Artist’s talent a lifelong gift

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 09/05/2017 (3356 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Residing in a riverside Wolseley Avenue house with a pine-cuddled, red-lettered sign stating “Kelly Art Objects”, are artist Jo’Anne Kelly, her re-homed shih tzu, rescued cats and renditions of goddesses, peacocks, dragons, a tiger and many trees.

These fantastical beings of Kelly’s own design (so, not her pets) stand, strut or slink on painted silk, on her finely-worked porcelain, or other sumptuous surfaces. Jewelry seedpods and snail shells stretch and curl in precious metals dotted with exquisite stones.

“I have a fascination with material and what the limits are,” says Kelly. “I’m an inquisitive person when it comes to process. What would happen if I do this and this? It leads me to different things.” Her creations range from impossibly thin papery porcelain to works generated by computer that adorn textiles, and other surfaces. 

This week, Kelly, who is a graduate of the Winnipeg School of Art (before it moved from downtown to the University of Manitoba’s Fort Garry Campus), a retired high school art teacher, a sometimes art adjudicator and always the artist, will have another birthday.

She’s celebrated several in Wolseley, where she’s lived almost 50 years.

Kelly purchased a house on Basswood Place, in an era when a single woman — she was then a widow with children, teaching full-time at Daniel McIntyre Collegiate Institute — was required to have a male co-sign her mortgage. For 45 years, she has been at her 1106 Wolseley Ave. home gallery, with its downstairs clay studio and separate painting studio beside the Assiniboine.

“I have enjoyed many fruitful years,” Kelly says. “I haven’t wasted my time on this earth.”

Her art is proof. In addition to porcelain bowls and vases, pendants, painted scarves and landscapes, there are her lush, detailed, illustrations in the children’s books, Som See and the Magic Elephant (1994) and The Peacock’s Pride (1996), both published by New York’s Hyperion Press.

Presently, she’s exploring digitally-generated images of women wearing hijab. One of these individuals stands proudly, life-sized, on a silk panel, her clothing and the background a contrast of color and patterns.

“Life and death and feminine power, that has been a refrain in my art life,” Kelly says. “I return to certain ideas and certain forms from time to time, often doing more than one thing at a time.”

Kelly’s current and archived works are pictured on her website: joannekellyartobjects.com.
You can arrange an appointment to see items for sale, at: j.kelly@shaw.ca or 204-772-4851.

Gail Perry is a community correspondent for Wolseley. She can be reached at: gailperry.writer@gmail.com