OLD MAN
For me, this is where it all began, my art career that is. Being in charge of Tofino RCMP Detachment in 1985, I spent a few hours each week walking the beat. My foot patrols took me to all of the stores, all twenty of them, in the downtown area of Tofino. One of those businesses was the Eagle Aerie Art Gallery, the artistic home of Roy Henry Vickers. We quickly became friends and I watched him paint for about a year. I didn’t realize at the time that I was learning as I watched. More as a practical joke than anything, I decided to try a painting in the “Vickers style”. My plan was to finish a painting, hang it on my wall and then watch Roy’s reaction, as he found apiece similar to his style. My plan fell apart one day when I was half finished the painting. Roy happened over to my home for a visit. He knocked and walked in. Catching me in the act, he leaned over my shoulder and took a long studied look. Without warning he reached to the table, picked up the half finished painting and tore it in two. His words at the time were “If you’re going to copy my style then do it right”. He left my home and went to his gallery. He returned in a very few minutes with proper brushes, paints and paper and began teaching me. The end result was my first painting in the Vickers style – “Old Man”. It was a few months later, when my painting was framed, hung and on my living room wall that the next development took place. Roy and I were sitting in a hot tub one colourful west coast evening and we had a conversation. Roy insisted that prints of my painting would sell in his gallery. I had no money to invest in such a fanciful project so Roy told me how he would tackle the project to prove his point.
Investing his own money, Roy took my painting and had it reproduced in a limited edition of 100 serigraphs and hung them in his gallery. Before the end of that summer all 100 prints were sold and had gone around the world. I was a believer – in myself. Roy Vickers gave me a gift that summer. The gift was a look inside myself. He showed me something of me that I didn’t know was there. I continue to paint and print my works to this day and I will be forever grateful to my friend and teacher – Roy Henry Vickers.
