›› Debra Ali • Debra's set to teach a Painting from Photography workshop. On display are florals and landscapes. More info >
›› William Band • William regularly teaches Watercolour workshops at VAB. His selection of works on display includes auto art and landscapes from his visits to the United Kingdom. More info >
›› Keith Moreau • Keith teaches the open studio times, three days a week and Thursday evenings. His works on display include still lifes and landscapes.
›› Jacqueline Veltri • Jacqueline teaches painting open studio times on Thursday daytime and Saturday afternoons. Her selections focus on portraiture and still life.

Brampton artist and photograph Alysa Bartha will exhibit works from her new book Petal's Wish.

A special book signing with Alysa is schedule, date to be announced.

Official site • Artist's website • Facebook fan page • Brampton Guardian article

Petal’s Wish is the story of a tiny fairy that goes on a big adventure that will change her life forever. Beautiful illustrations compliment the whimsical tale of Petal and her friend Bishop the cardinal. The two best friend’s journey through their fantastical world looking for a powerful treasure. Petal, facing many challenges along the way learns the meaning of friendship, the importance of honesty and the value of self reliance. This imaginative and exciting story was written to inspire self confidence in young readers.

Visual Arts Brampton is celebrating its 24th anniversary in 2010. All VAB member artists have been invited to create artwork on a 24 inch by 24 inch canvas. The work can feature any topic, so long as there is floral imagery.

Works will be displayed at Brampton City Hall's Atrium Gallery, in June, before moving to Artway Invitational Gallery.

Participants in 2010 were Debra Ali, William Band, Alysa Bartha, Merlene Boyce, Makini Calliste-Woolard, Chang Sun Kim, Mary Chorniuk, Nicole D'Sousa, Maria Dlubak, Paul Draper, Marguerite Finlayson, Emily Kowalik, Dolores Miron, Keith Moreau, Mary Noble, Francesca Riopka, Victoria Riopka, Vanetia R., Marian Simpson, Tashiana Singh, Paulina Su, Ryan C. Thompson, Marilyn Turingia, Anand Vaid, Jacqueline Veltri, and Devere Wint.

Brian J. Michon is has been painting part time for the last 10 years, focusing mainly on studying and practicing Portraiture. Along the way Brian has taken the odd commission, however the main focus was to keep honing his skill as a painter. Last year Brian entered a painting of his parents into the Kingston Prize, Canada’s National Portrait Contest and was delighted to learn he was chosen for the competition. Brian earned a Special Mention Award.

Brian paints mainly in Oils and Watercolour. Just recently he has begun to explore acrylic with positive results.

Brian has a Bachelors Degree in Fine Art Studies from Algoma University/College in Sault Ste. Marie, On. As well he has a Diploma in Advertising Art/Graphic Design from Sault College of Applied Arts and Technology. Brian also holds a Diploma in Digital Media Design from the International Academy of Design in Toronto, ON.

For the past 9 years Brian has been working full time in the Sign industry, working as a Graphic Artist/Designer.

Brian was born and raised in Geraldton, ON, a small town just North/East of Thunder Bay, ON. He was encouraged as a youngster, by his parents, friends and family to pursue a career in the arts.

Brian’s main artistic influences included Ken Danby, Norman Rockwell, Caravaggio, Norval Morrisseau, just to name a few.

Artist's statement:

I feel my life as an artist has just begun to take shape. I finally feel the confidence in my abilities to take a step further to embark on a body of work that will be more cohesive in what I want to say as an artist. I have many themes I want to explore, as well, there are many different techniques I want to utilize to tell my stories. The small body of work you see here represents a process in my journey as a painter, of which I am proud to present to you. While Portraiture will always be a love in my life, I want to explore a more Existentialist approach in my art, provoking thought and solution.

Since joining Visual Arts Brampton, Thompson has participated in numerous shows at Artway Gallery and regularly practices at its life drawing sessions. His painting "Hortus Leonis Rex" has toured with Visual Arts Brampton's 24th anniversary floral art show, to locations including the Canadian National Exhibition.

Featured in this exhibit are drawings and paintings by Visual Arts Brampton's youth classes, for a contest by the local conservation body. Students aged 9 to 18 all contributed their creativity, using a variety of themes related to the Credit Valley Conservation Authority's Floating Island Project, and their collection of parks.

Working in Ahmedabad, India for many years, Priya Anand Pariyani will exhibit her oil paintings, which she describes as being her "own imagination display of human feeling." Pariyani has done solo and group shows in India.

The Image Matrix Printmakers of Mississauga is a non-profit printmakers' studio located in Visual Arts Mississauga at Riverwood, Mississauga. The group has promoted this fine art form for decades, exhibiting in Peel, Halton, and Toronto, including at the Art Gallery of Peel, alongside Visual Arts Brampton's own printmakers.

The group includes Patricia Vega, Deborah Moore, Ivan Fitt, Silvia Damar Radvansky, Eileen Oswald, Bev Didur, Gillian Futlon, Louise Cahsens, and Gil Caldwell.

The Image Matrix facilities allow members to created monoprints, woodblocks, lino prints, intaglio, and silk screen prints.

Lorne Scot Corporal Nathaniel Montague is a young, emerging artist, serving in Afghanistan at the time Runs in the Family began. As Nate's tour was extended past this show's start date, the figures and portraits on display were reproductions. Given a small window of time, available to send work home via email, they were the few images he was able to scan. The portraits on display were sketched from life, while the characters were from his imagination. He has always loved drawing.

One work on display, a "moral" illustration, was a response to the recent Toronto Star online article on the Canadian government, and its lack of support for wounded soldiers, reportage Nate and his fellow soliders were following. The siren warning of rocket attacks has a very distinctive sound, inspiring "The girl with the rocket". There are an abundance of Doritos for the troops. Nate painted the wall mural "Democracy is delicious", featuring a Dorito chip. (There are also bowls of Oreo cookies, pop, and water everywhere.

Teen artists Priya Mistry and Makini Calliste-Woollard both won Platinum Awards at the recent 2010 Visual Arts Brampton Youth Achievement Awards. These two teens won five gold medallions each during their time with Visual Arts Brampton, earning them Platinum Awards. The only other person to win this award was Emily Kowalik, in 2004.

Currently in grade 12, Makini Calliste-Woollard is set to graduate from Mayfield's Region Arts Program, Visual Arts. Having attended Visaul Arts Brampton's teen classes for six years, she received one silver before earning five consecutive gold medals. Makini is the new co-instructor of kids classes at VAB, for 6-to-8-year-olds. Makini does artwork in a variety of mediums that include pencil, coloured pencil, silk screen printing, and cake decoration. She hopes to pursue a post-secondary education in fashion design.

High schooler Priya Mistry remembers her first art class at Visual Arts Brampton, at age 9. She remembers "walking into a room of talented teens, who had so much enthusiasm." While some might be intimidate, she says that this inspired her to discover art. After receiving a bronze in 2004, and a silver in 2005, she recieved 5 consecutive gold medallions. Along with being one of the only three Platinum Award winners, Priya is tied with one other student for longest time as student at VAB, with 7 years. Despite all this, she says "I really feel like is that I won something greater than that: I won the ability to expose, express and find myself."

A variety of media was used to further the exploration in order to resolve how physical reflection would be achieved from one medium to another. This gave the artist the freedom to discover new ways of conveying the notion of what an object might look like when it is reflected on a surface which is sometimes in motion, or fraught with inclusions.

Visual Arts Brampton is expanding Laughlines, its annual exhibit of cartoon art, to two spaces this year. The 2011 show will run on the normal schedule at Artway Gallery, from 26 March to 29 April 2011, it will also run at Artway Invitational Gallery from mid-April to mid-May.

Featured is special guest exhibitor Patricia Storms, creator of children's book The Pirate and the Penguin, and illustrator of many other titles. Storms also is a Ontario Community Newspapers Association-award winning political cartoonist.

Also new to the show this year is Brampton storyboard artist Jim Caswell, who is premiering his MonsterMashupTv at the show.

Returning favourites:

•  Steve Nease, exhibiting his editorial cartoon the past 12 months, and PUD comic strip,	•  Peter Emslie, a Disney-rooted illustrator teaching character design at Sheridan College, known for his Cartoon Cave punditry, will exhibit some new caricatures,	•  Ryan Christopher Thompson, returning with his superpowered webcomic.

OPAS is a society of Ontario landscape painters who are focused on depicting the grandeur and immensity of the True North. We do so in spontaneous and dynamic images that reflect the magnificence of Canada in general and Ontario in specific in both its Urban landscape and its Wilderness. By choosing to interpret nature en plein air, facing the elements and feeling at one with the Canadian landscape, we seek to capture its vitality and inner poetry.

At a time when the heightened awareness of the fragile nature of our planet has captured public concern, we offer a new voice for our Canadian environment by depicting its splendour and character in paint.

Helen Walter "Three Sisters"	Scott Cooper "Frozen Creek"	Keith Thirgood "Ward's Island Café"
Dalibor Dejanovic "Sunnyside Pavilion in Sunset"	Fred Cootes "Paradise"	Tom Hirsz "Red Barn at Wilberforce"

Visual Arts Brampton's 2nd annual floral art project.

Participants in 2011 were Debra Ali, William Band, Luis Barrios, Merlene Boyce, Maria Carosi, Makini Calliste-Woollard, Chang Sun Kim, Mary Chorniuk, Stephanie Czolij, Nicole D'Souza, Maria B. Dlubak, Paul Draper, Yulia Duchenko, Betty Jean Evans, Lucy Feng, Marguerite Finlayson, Paul Highgate, Thea Jansen, Susi Grell Knox, Maureen McLellan, Sheila McCulloch, Michelle, Dolores Miron, Keith Moreau, Bev Munroe, Mary Noble, Francesca Riopka, Victoria Riopka, Diamond Scott, Marian Simpson, Tasha Singh, Ryan C. Thompson, Marilyn Turingia, Anand Vaid, and Jacqueline Veltri.

Jean Liang and Shirley Liang exhibit their artwork at Artway Invitational Gallery; Jean is studying animation at Sheridan College, while Shirley is in her first year of illustration at Sheridan.

Jean Liang

"Ever since I was young, I wanted to tell stories with my artwork. At the age of 4 I doodled on the backs of my grandparent's calendars of things I did during the day. In elementary school I drew comics for my friends to laugh to. In high school and college I sought to create imagery with hidden meanings and are hauntingly beautiful in nature. To me, the most enjoyable aspect of painting are the reactions I get out of people when I show them my work. I want to inspire people. I want to tell stories, create worlds and tug at heart strings. I think it's beautiful when people can all share an idea without even knowing each other and I wish that some day my work can be that idea that brings us all a little closer together."

Shirley Liang

"My work reflects what I value in art: the simple aesthetics and a balance of old and new. I am constantly experimenting with the merge of traditional technique with contemporary design, while striving to capture and display the moments where colour and light create something beautiful. My passion lies in both the intimate observation and replication of realism and the freedom of creation and imagination. I’ve studied art for over eight years and graduated in 2011 from the Regional Arts Program at Cawthra Park Secondary School with top marks in Visual Arts, Design and Communications Technology and receiving a Visual Arts Bursary from the Peel Police Association. I am currently studying Illustration at Sheridan Institute of Advanced Learning and Technology. "

This popular exhibit returns for a second year, with a new set of professional artists, and their parents, spouses, or children, who all have an ability as well.