Authors & Headliners

Gerald St. Maur is the former Dean of Interdisciplinary Studies at the University of Alberta. He divides time between the visual arts and the literary arts, as poet and dramatist. In the past decade, his visual work has concentrated on charcoal and conte drawings, the former in landscapes and the latter on the figure. He is most interested in chirarscuro effects found in landscape depictions of trees, skies and water. He is a signature member of the Federation of Canadian Artists and the Alberta Society of Artists of which he is a past president.

“I have always been intrigued by chiaroscuro effects in trees and skies when the setting sun or stormy clouds create such interesting contrasts in light and shade. A good deal of these landscapes have been done in charcoal, and are the subject of my forthcoming book Searching Skies, Seeing Through Trees. More recently, my work has extended in two new directions. The first combines my poetry with figurative drawings in pastel to create haiga, an ancient Japanese art re-configured for the contemporary Canadian scene. In the second, which might be described as decoupage, drawings are deconstructed to explore shapes, much as counterpoint does in music.”