Sheri Paisley | Kennedy River Rest
Sheri Paisley | Kennedy River RestSolo Exhibition
October 17-November 1, 2026
Main Level Gallery
3045 Granville Street
Opening reception: Saturday, October 17, 2-4 pm | Artist in Attendance
Bau-Xi Vancouver is delighted to present Kennedy River Rest, Canadian artist Sheri Paisley’s latest exhibition inspired by the shifting atmosphere of the Pacific coast. Drawing inspiration from the unexpected beauty of an unassuming highway rest stop along the Kennedy River on Vancouver Island, the artist explores landscape through richly layered colour and her signature expressive pointillist marks, capturing the experience of being immersed in the energy of landscape.
In March 2026 Paisley was awarded the prestigious Takao Tanabe prize, an annual award given to one selected emerging artist and one mid-career artist based in British Columbia.
Artist statement:
My work explores light, weather, water and atmosphere of the Pacific coast through paint.
I live with aphantasia: I can't experience visual imagery in my mind. Painting offers me a way to visualize. I can organize something outside of myself, look at it over time, deconstruct and reorganize it, and find greater meaning in it that I couldn't access before.
Usually I begin by photo-documenting a place from multiple perspectives. I am drawn to a particular feeling and quality of both landscape and atmosphere. Multiple images and perspectives of one place go into a single painting. From there, I follow the process and the painting becomes its own thing. Colour, marks and layers create variables that I am unable to imagine or predict in advance. I watch for patterns. It is this unfolding process that interests me most.
Painting is a way of sorting and processing life. It gives me somewhere to think and a place to put things. Somewhere to think without having to think in words. I don't always know where a painting is going when I begin. I trust the direction before I fully understand it. That trust is important to me.
Painting has become a way of being in the world. Without it, I’m not sure how I would fully process life experience.
This body of work began at a rest stop along Highway 4 on Vancouver Island. The Kennedy River Rest Area sits between Port Alberni and the junction for Tofino and Ucluelet. It isn't a destination. I was unexpectedly drawn to it because it offers something I am trying to create in my work: a place to stop, take a break, and then continue.
- Sheri Paisley, 2026
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