The two featured painters exhibiting in the showcase window at Mills Office Productivity represent the open possibilities of junior and the elder creators. Joseph Cunningham is in his 20s, Doreen Gray is in her 80s and yet they share the display area as peers.
"Part of what this pairing goes to show is how creativity has no age," said Mills curator Michael Kast. "Art comes out of people no matter what their life looks like, young or old, male or female, it is built into all of us."
Gray was a teacher in local elementary schools for about 35 years, but never became a regular artist until later.
"I decided to take this up when I retired," she said. "My job kept me too busy, but once you retire you find yourself with more time. I did art as part of my teacher training, we did smatterings of science and music and all the topics we wanted to be included in a young child's learning, and I felt an interest in art."
Cunningham couldn't agree more that jobs get in the way of artistic development.
"I decided to become a permanent artist, full-time," said the former seasonal firefighter who made the decision to focus on art soon after completing his post-secondary education, a year of which was the CNC Fine Arts program. "A lot of people will tell you you're not going to make any money and I just say that's exactly what happens anytime you start a small business of your own. It starts with struggle, there will be ups and downs, you just have to keep applying your skills to your trade - I call it a vocation - and you'll get through them."
Gray knows about the struggles to become an artist. For more than 12 years, now, she has been a member of the Artists' Co-Op, a long-time local association that provides lessons and exhibition opportunties, as well as artistic fellowship.
Cunningham took over his father's basement, when his full-time art endeavours began, but he now rents a space just outside of town where he has physical space and also mental freedom. It's a helpful feature for someone primarily an abstract artist.
"He comes into the store and gets a few things now and then, we got chatting, and we discovered that we do the same genre of abstract art, although it is quite different between the two of us. It all just clicked," said Kast, describing Cunningham's style and why he was chosen for the coveted display space in the Mills window.
"She is more of a realist, and works in oil paint," said Kast of what Gray does. "She had been on the list waiting quite some time for a chance to display her work here, and this time we were able to make it happen and we are so excited to show the public what she does."
Gray said she is evolving her work into mixed media and is "leaning towards abstract and impressionist work and collage which some people don't even consider art" as a natural development she is going through. "It's an open world now, the art world."
The space he works in and lives in defines where Cunningham's art is heading, he said. "I haven't left this community except for travel. It always brings me home, every time. This is where I love to be and I think that'll be forever."
He has been embraced here, like when CNC bought two of his works for the college's permanent collection of student art and like the commissions he's received from businesses (Northern Traditional Homes, Nordic Physiotherapy, etc.) for prominent display of his paintings.
These two local painters will have their work on display in one of the downtown's most eye-engaging corners at Fifth Avenue and Brunswick Street until the end of the month.
