It was lovely to have three of my works selected for Voices of Women Through Canadian History curated by Astri Wright for the International Womens Day exhibition in Victoria at the Bay Centre, shown from March the 2nd to the 12th.
Here is my statement about my work:
My three watercolour silhouettes are part of a series of spontaneous responses to war time photographs, and represent many women of that time. I have presented these pictures so they hang slightly out of the frame to represent history joining our present.
Through these pictures I am reminded of my mother and my grandmother. My mother had her first two little girls during WW2 in Holland; Canada’s role in liberating the Dutch moves me with deep gratitude. The third picture represents my grandmother who as a refugee from Latvia, just after WW1, fled to Germany and then lived through that country’s depression and WW2 experience. As an immigrant to this country I often imagine that my grandmother, who lives on in me, has somehow found peace here.
Cornelia van Voorst 