From the Times Colonist, Thursday October 2, 2003 Go! Art

Inspired by Her Dreams

by Robert Amos

Darlene Gait’s art is about all things good. Her detailed acrylic paintings are often narrative, with a poem attached, inspired by her vivid dreams. They might feature a local animal imbued with spiritual significance, totemic animals like eagle, wolf, heron, kingfisher and lynx. With acrylic paint on canvas, she paints animals and young women with every hair in place.

Children are often the subject of her pictures, as big-eyed and charming as those of Dorothy Oxborough. There is a cosmic niceness about her themes which brings to mind Roy Henry Vickers or Carol Evans. Often the whole scene is bathed in a heavenly glow in the mood of Thomas Kincaid.

Gait grew up at Errington near the Englishman River on Vancouver Island. She is a member of the Esquimalt Band of the Coast Salish Nation and lives in Shawnigan Lake. With a high level of skill and encouragement, she seems poised for success in the wider world. The current show is almost entirely made up of giclee prints of her originals.