PAMELA MAYHEW ART

Summer Light

This Spring, I stepped away from the studio and immersed myself in landscapes that have lingered in my imagination long after returning home.

Over several weeks, I travelled through France and Portugal, biking through the Loire Valley, exploring the Algarve coast, and spending time in the Azores. It was a journey of movement, observation, and sketching. Each day offered new encounters with colour and light - the warm glow of evening on stone villages, brilliant reflections on water, fields shimmering under expansive skies, and coastlines shaped by wind and time.

As painters, we often travel not simply to see new places, but to see differently. What stayed with me the most was the quality of light. There was a warmth and luminosity that seemed to permeate everything. I filled sketchbooks, took countless photographs, and spend long hours simply looking.

Back in the studio, those experiences have begun to find their way into the work.

While my paintings continue to explore landscape and hover at the edge of abstraction, a new palette is emerging. Colour has become brighter, more luminous, and perhaps more adventurous. The works is less about describing a place and more about capturing an experience of light - how it moves across water, dissolves distance, and transforms the familiar into something unexpected.

The paintings remain rooted in landscape, but they are increasingly concerned with atmosphere, sensation, and memory. They ask what happens when observation is filtered through experience and translated through paint.

This summer, I am pleased to be sharing this new work in several exhibitions.

Layered Landscape - Responding to Where We Live

Opening June 20th, I am honoured to be part of Layered Landscapes- Responding to Where We Live at the Wellington Heritage Museum.

This exhibition brings four artists together whose work reflects personal interpretations of our environment. Two textile artists, Bear Epp and Bay Woodyard, a potter/sculptor, Andrea Piller and myself as a painter. We each offer a unique perspective on the landscapes and places that shape our lives.

I am excited to see how the different mediums- woold, clay , form and paint speak to one another within the beautiful setting of a former church.

Beneath the Surface

My work also continues to be featured in Beneath the Surface, a pop-up exhibition at Hartley’s Restaurant in Picton, curated by Jim Turner of 2Gallery.

The paintings in this exhibition examine the shifting relationship between land, water, memory, and perception. They invite viewers to linger, to look closely, and to discover the subtle movements that exists beneath what first appears familiar.

J2 Gallery, Gananoque

In Gananoque, selected works continue to be exhibited at J2Gallery, a vibrant contemporary gallery in the Thousand Islands region.

These paintings share many of the same concerns that occupy my studio practice today; the interaction of colour and light, the emotional resonance of landscape, and the possibilities that emerge when observation gives way to interpretation.

This new body of work feels like a transition- an exploration of colour, light, and scale that is still unfolding. I would genuinely love to hear what you think. Your responses, observations, and conversations often become part of the ongoing dialogue that shapes future work.

I hope to see many of you over the summer.

Warmly, Pamela Mayhew

As always, I am grateful to everyone who follows my work, visits exhibitions, collects paintings , or simply takes the time to look.

Looking ahead, I’m excited for an exhibition early next June featuring four local PEC artists responding to our environment - two textile artists, a ceramicist, and myself as the painter. It is called Layered Landscapes.

With a background in interior design, practice and teaching; I’ve always been passionate about the way spaces and aesthetics influence how we feel. I continue to blend my love of design and art in my practice, creating work that celebrates their shared language of form, texture and emotion.

Thank you for being part of this journey. I’m wishing you a restful end to the year and a gentle, inspiring start to the next. I look forward to hearing your thoughts on these new paintings. If you can envision one in your home, please let me know.

Until next time,

Warmly. Pamela Mayhew