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Inspired by nature

The late artist Mel Kero loved to paint in the outdoors, finding his artistic inspiration in the forests and inlets around Sechelt. He and his wife Eva first began visiting the Coast in the 1960s, where they had a small boat moored at Porpoise Bay.

The late artist Mel Kero loved to paint in the outdoors, finding his artistic inspiration in the forests and inlets around Sechelt. He and his wife Eva first began visiting the Coast in the 1960s, where they had a small boat moored at Porpoise Bay. Together, they would often paddle up the inlet, he with watercolour supplies, to find suitable locations for his art. He was very much in tune with nature, Eva remembers, and he was prolific.

"He painted all the time he was here on the Coast," she recalls. He painted right up until the last three weeks of his life until he passed away in 1998, leaving behind over 800 works in his collection. The public can enjoy 18 of them, mostly watercolours, at a heritage show at the Sunshine Coast Museum and Archives on now until Sept. 16.

Passion to Create displays only a small selection of the paintings inspired by the surrounding area; they depict a Chapman Creek or a Secret Cove still wild and natural. No hikers or boaters intrude - Kero did not paint much portraiture, except for a fascinatingly moody self-portrait done in 1950. Instead, the Porpoise Bay of 1966 is a far different place than today's view of waterfront homes and businesses.

Kero's colours are a soft wash that suffuse the scene in a pale light. To enhance some of the softer shades, he employed a technique of outlining the highlights to give definition, as in a painting of Secret Cove done in 1979 or in one of Sechelt Inlet in 1970, both on exhibit. Though watercolours were his choice, mostly because they were quick to dry when painting en plein air, he also painted with oils, and he made pen and ink sketches.

Kero was born in Sicamous, B.C., in 1925, already a third generation Canadian of Finnish heritage. He moved to Vancouver at the age of 12 and after serving in the war, he earned a Veterans' Affairs grant to attend the Vancouver School of Art where he graduated with distinction. For a time he worked for the T. Eaton Company as an apprentice architect and interior designer.

Although he left that job to become a teacher, he never lost his interest in architecture, and many of his paintings, drawn while on his travels around the world, depict historic or aesthetic buildings in every country: Spain, Britain, France, Australia and the U.S. (These images can be seen on computer in an extensive database of his work, also available at the museum.)

When, in 1964, the Vancouver School Board opened City College, Kero was hired to teach literature and film-making while continuing to paint for his own pleasure. In 1972, after the couple's move to the Sunshine Coast, Kero decided to follow in his grandfather's footsteps and build his own house in Davis Bay. In his two months vacation time from the college, he dug his own foundation, and within six weeks he had constructed a log house that stands today, with later additions, on a five-acre parcel of land that remains largely untouched except for the landscaped gardens.

Kero has shown his works regularly every year at the Langara College faculty association lounge and at the Westbridge Fine Arts Gallery in Vancouver. Eva Kero will be organizing a show of more of his works at the Westbridge Sept. 28 to Oct. 7.

The museum, at 716 Winn Road in Gibsons, will continue to show this selection of local landscapes until Sept. 16. Phone 886-8232 for open hours.