‘In the Spirit of Allusion’ now at The Gallery

A girl with a challenging gaze is hiding behind the door when I arrive at the home and studio of Andrea Klann. The girl in question is not Klann’s seven-year-old daughter, but rather Girl with Chihuahua, a captivating painting in oil that is included in Klann’s solo exhibition, In the Spirit of Allusion at The Gallery, opening Aug. 5 and running until Aug. 24.

Klann’s current studio is in a front room of the 1920s bungalow the family barged to Tunstall Bay from Port Moody in 2006. It is a jumble of brushes, paints, books and finished canvases that compete for attention. Hard cover books with the bold names of Picasso and Goya lie open on the art table, and Old Masters prints are tucked amidst photos, drawings and ephemera on an adjoining wall. When the weather is warm she moves her easel out to the back sundeck where she paints 12 feet above wilderness where unhindered deer often visit.

Commenting on her upcoming exhibition, Klann enthuses, “Two of my greatest passions are painting and the written word. While working on In the Spirit of Allusion, I came across words written by poets and writers that I felt contributed to my work in a kindred manner; it is these literary allusions that I’ve included in the show”. Klann’s work is sophisticated and intriguing, with elements of both symbolism and surrealism. “I blur reality with the imagined to create a narrative of invented figures that inhabit a symbolic otherworld.” The intense emotion and expression of the figures relate directly to the landscape in which Klann places them – be it the confined interior of Pierrot in The Carnival or the expansive ocean of Leaving.

The character present in many of Klann’s paintings in this exhibition is Pierrot, the white-face clown, who was introduced to French theatre in the 17th century, and a symbol that Klann became fixated with many years ago. “I lived in Paris at age 18 and often saw Pierrot represented; his character has been with me since that time and for me has become symbolic of the melancholy of the human soul. In my current exhibition he is spiritually dispossessed and isolated in the ‘carnival’ of the modern world.”

New Westminster-born Klann inherited her talent from the Liverpool-based Tate family of more than six generations of painters. She has always painted and drawn, and indicates that her work is intuitive in nature. “I generally have a strong visual image in my head, and surprisingly, the finished work usually turns out very similar to this initial image”. A graduate of the University of British Columbia, she completed further art studies at Emily Carr Institute of Art + Design and Westminster College, London, where she lived for four years. Klann considers herself self-taught in painting and attributes much of her talent to hard work, a curious and introspective nature, and her ancestors. “Moving to Bowen Island was a turning point for me personally and professionally. It is here that I’ve met an incredible community of people and found a depth of inspiration.”

Klann’s work is held in private collections in Canada, England and Australia.

The official opening of the exhibition is Sunday, Aug. 10, from 1 – 4 p.m.. Please see www.eaklann.com for further information about the artist, her work, and The Gallery hours.

Rhonda Leduc