Encaustic paint - hot beeswax loaded with rich colour - is here for visitors to see, smell (wonderful!) and watch in action, in the hands of Sarah Petite, long-time Fredericton artist and thirty-year master of this exciting ancient medium.
Thanks to a Creation Grant from ArtsNB, Petite is embarked on a series of paintings titled ‘Earth is Old’, depicting life on our planet since it first rose four billion years ago. Built of plywood cut into lyrical shapes, the painted panels celebrate ancient life-forms, cosmic and tectonic events, the several great dyings, the coming and going of epochs long past - including our own thousands of years of hunting and gathering. In these poignant times of climate angst, a little wonder at the richness of ongoing life cannot be a bad thing. There may be hope yet to save what we still have.
This is a presentation that invites visitor interest and participation. Whether you choose to try out the paint - stroke some cadmium red on a small shingle and watch it dry (cool, actually) or discuss which of the great extinctions was the greatest, or revel in the Cambrian explosion, there will be lots to draw your attention. One of a dozen paintings will be in progress at any time, maybe even two or three at once! The process involves painting, tooling, scraping, melting back, troweling and many other techniques,
Sarah Petite, trained at NSCAD University in Halifax and professionally engaged for forty years, works out of two studios, in Fredericton and on the Fundy shore of Nova Scotia. She has shown across the Maritimes and beyond, and has works in several public, and many private, collections. Petite is a recent recipient of the Marie Hélène Allain Fellowship Award from the Sheila Hugh Mackay Foundation.
Artist Bio
Educated at NSCAD University in the ‘80s, Sarah Petite has been painting professionally for forty years – most of these devoted to encaustic painting, her flagship medium. She works out of two fully-equipped studios, winters in Fredericton, summers on the Fundy shore of Nova Scotia. Petite has shown her paintings in galleries throughout the Maritimes, and can currently be found at Gallery on Queen, here in Fredericton. She is one of this year’s recipients of the Marie Hélène Allain Fellowship Award from the Sheila Hugh Mackay Foundation.
Studio Schedule
Tuesday 12PM - 5PM
Wednesday 12PM - 5PM
Thursday 12PM - 3PM + 6PM - 8PM
Friday 12PM - 5PM
Saturday 12PM - 5PM
Sunday 12PM - 5PM
