Remembering Home: The Story Behind My Watercolour House Portraits

When I was a child, my first memories were at home with my family: building LEGO planes and houses, crawling around on the floor at a family party, running through the woods surrounding our house and making mud pies on the front lawn. For me, home always smelled of woodsmoke, had sunlight slanting through the windows at golden hour, and was full of comfort and safety and bedtime stories.

I’ve always been an adventurous person. My first job at seventeen was far from home, working in Quetico Provincial Park northwest of Lake Superior. Since then I’ve been blessed to work across Canada and in the UK. All this moving around made me feel quite uprooted, always poised to pack my boxes and make another trek to somewhere new when necessary. But when I felt restless and disjointed, anxious about where I might go next, I remembered the things I loved about my childhood home - and it re-centred me and brought me calm in a whirling world.

When I was fourteen, after much convincing my 85-year-old grandmother Lilian moved in with my family. She sold her house and put the equity into building a “granny flat” addition on the side of our home, where she resided for eleven years. It was a difficult choice for her to make, having lived in her own home with her husband before his death thirteen years prior and spending many happy years there. But it was a joy for both her and our family to have our grandmother next door, always available for visiting and laughing together over Coronation Street or a Blue Jays game. It was a gift to spend so much time with her, sharing our lives and getting to know her in a completely different way.

I know that not every elder gets the opportunity to move in with family, and selling a home and moving to retirement or long-term care can feel more like a necessity than a decision made freely. Leaving a home you’ve written your life story in is incredibly difficult.

I make my watercolour house portraits with this in mind - trying to capture all the small details of a home in a way that honours its stories and the people who lived there. I do this to help folks hang onto a part of home they might otherwise forget. And I do this with immense joy and care for elders who move into long-term care, either by choice or necessity. I hope to grow this tiny art studio enough financially that I can offer subsidized portraits to elders who might not otherwise be able to afford a portrait of their own.

If you have a friend or family member who would appreciate a handmade painting of their home, cottage, wedding venue, favourite business, or vacation spot painted by a local Canadian artist, send them my way! I can’t wait to fill my portfolio with the places we each call “home”.