The key was handed over on Thursday afternoon, and already the new artist-in-residence at Studio 2880 had customer interest in her paintings.
Carla Joseph Aubichon has barely gotten her paintbrushes set on her new desk and already a passerby offered to purchase the semi-painted work on her easel. It was the kind of exposure she was hoping for, but wasn't expecting in her first morning on the job.
Artist-in-residence isn't really a job in the typical sense. It is the Community Arts Council's way of giving an artist a career boost. The successful artist gets a year of free studio space in the CAC's arts complex at Studio 2880. They also get prime space at CAC events like Studio Fair, Spring Arts Bazaar, their on-site gallery, Art Battle, 6x6 Art Auction, and other high profile opportunities.
Aubichon is the fourth in this now-annual CAC offering. The previous three were, in chronological order, Corey Hardeman, Cliff Mann and most recently Crystalynn Tarr.
One of them, Mann, got such career traction while the artist-in-residence that he never left the building. He rented space in the next studio and is based in that spot today, only six feet from where Aubichon is setting up her shop. It is an open-concept floor plan, so there will be plenty of neighbourly interactions.
"It's a great experience the whole year through," said Mann, who formally presented Aubichon with the keys to the building as a ceremonial welcome. "Having that space got me out of my kitchen, it got me into doing classes, and I'd always wanted to teach art so that happened for me as a result of being the artist-in-residence, and it got me going in a direction I'd always hoped for," Mann said.
"There are so many opportunities that come with this, it really pushes your comfort zone, gets you painting in public, gets your name into the public, it brings up all kinds of interactions that helps market you as an artist but it also helps make you better as an artist."
Aubichon confessed she had never taught art classes before but had that desire and eyed the tables across the hall in the Studio 2880 conference room.
"This is a lot more space than I have at home. I just have the kitchen table and my kids are artists, too, so we all have to share," Aubichon said. "It's great to not have to worry about cleaning everything up when you run out of time, you can have more than one project going at a time, and it's great to be outside the home with all those distractions."
She never had a formal art teacher until her high school years, she said, so to now be surrounded by high level creators of all kinds was a buffet of knowledge she now had available. She was looking forward to having those quick conversations, those passing question-and-answer moments where she and the regular established artists could talk shop. Two of them - Mann and Janice Parker - were right beside her with their display and creation spaces.
That, said CAC president Zelda Craig, was exactly what was envisioned when the artist-in-resident position was invented. All three past ones have seen their careers spiral upwards since they held the key to the building, and it is radiating success into the broader arts community.
"I had no idea, even being on this board, until the artist-in-resident program started how deep and how wide the pool is in Prince George," said Craig. "We had a number of applicants to be the artist-in-residence this year, and some real talent among them. It was a difficult choice. We hear all the time, now, about how the program is having an effect on connections being developed and relationships developing between artists, and the public getting more of an understanding about local artists because of the work being done and the profiles being built among these few artists who get this chance. It really is having an effect on more than just these four we have selected so far."
Aubichon looks forward to being able to come and go as she pleases from her work space, and being able to tackle some images she's had in her imagination but couldn't get started on for practical reasons in the kitchen at home. She has been a commercially successful artist from years now, but expects her career to really start cooking in this gift of a year at Studio 2880.
