troy