When Landon Peters unveils his art show at Visual Effects next Thursday evening, it’ll smack of colour.
“With this show focusing on the skies, I think people will be really delighted by the images. A good colour slap in the face, so to speak,” said Peters.
The show at 4905 48 St., runs from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m., with over 20 pieces available for purchase and viewing a week afterward. Peters’ painting centres on local scenes of Old Town and the surrounding landscape, using sunsets and sunrises to make each painting pop off the canvas.
Nick Pearce/NNSL photo
Peters, a theatre instructor Sir John Franklin High School, typically clears his evening to paint. Working at night, he’ll often take 10 steps back, ensuring views are drawn in from a distance.
The pieces at next week show are largely from the past few months and fall, when he began to experiment more with colour in his artwork.
“It’s exploring your palette and exploring the sky. Sometimes in the past I’ve limited myself but now you kind of just go for it,” he said. “Try not to be hemmed in with your own idea of where you need to stop, try to take it a little further.”
When he painted houseboats or shacks, he aimed to push himself. He included more warm colours, like oranges and reds, and added them to the sky in nature scenes.
Similarly, what normally would be straight yellow sides of a houseboat were accented with warm reds and oranges.
While landscapes can often appear flat, Peters aims to use whites and cooler colours to accentuate the painting.
“Some people use a computer program to try to bring out the colour in a picture, (use a) colour enhancer,” Peters said. “I’m just trying to use my imagination, or creativity, to see how I could make colour pop.”
“I don’t limit my judgement based off a photo."
Influenced by the Group of Seven (he was a student at the Emily Carr College of Art and Design), Peters thinks the landscapes are widely relatable, with the Canadian Shield near Yellowknife readily applicable to someone’s life in Northern Ontario.
Consequently, tourists will often pick one of his pieces as keepsake, he said. But often times local residents aiming for vibrant look at their surroundings will pick up a painting.
“There’s a lot of people in Yellowknife, when they move away from here, they want to keep a piece,” he said. “We sell a lot to local people.”