Janna Watson's new paintings offer a much-needed burst of joy, at Bau-Xi Gallery to January 23

The Toronto artist brings an emotive, human quality to abstraction

Janna Watson’s Fly Horsie! and My Hair Isn’t Working Very Well, at the Bau-Xi Gallery. — Janna Watson’s *Fly Horsie!* and My Hair Isn’t Working Very Well, at the Bau-Xi Gallery.

Bau-Xi Gallery Vancouver presents Finding Joy until January 23.

TORONTO ARTIST Janna Watson’s new Vancouver show is called Finding Joy—a title that will resonate as something we’re all trying to do right now.

The way the paint and ink sweep, loop, and fold in on each other in her new large-scale paintings somehow provides a sense of freedom and escape from the confinement we’re all faced with in this strange socially distanced time.

In Watson’s mixed-media works on wood panel, the paint itself seems to emote and express itself in swirling, lushly organic ways—sometimes offset by graphic shapes.

The artists calls these gestural expressions “moments”, and in the process, she makes abstract art vulnerable, honest, and deeply human, without being figurative.

Her paintings’ fun titles—Lil’ Bit Wiggly, Let’s Go Chickens, and My Hair Isn’t Working Very Well—are just the bonus.

Watson studied at the Ontario College of Art and Design, and has exhibited here and across Canada and the world.

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