Twelve members of ArtSaturna will be showing new pieces at the Saturna Café from December 8th to January 4th. This creative dozen works in several media, so the show promises to be varied and interesting.
An informal opening is planned for Saturday, December 10, from 3:30 pm to 5 pm. The Café is at 101 Narvaez Bay Road, a few minutes from the ferry terminal.
It’s been a couple of very warm weeks on the coast. Too hot to be in the garden in the afternoon, we seek the shade.
And when evening comes, we go back to the western deck, to admire the golden hour tinged with red, as the sun goes down behind the distant mountains of Vancouver Island.
“Sometimes, I need only to stand wherever I am to be blessed.” — Mary Oliver
This is a quick visual report on a sunny summer day’s activity for kids of all ages, an annual July ritual on Saturna Island in coastal BC.
Around 1 p.m. last Saturday, people started showing up at East Point, on Saturna Island, to come play and discover critters at the edge of the Salish Sea.
The point was a busy place, with divers headed into the water, to gather all kinds of creatures and bring them back to shore, so everyone could have a look…
Tanks were set up on the beach, with recirculating water, so their temporary residents would be comfortable.
And everyone gathered to hear about the animals and plants that make the intertidal zone their home… Student biologists from the University of Victoria were on hand to share their knowledge about life below the surface.
There were sea stars, in their variety…
California sea cucumbers…
Sea urchins, including this big one (and look at the little baby one in the tupperware container on the side)…
And crabs, including these kelp crabs…
And we learned that male crabs have a “lighthouse-like” marking on their abdomen…
… while female crabs have a wider plate on their abdomen… So now, we can tell them apart. Also, notice that this female has been busy adding some camouflage greenery to her legs and back…
Finally, this brown kelp is known as Sargassum, an invasive algae now present in the Salish Sea… We can pick it and plow it into our gardens as fertilizer without any guilty feelings…
And finally, no Beach Safari is complete without a little kite flying! There was a nice breeze, and people gave it a shot.
Summer weekends, the right time to go play outside.
Everyone is cordially invited to the opening reception of my exhibition, June 24, 4 to 6 p.m. The opening will be followed by a dinner prepared by chef Hubertus Surm.
(Reservations for dinner: 250-539-5177)
The exhibition at the Saturna Café goes to August 2, 2017.
“Narrative is anchored in the passage of time. A story unfolds in the tension between a beginning and an end. Singly and in juxtaposition, these photographs by Andrée Fredette are replete with stories. An image of a seemingly deserted Mayne Queen is paired with a photograph of a ghostly Saturna, producing a tinge of anxiety and uncertainty. Again, an empty path in the forest tells a tale of fear and disquiet. Further, the infinitely small (feathers) and the infinitely vast (the awesome sky) are conjured up. There are no figures in these photographs despite the great variety of subject matter. An irony resides in these works: it is suggested that they evoke the passage of time, yet photography congeals duration. This irony adds a layer of complexity — a dialectical interplay — to our experience of these artworks: we move from duration to time’s suspension and back again. Also, some of these works underline the materiality of the photographic medium, a salutary move in the era of digital media. Meditation portrays an ethereal, almost monochromatic sky — the surface of the photograph is underlined. Also, grains of sand and the grain of the photographic object conjoin in a literal manner. There is a hint of nostalgia in all these works: the backing in aluminum recalls photography’s metallurgic substrate —silver—and the quasi alchemical nature of work in the darkroom, a process which has almost been entirely eclipsed by digital technologies.”
— Jean-François Renaud
Photo above: Boiling Reef, near the point, is still an encampment for Steller sea lions, harbour seals, eagles, ducks and more.
On a grey day in spring, it’s a quiet place. Few people, plenty of birds. A rare daytime low tide, too. Great for bird watching…
Above: the long nose of East Point, and in the distance, Boiling Reef to the right (the rocks where the big critters lounge), and the tip of Tumbo Island on the left.
There is quite a bit of wildlife at East Point, on Saturna Island… Lots of birds are finishing their winter residence and will soon depart for other locations in BC and Northward.
A Harlequin drake (Histrionicus histrionicus), handsome fellow, at the water’s edge. Waiting for the tide to come back in.
Not far away, his girlfriend, the female Harlequin.
Above: another Harlequin female, standing right where the buffet is happening, as the tide is rising. They seemed to like spots where the returning water was flipping over the sea weeds…
And this handsome one is a male Barrow’s Goldeneye (Bucephala islandica). Caught him just after he surfaced, water still beading on his plumage.
Above, a view of Boiling Reef, where the Steller sea lions (Eumetopias jubatus) are still lounging. They will soon leave to go to their rookery, that party place where all the mating occurs during the summer. To get that shot, I used a long lens because they are far away. The males can reach 7 to 9 feet long, and weigh 1.2 tons…
Which is why I am all the more impressed by the sang-froid of this diver: