Erica Gajewski
Markham
October 04, 2008 09:07 PM
10 minutes with Erica Gajewski
Simone Joseph
Erica Gajewski is as comfortable in her Markham home studio as she is on a soccer field or competing in a cross-country race.
But she aims to make people uncomfortable.
Uncomfortable with the idea some animal populations are dwindling into oblivion.
The first owl paintings on her studio wall — northern spotted owls, to be exact — are painted with lustrous brown colour but with each successive painting, this colour fades, until the animal ends up looking like a scant version of its original self.
Only 16 of this type of owl remain in Canada, so appropriately, Ms Gajewski’s exhibit contains 16 paintings (or panels in artists’ lingo).
Each panel is the same height, width and weight as the actual owl.
Ms Gajewski’s owl paintings form part of her exhibit, chillingly titled Thin Ice.
The exhibit, on at Markham’s Tangerine Gecko Art Gallery Oct. 23 to 29, focuses on animals in danger of extinction because of human activity.
“It is the animal’s story. It is just the beauty of the image of the animal,” Ms Gajewski says.
Ms Gajewski’s preparation for this exhibit included researching and sifting through data.
But Ms Gajewski used to be on a different path. She was intent on studying veterinary science until her high school art teacher convinced her she could persuade with paint.
She went on to attend the Savannah College of Art and Design in Georgia, determined to achieve her twin goals of becoming an artist and protecting animals and the environment.
Because of her athletic ability, she attended on a full soccer scholarship. She also ran cross-country and attended grad school as a cross-country assistant coach, which paid her way.
The 29-year-old has a seasonal position with the Town of Markham in the horticulture department during spring, summer and fall.
In the daytime, she takes care of plants and flowers in places such as parks, then comes home at night and paints.
Q: Explain the title of your exhibit — Thin Ice.
A: It embodies the pressure the environment is under right now. The cold and the Arctic are fading away and deteriorating and the animals are suffering because of that ... I have always been fascinated by animals. I love them. When I started looking at what was going on in their environment, it became a real concern to me. I wanted to do something. I wanted to somehow bring about awareness and affect some kind of change, raise consciousness. We are losing so many species of animals. We are losing one plant or animal species every 20 minutes. It is being caused by us. We can bring about change. In order for people to start to change, they have to know what is going on.
Q: How did you know this was going on?
A: Well, I have always grown up in a lot of urban areas and I have seen a lot of housing development and I have seen a lot of animals being pushed out of those areas. I want to know as much as possible about the animals and I have always said this work is not really about me. It is about the animals. It is giving them their time and their space to be seen and understood. I try to do as much research about the animal, spend as much time around them as I possibly can. Sometimes that means going to the zoo or reading articles or scientific journals or peer review reports to understand the issue ... Animals are an important part of the world and it is a diminished world if we stay on the course we are on.
Q: When did you know this is the avenue you wanted to take as an artist?
A: It is just something I have always done. I have always been curious about animals and always drawn to them since I can remember. Sometimes, I don’t think you choose something, I think it chooses you. That is kind of what happened.
Q: Do you find that there are a lot of artists doing the same thing as you?
A: When I was in graduate school, we were asked to look at other artists doing the same kind of work or focusing on the same idea. I didn’t see a lot out there that was like what I was doing. Some artists were doing a single image and in it, it would have, say, an animal surrounded by garbage or it was a very negative image. What I wanted to do was celebrate the animal, have people understand they are beautiful or see a kind of intrinsic beauty in them.
Q: Can you explain how you do your work?
A: I go out into the environment and try to photograph the animals. I spend a long time sitting with the subject. I go to zoos or I will go out into parks, into fields, into their environment to look at them. I take images of the animal and use them as references for my work.
Q: Your other talent is sports. Do you plan to continue pursuing that or somehow merge the two (art and sports) in your life?
A: Athletics teaches you a lot that you can take with you into the rest of your life. It teaches you about goals and organization. It teaches you about success but it also teaches you about failure, how to deal with both aspects. As an artist, I find I am constantly pushing through ideas and they are not always successful. They don’t always turn out right but you have to keep going, pursuing what it is you are after.
Q: Is running and soccer something you want to continue pursuing?
A: I am training for a half-marathon right now. It is down in South Carolina.
Q: What was the biggest difference between living in Markham and living in Savannah?
A: The very first thing is the heat. Oh my God, it is so hot down there. When I went in for (soccer) training, it was 114 Fahrenheit in the late summer and fall. It took me about a year to adjust to that.
Q: Were there any assumptions or gaps in knowledge (about Canada) that surprised you?
A: The same old cliches you get everywhere. Some people think we still live in igloos, some think it is 40 below the whole year round. That we speak like they do in the movie Fargo, that we are very polite.
Tangerine Gecko is a fine art gallery located at 107 Main St. N. (Hwy. 48) in Markham, just north of Hwy. 7. Go to
www.tangerine-gecko.com, call 905-209-0303 or e-mail
info@tangerine-gecko.com for more information.