Artist in Residence: Sherry Park

Painter Sherry Park’s softly colourful works lie in the realm of realism, but the artist isn’t reproducing every minute detail. “I want to see the brushstrokes,” she says. She relies on photos, but doesn’t copy them grid by grid, instead using them as models in her Alton Mill Arts Centre studio. This leaves room to characterize her subjects with both honesty and affection — especially her older muses.

“Maire Kearns”, oil on wood panel   24″ x 36″

“Jillian”, oil on wood panel   24″ x 36″

“Portrait of Ung Yol Park”, oil on canvas   30″ x 40″

Sherry will tell you the image of Ung Yol Park, her father, is a tender moment in the rhododendrons at a public garden in Mississauga. The woman in the award-winning Maire Kearns is a model Sherry painted in an art class. “The way she’s sitting, her gaze. She’s a very strong person who is aging gracefully,” she says fondly. 

See more of Sherry’s work at sherrypark.ca