Roberta Anderson

“For the things we have to learn before we can do them, we learn by doing them.”

                                                                      –    Aristotle

Years before I retired, I took my class on a field trip to Langley City Hall. Artwork adorned the hallway and I spied a beautiful collage. I stopped in front of it so quickly that the student behind me ran straight into my back. While the student was busy sputtering about how I should give them some warning for crying out loud, I was thinking that one day I would like to take lessons from this artist. Her name was Gabrielle Strauss. 

After apologizing to the student who no doubt caught teacher cooties by running into me, I explained why I stopped and I pointed out how much I was taken by the art on the walls. We stayed for a few minutes and admired all of the artwork.

Fast forward five or so years — I’m retired and wandering an artisan fair in Fort Langley and low and behold I recognized the name of one of the artists. I convinced my mother to sign up for a class with me.

Gabrielle creates stunning collage works. Huge challenge for someone who is a self-confessed control freak, so I was nervous walking into the session. She was so gracious and calm and gentle in her teaching approach that I felt comfortable pushing my artistic boundaries. 

One of the biggest lessons I learned from her in that first session centered around my frustration when I didn’t like what was going on in my piece and was whining about it.

She looked me in the eye and calmly said, “You have to work through the ugly.”

She was not speaking about the work. She was talking about the stage of the artwork as well as the attitude that I had about it. Push on, work through, persevere was the message. 

This is the finished product after “working through the ugly.”

This is my mom’s piece. 

Realizing that I needed further instruction if I were to add paint to my collage, I signed up for another session with Gabrielle and this time convinced my niece to join me. Here are the results of that session.

Georgia, my niece, with her collage.

Here is me with my finished work. This one has paint added to it to calm down some of the wild colours and allow the eye to see the central figure of vase and flowers.

It was such a privilege to be able to work with and learn from an artist whom I admire. 

Thank you, Gabrielle!

Meanwhile, I will keep “pushing through the ugly!”

Cheers!

Roberta