My name is Anne.
Painter, writer.
I grew up in a small town in Quebec.
In 2015, I moved to Vancouver.
At the time, writing was my only artistic outlet.
Life having its challenges, I experienced homelessness during my first 7 months there.
It was dark, very dark time.
I discovered my love for painting and drawing then. One night, just an other night surviving, I picked up a few markers and a big sheet of paper. And drew.
Drew.
And drew.
And I felt peace.
Like I haven’t in a long time.
And I was amazed by the Colors.
And I kept on going.
Overtime, I discovered my love for watercolors.
Practical, as they fitted in my backpack, dried fast and easy to carry around.
It was dark, very dark time.
But this peace that making art brought, helped me to keep going.
I was not a mom yet, I was not sober yet, I was not equipped to deal with my overwhelming emotions and thoughts yet.
But I had art. To keep me going.
In April 2016, I found sobriety. Or sobriety found me.
I was scared.
I didn’t know how to paint, live, socialize, be.
I didn’t know life, sober.
Despite my fears, I kept on painting.
I stayed sober, ever since.
I had my children.
I lost my mom.
I discovered acrylics and oil pastels.
I dreamed. Big and bigger dreams.
I met beautiful people.
I received help and I helped.
I felt sad, angry, anxious, happy, nothing or too much.
I felt alive.
And all along, there was art.
To bring me peace.
To keep me going.

Making art saved my life.
Making art saves my life.

My name is Anne.
It is nice to meet you.

Auden Derksen was born in Vancouver, BC and raised up north in Prince George, BC. Attending secondary and post secondary school in PG, he pursued art intensely in high school and moved onto study social work at the University of Northern British Columbia. Although his pursuit of a social work career has been put aside, it solidified many of the values Auden expresses in his artwork. Emotions, trauma, and feeling recognized for your experience is a significant part of social work and his process in developing his art. He unanimously won first place in 2018 for the Canadian Mental Health Association art contest, which would help build his foundation of expressing difficult emotions through the power of art. Auden has experience with a variety of mediums, ranging from painting, digital artwork, and animation. His favourite medium consists of a little bit of everything, as he enjoys the creative process of all art mediums. Using digital art programs such as Procreate, Auden creates meaningful pieces with people and emotions as his center piece. It is Auden’s hope that you see a part of yourself in his artwork.

Inspired by nature, animals and the people in her life, Karen paints stories through her art. She often finds herself dreaming of her next creative idea, which she meticulously translates onto a medium with her special skills. While acrylics, oil and etching are some of her favorite mediums to play around with, Karen's artwork can be found on rocks, glassware, driftwood, canvas and feathers.

Kat creates innovative, inventive and fun mixed media pieces. She gets an adrenaline rush painting in front of a live audience in just 20 minutes.

I am a multi media artist from Prince George, BC. I dabble in a range of art from acrylic painting to digital art and a variety of crafts. I love playing with darkness and contrast in my work.

Started a little art project to help me with my mental health in 2023. Have had a lot of fun working with the variety of mediums that have been available to me through my SketchBox subscription. I'm not limited to one medium, and enjoy working with anything I can create art with

I like to paint colourful expressions of nothingness to let me brain interpret as somethings but also nothing. I also sometimes like to hone in on a realistic piece of art to teat my concentration and visual perception of reality. Life is art. Make it.