Calendar

Mondays – 5:00 to 7:00 PM

Now until December 19, 2022
Drop-in: no pre-registration required

Experience the benefits of creative expression in a supportive group environment. No experience required.

Join us at our weekly open studio, each with its own theme, using a variety of art making mediums and techniques like mending, stitching, paint, collage, clay, found objects, 2d and 3d, weaving, and nature to explore what is immediate for you in the moment.

Making art together can support us to move through life’s challenges, helping us to grieve our losses, mitigate feelings of isolation and loneliness and reduce symptoms of stress and anxiety.

The sessions will be facilitated by Art Therapist Heidi Abbott, and Art Therapy Intern Farrell Elliot.  Heidi and Farell both have a love for the therapeutic, meditative, healing, and self-expressive attributes of creating together.

Everyone welcome, free, all supplies are provided.

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The Industrial Shoreline Series - examines the working harbour, where the industry of shipping goods and products from our factories and fields intersects with our essential need for a healthy ecosystem and marine environment. This textile exhibition showcases work created over the past 6 years and includes both large scale wall pieces and 3D components.
You are welcome to an Opening Reception and Artist Talk on Nov. 16th, 1-3 pm. If you are coming anytime from off island, please contact me and I would love to meet you at the gallery.

Tides & Moons: Herring Capital is a new animated art installation by Cindy Mochizuki that shares memories and stories from Japanese Canadian fishing and boat building families who populated Nanaimo shorelines before World War II.

Throughout her practice, Cindy has developed multi-media installations, fictional audio works, performances, animations, drawings, and social collaborations that relate to Japanese Canadian experiences in B.C and Japan. She works with members of these communities and often includes her paternal family’s history both within internment camps and as repatriated Japanese Canadians in Japan after the war.

In the early 1920’s Japanese Canadian fishers lived and worked in Nanaimo at Hammond Bay (also known as Kujira Bay), Departure Bay, Shack Island (a way station for salmon and coho fishers traveling north), and Saysutshun. While Nanaimo had been known as a coal town for half a century, it also had 43 Japanese herring salteries. Due to the unexplainable abundance of t

Our popular OCAC Members Show features 2D or 3D artwork, in any medium, no larger thatn 6″X6″X6′.

Join us in celebrating the miniature creations by local artists.  A perfect Christmas gift!

 Download the application here