SHERI PAISLEY | LIGHTSCAPE

Sheri Paisley's work explores the connection between internal and external landscapes, with a focus on breath, spirit, and wind. Through abstract and loosely rendered scenes, she examines the dynamic tension between form and formlessness, as well as the invisible forces that shape our experiences. For Paisley, painting is a way to engage more deeply with the world, using color, mark-making, and gesture to process life's complexities and connect with the flow of energy in nature. Drawing inspiration from the shifting winds and light of the Canadian West Coast, her work seeks to evoke a sense of wholeness and unity. Ultimately, Paisley aims for her paintings to create a meditative space where viewers can reconnect with the interconnectedness of all things.

Paisley received a BFA from Emily Carr University of Art and Design in 1998 and began exhibiting in 2002. She lives and works on Vancouver Island, British Columbia. Paisley has exhibited in Europe, New York, Los Angeles, Seattle, Toronto and Vancouver. Her work has been placed in numerous private collections across North America and Europe, and in permanent collections with Dubai's Emaar Properties, Enunciate Conferencing, Toronto Dominion Bank, UBC Psychiatric Hospital, Vancouver General Hospital, St. Paul's Hospital in Vancouver, BC, Swedish Hospital in Seattle, and Overlake Hospital in Bellevue.

My work explores the fluid interplay between internal and external landscapes, connecting breath, spirit, and wind through loosely rendered, windswept scenes. These landscapes shift between abstraction and loose representation, reflecting the dynamic tension between form and formlessness. The term Ruach (spirit, breath, or wind) encapsulates the essence of what I seek to convey in my paintings—the invisible forces that shape our experience of the world. I see light as both a physical and spiritual presence, with internal light also related to the nervous system.

Painting is a way for me to process living more deeply. It allows me to engage with the world around and within me. I find meaning through color, mark making and gesture. The act of creation becomes a space for exploration, where I’m able to process life’s complexities and tap into the flow of energy in nature.

Through my work, I’m drawn to a familiar remembering of wholeness—a sense of unity between body, breath, and environment. I draw inspiration from the natural world: shifting winds, changing light, and subtle variations in weather patterns, particularly from the Canadian West Coast landscape, which deeply informs my understanding of stillness within balance and movement.

I attempt to create work that offers a meditative visual space, inviting an experience of subtle, regenerative vitality and a deeper sense of interconnectedness.

This current body of work is inspired by a non-ocular seminar led by Rick Williams at Emily Carr University in Vancouver, B.C. These experiential classes challenged us to engage with the world beyond visual sight. We created two sets of glasses—one completely blacked out, the other with translucent frosting—allowing the eyes to remain open while focusing on sensory experiences beyond sight. In this show, I wanted to create work by feel. No photographic references were used; instead, the paintings are an exploration of sensation and intuition through paint.

2025 Exhibition Catalog Lightscape

2023 Exhibition Catalog Wonderland Trail

2019 Film by CBC Arts

2019 Exhibition Catalog Essay for Extreme Imagination – inside the mind’s eye

2019 Exhibition Catalog Landscapes

2017 Exhibition Catalog Celestial Navigation

2015 Exhibition Catalog Even In The Dark

2013 Exhibition Catalog Windsong