Meet The Artists
Barb Sohn
Working with acrylics on canvas, I paint the natural environment that surrounds me in Eastern Ontario where I live. My paintings reflect my fascination with the interaction between light, colour, pattern in water and landscape. Because of the many layers of design in the transparency of water, the possibilities are endless. I work to capture these mesmerizing qualities with bold colour and solid design.
My work is an ongoing process of discovery – starting with the observation of some aspect of the natural world that I work to bring to life through my personal interpretation and style.
I have been painting for most of my life, while working full time as a social worker. When I retired in 2015, I then began to paint full time after downsizing to a rural home near Perth, Ontario. I built a studio in the woods and began to explore painting in an in-depth way.
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Catherine Orfald
Catherine has been painting most of her life, inspired by her artist Grandfather, creative family, and fine arts education. When she moved to Brooke Valley in 2004, the studio on the property enabled her to focus more energy on her art.
Catherine’s artwork has been shown in solo and group exhibitions in Canada, the United States, and Mexico and her commissioned work is in many private collections. She focuses on painting from the natural world that inspires her and enjoys doing portraits of people and pets, landscapes, and other subjects.
Catherine says, “I paint to see more clearly,
feel more deeply, and to make stronger connections with the world around me.”
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Denyse Gridley
Denyse, a fine artist and retired teacher, works primarily in oil painting. Her impressionistic style uses vibrant colour and bold expressive brushstrokes, finding inspiration in the landscapes and wildlife of Eastern Ontario. She has sold artwork at juried art shows across the province and is represented by Rothwell Gallery in Ottawa.
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Donna McPhail
After retiring from teaching high school Visual Art, I moved to Perth in 2017, joined the Rideau Lakes Artists Association and began painting.
I have always been a bird lover, and I began painting them a few years ago.
My love of nature is evident in my up-close and detailed flower portraits, which celebrate the colours and patterns found in nature. I am a big Georgia O’Keefe fan!
I work in acrylics. I am also a member of the West Carleton Artists Society, the Carleton Place Art Hub, and the Kanata Civic Art
Gallery. My paintings have hung at local group shows and associated venues.
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Elizabeth Sampson
Elizabeth specializes in the design and fabrication of original stained glass using traditional lead came construction combined with modern forms, colours and textures. Much of her work involves architectural stained glass, i.e. glass designed to become an integral part of a particular building. An architect who has worked in the public and private sectors, Elizabeth sees architectural stained glass is an ideal way to combine the spatial and contextual design aspects of architecture, the beauty of fine art and the rewards of excellent craftsmanship.
Influences from the glass work of architects Charles Rennie Mackintosh, and Frank Lloyd Wright are evident in many of Elizabeth's windows. Other designs utilize interwoven abstract forms which create a sense of fluid movement. In all her work, the light-charged medium of coloured glass contributes an additional dynamic to the design.
Elizabeth works out of her studio in Perth, Ontario and exhibits at the RiverGuild Fine Craft in Perth.
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Ellen Fraser
I started making jewellery as a young teenager and have been a professional jeweller since the late seventies. Painting has always been
something I did for myself, a work in progress over the decades.
I live at Kiwi Gardens, so it was inevitable that eventually I’d make something to show at Art in the Garden, the annual outdoor art event. I
started making mobiles a few years ago, and am enjoying using my metalworking skills on a larger scale. People like to joke that I am now
making earrings for trees…
Isabel Joyce
Many years ago I discovered the magic of stained glass. Over the years, I've evolved as an artist, and my love for this wonderful art form has grown.
Now, living in the heritage setting of Perth, I find my inspiration in the historic architecture and classic beauty of the region. It has been my pleasure to enhance many of the homes in our area with the colour and light of stained glass, and to teach my craft to others who share my passion.
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Jen Raby
“I dipped my brush in dye and touched it to the white fabric stretched out on a wooden frame. The colour spread stopping here and there as it met wax. It was magical and I knew that I had to learn all about it.”
I have been exploring this magical process ever since (for more than 40 years) to produce fine art batik and I have become a batik master and a member of the International Batik Guild.
Through the use of: textile dyes and various types of hot waxes as my paints; hot waxes as a resist; natural fabrics of cottons, hemp, silk, linen bamboo, rayon and mixes there of as my canvases; and tjanting, water colour and acrylic brushes as my drawing and painting tools
My Batik process and techniques can best be compared to water colour, but much less forgiving.
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Julie Burke
Julie is an award-winning artist whose stunning oil landscapes celebrate the natural world, from humble shrubs to grand
vistas. For the past decade, she has been nestled in the beautiful Rideau Lakes area in Ontario, finding endless inspiration at every turn and through every season.
Julie's work features a stylized approach that remains true to her subjects while additionally infusing her emotional response into each piece. She is profoundly inspired by the magical interplay of light, and her use of bold colour brings joy to her compositions, with dynamic line work adding excitement. Each painting reflects her deep connection to the environment, inviting viewers to experience everyday nature in a new way. Julie’s
work is collected internationally and is showcased in several galleries across Ontario.
Liz Minnes
I am a painter. My practice is conceptually determined and exploratory. The underlying inquiry central to my work is the examination of boundaries, the importance of proximity, and the invisible connections that bind.
I am committed to the archaic process of painting.
I believe that when created with the energy and passion of personal belief, paintings resonate with a spirit that is recognized and related to by the viewer. Hands on application of paints and mediums has an essential visceral quality that mechanical
image production can never replicate.
Paintings demand a certain reverence. The discourse is intuitive and imbues the work with an intimate energy that is largely instinctual,a constant exploration dictating the begin-
ning and final layering of paint.
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Suzette MacSkimming
Suzette is an abstract artist whose most recent works can be viewed at Studio 87 in Perth. She finds the flora of beautiful gardens an inspiration for her abstract artworks. Suzette’s art has been widely exhibited by galleries, including the Agnes Etherington Art Centre in Kingston, the Contemporary Artists‘ Centre in North Adams, Massachusetts, Ottawa’s Atrium Gallery at Centrepoint, and successive galleries in Perth.
A collection of 15 of her large mixed-media prints is on permanent display at the Sprott School of Business, Carleton University in Ottawa. After completing her undergraduate and graduate work in Fine Arts at the University of California, Berkeley, Suzette travelled widely in Europe before moving to Canada in 1965. She studied at the Three Schools of Art in Toronto and later at the Ottawa School of Art.
In 2013 she was a finalist for the MERA Award for Excellence in the Fine Arts. In 2023 and in 2025 she was honoured to be a jurist for that same prize.
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