JOAN SHARROCK ........... Artist - Wildlife Painter
JOAN SHARROCK ........... Artist - Wildlife Painter
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Number 4 - Autumn /Winter 1995
THREE PAINTINGS SOLD AT CHRISTIE'S
Sending paintings to an art auction is always a bit of a gamble. However, for their Wildlife Art Auction in London last summer (1995) Christie's chose three of Joan Sharrock's best paintings and the artist reasoned that having the paintings in a catalogue with international exposure would compensate for the expense of shipping them there and the risk of not knowing what they would fetch. The gamble paid off. Not only did "Autumn Light - Cougar" and "Strength of Purpose - Lion" sell, but "Sand Jewel" an 8"x10" painting of a jungle fowl fetched double its estimate of £400 to £600 sterling - it went for £l,350 sterling which is approximately $2,600 Canadian dollars. Sometimes it pays to take a chance!
Painting: "Strength of Purpose" 16 x 20 ins. oil © JOAN SHARROCK
Painting: "Sand Jewel" 8 x 10 ins. oil © JOAN SHARROCK
It is always gratifying to get exposure in the press and 1995 was a good year.
US ART Magazine April 1995 pages 40 - 42, feature article "Where the Wild Things Are" by Sue Keller, had a double page spread of the painting "Lily Dabblers".
This particular artist is Joan Sharrock, who left England for Vancouver B.C. in 1972. She lives close to downtown and doesn't own a car. Three blocks from her home is Stanley Park, ideal for a walk in the forest; visible from her window are the migrating birds that periodically dot English Bay.
Ever since her farming childhood, Sharrock has drawn the animals that surround her. "I inherited the impulse to create from my great-grandmother," she says. Early artistic efforts were encouraged by her parents, but because she didn't consider art a viable way to earn a steady living, she become an executive secretary. Never forgetting the pleasure she derived from painting, though, Sharrock came to Canada armed with an adventurous spirit, a droll sense of humor and an unquenchable yen for travel. In 1983 she decided to become a full-time artist, focusing on what she knew best: animals and birds in their native habitats.
With a combination of limited-edition prints and plates, greeting cards and a forthcoming series of mini-prints and posters, Sharrock has made sure her art reaches a considerable number of people in a variety of places. In 1992 she established her own company, The Catbird Seat, after her previous publishing partnership of three years dissolved.
North American wildlife - cougars, lynx, bobcats, raccoons, herons and, recently, gray squirrels - appear in about half of Sharrock's work. But her habit of taking "one good reference-gathering trip a year" has had a strong influence on her choice of subject matter. She's fallen in love with the national parks of Kenya, Tanzania and Namibia, where she uses her camera more than her sketch pad to capture the big cats, elephants, zebras and other animals that she uses as inspiration for the other half of her work. The wild cats - tigers, leopards, cougars and lynx - are Sharrock's favorite animals to portray because of the texture and pattern of the "fur, stripes and spots." As luck would have it, she says, her public like the large cats best too, along with her elephants, zebras and giraffes.
Although she depicts every season of the year in her work, she expresses a special fondness for fall because "I love all the dry grass - gorgeous sprays in their infinite shades and dusty effects. The drier times are more paintable with their gray, warm monochromes, and patterned animals look best against these backgrounds....."
Many of the creatures in Sharrock's paintings look directly at the viewer, making them easy to relate to. She often eliminates the horizon line as well, which makes the space inside the painting appear more intimate and pulls the viewer in for a closer look.
Working on several canvases at once, Sharrock paints only when inspiration strikes. "Every time I paint, my only goal is to produce the best possible, most beautiful painting I can," she says. "If I can put a little bit of drama into it, I will. I'm looking for something gorgeous."
WILDLIFE ART Magazine's "Wild things" segment featured coyotes in July/August 1995. Joan's "Coyote Pups" painting was shown on page 94.
If you consider all of Canada a frozen tundra, you haven't spent time in its westernmost province. British Columbia, in the words of one wildlife artist, is "civilized, livable and has an equable climate - the rest of Canada tends to freeze" B.C., she adds, is a haven for artistic types who've come running in search of a peaceful place to live and paint.
B C OUTDOORS Magazine used "Treading Softly" to illustrate a story on cougars on page 26 of the November/December 1995 issue.
The menu cover at this year's Trout Unlimited fund raising banquets featured a painting of a fall landscape in the eastern foothills of the Rockies. The painting was "Willow Creek" by Joan Sharrock.
"Willow Creek" was published by Trout Unlimited as a limited edition print to be auctioned at the banquets. A conservation edition of the prints was also remarqued by the artist with a colour sketch of fishing flies. Moneys raised from the sale of the prints goes to protect and enhance fish habitat in Canada.
A small number of Artist's Proofs of "Willow Creek" are still available .The image size is 24"x18"
Willow Creek, only a few prints remaining
Click Here to go to it now
Joan Sharrock took SECOND place in the 1995 WILDLIFE HABITAT CANADA stamp & print competition - also known as the "Canadian Duck Stamp". ( Joan placed third in the 1994 contest.) Unfortunately WHC announced that they would not be holding a contest for the 1996 year.
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