To begin something with a clean slate is to clear away evidence of the past so that one can attempt to make a fresh start. This group exhibition will consider both the challenges and opportunities that arise when one is faced with a blank canvas. CLEAN SLATE features the artwork of Ece Asitanelioğlu, Sandra Bérubé, Bella Blanca, Cece Cheung, Lindsay Cohen, Sarah Dufresne, Sebastian Fuertes Pelayo, Grace Gordon-Collins, Heather Lane, Brandon Leung, Naomi Leung, Khim Mata Hipol, Yin Mei, Katie Rodgers, Michael Rozen, Mahin Sharilli, Tala Shayegan, Jim Stewart, Andrew Tavukciyan, Jing Xia, and Ketty Haolin Zhang.
CLEAN SLATE Artists
Ece Asitanelioğlu | @asitanelioglu
Ece Asitanelioğlu is an emerging artist from Istanbul, Turkey. After graduating from an international high school with a dual diploma, she moved to Vancouver, Canada, to attend the University of British Columbia. She began her studies in Media Studies before completing her BA in Visual Arts. Throughout her degree, Ece experimented with various mediums to refine her artistic style. Her current practices includes painting, photography, sculpture, and woodworking.
During her undergraduate studies at UBC, Ece participated in three group exhibitions, including: the Visual Art Undergraduate Exhibition at the AHVA Gallery, Audain Art Centre (2020), “What is a Student Body?” at the Hatch Art Gallery, AMS Student Nest (2022), and the MESH Visual Art Graduating Exhibition at the AHVA Gallery, Audain Art Centre (2022). MESH was also one of her first curatorial experiences in her academic career. Following her graduation, she exhibited in a group exhibition at North Van Arts titled “Women, Life, Freedom” in 2023, which was very special for her.
In addition to her artistic endeavours, Ece is deeply passionate about participating in the art scene, regularly attending events, concerts, plays, and dance performances. She has volunteered and worked at various art institutions in Vancouver, including The Polygon Gallery, the Vancouver Biennale, the Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery, the Rennie Museum, the Vancouver Art Gallery, and the Ferry Building Gallery. Currently, Ece is working with Martha Sturdy, where she continues to learn and grow every day.
Sandra Bérubé | sandraberube.com | @sandra.berube.art
Sandra Bérubé is a metal sculptor and installation artist based in North Vancouver, Canada, originally from Québec. Her work delves into the complex dualities of life, using bronze and steel to explore themes of transformation, resilience, and the interplay between vulnerability and strength. Whether in the form of intricate art or large-scale installations, her sculptures capture moments of profound change and the tension that exists between stability and instability.
Before becoming a sculptor, Bérubé’s creative path spanned the worlds of fashion photography and performance art. As a model and circus performer—most notably with Cirque du Soleil—she lived a life steeped in movement and expression. However, after injuries abruptly ended her circus career, Bérubé turned to sculpture as a way to channel her grief and a newfound sense of resilience. This pivotal shift, compounded by the challenges of surviving CPTSD and brain surgery, has deeply influenced her artistic practice. Her work is a meditation on how dark periods can serve as catalysts for personal growth and breakthroughs, inviting viewers to reflect on the fragile balance between strength and vulnerability.
Bérubé holds an Honours degree in Sculptural Metal from the Kootenay School of the Arts. Her works have been exhibited across Canada and the United States, including public art installations in several cities throughout British Columbia. A recipient of multiple awards and grants, including recent funding from the Canada Council for the Arts, Bérubé’s art creates pieces that resonate with both personal and universal themes of resilience, transformation, and emotional depth.
Bella Blanca | bellablanca.myportfolio.com | @bellablancastudio
Bella Blanca (b. 2001, Portland OR) is a Chilean-American ceramic artist, educator, and emerging human based on the unceded territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓ əm, Sḵwx̱wú7mesh, and səlilwətaɬ nations. She is currently working towards a BFA in Critical and Cultural Practices at Emily Carr University of Art + Design. Blanca uses ceramic sculpture as a means of understanding how craft informs and reflects individual and cultural identities. She views the material process as a conduit for devotion, care, and love. Blanca lives in East Vancouver and teaches at Mudlab Pottery. Her work has been exhibited in Vancouver and Victoria B.C. In 2024, she received the Gardiner Museum Emerging Artist Award.
Cece Chung | cececheung.com | @bloom_abstract
Starting my artistic journey in early 2021, the desire to create art was fueled by the void that the pandemic had left in my day-to-day life. It soon propelled me to explore painting as a contemplative and creative outlet and a means of finding something fulfilling, joyful and healing to focus on. I paint in my home studio and approach art in a reflective and meditative state while drawing inspiration from the beautiful natural surroundings of the Lower Mainland. I’ve been lucky enough to have participated in a collection of exhibits and to have received ongoing commissions, which has allowed me to continue to grow and evolve as an artist.
Lindsay Cohen | lindsaycohenart.com | @lindsaycohenart
I am an emerging artist living and working in North Vancouver. I am a self-taught artist; I have been experimenting with various mixed media since high school and have been making hydrocal sculptures on wood panel for the last 10 years. Previously, my work has been displayed at The Aviary, Virtuous Pie, 017 Shop, and Philosophy MD, and has been purchased by several private clients.
Sarah Dufresne | sarah-dufresne.format.com | @sarahdufresneart
Sarah Dufresne is a 30-year-old Canadian artist from Thunder Bay, Ontario who is now based in Vancouver, British Columbia. Dufresne has completed an honours BA in Psychology from Lakehead University and BFA from OCAD University, which has enabled her to merge the worlds of art and therapeutic practices with her large-scale abstract expressionist pieces. Dufresne originally turned to artmaking as a means to alleviate some of these anxieties that non-art focused studies had brought her. What started off as a practice in self-care, quickly flourished into a love affair with painting and art making that would be the center of her life for years to come. During her first few years of art classes, Dufresne struggled with finding her own style and seriously considered quitting painting altogether. What gave her the confidence to continue with her craft was a joint father-daughter exhibition, set up by her father and artist (Guy Dufresne). Since this exhibition, Dufresne has gone on to have numerous solo exhibitions and work with other great artists and mentors from OCAD University. One of these mentors (Daniel Solomon), has been a critical influence on Dufresne’s practice, recommending her to the gallery she has been represented by since the summer of 2019 (Hatch Gallery in Ontario). Most recently, she was featured in a two-person exhibition in Prince Edward County with seasoned artist Tom Wilson.
Sebastian Fuertes Pelayo | sebastianfuertes.com | @sebastian.fuertes_studio
I am Sebastian Fuertes, a visual artist and architect from Mexico City. Growing up in the chaos of a massive city, I was drawn to how its spaces shaped the people living in them. This fascination pushed me to study architecture, to understand how structures impose on life and how they define movement and interaction. That same drive now informs my practice.
My work focuses on the transformation of the human body through time and space. I explore how the body interacts with its surroundings, capturing the hard, unfiltered realities of change. My approach is stripped down, direct, and grounded in abstraction, showing the raw interplay between structure and transformation.
In addition to my artistic practice, I have experience as a public art consultant, collaborating on projects that bridge the gap between creative expression and urban spaces. This role has deepened my understanding of how art interacts with public environments, influencing both the physical and social dynamics of space. These experiences feed directly into my work, driving my exploration of how spaces mold and reshape the human body.
Looking ahead, I aim to develop projects that delve into the concept of invisible boundaries within modern society—the unseen yet powerful forces that shape interactions and define communities. My work is also part of multiple private collections in Mexico and Germany, reflecting its resonance with diverse audiences and its ability to connect across cultural boundaries.
Grace Gordon-Collins | @ggordonc
Grace Gordon-Collins RCA is a Vancouver based mixed media artist whose work seamlessly blends her passion for both the visual arts and architecture. Raised in a creative home, Grace’s artistic mother not only painted, but she also sang operatic arias while doing so. Grace is the same, with her music of choice being jazz of course! Her love of artistic expression and unrepressed curiosity has informed her work both as an architect and as a mixed media artist. This foundation has deeply influenced her artistic practice. Her journey as an artist began in her formative years in Manitoba when she studied painting under the iconic Canadian artist Ivan Eyre. Later while pursuing graduate studies, MA degree in Architecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), she took an elective in photography and environmental art at the Centre for Advanced Visual Studies. She was involved in several large-scale art and photography installations, working directly with the head of the department, artist Otto Piene. Grace’s current vision lies in reinterpreting architectural forms, using the elements of shape, space, light, colour, geometry, and perspective to create abstract compositions. She invites the viewer to experience the built environment in new and unexpected ways that evokes both emotion and intellectual inquiry. Her work has been featured in several group and solo shows and is held in many private collections. She remains committed to creating works that challenge conventional perspectives and invites the viewer to engage with spaces around them in fresh and meaningful ways. She continues to push the boundaries between art and design.
Heather Lane | heatherlane.com
Heather Lane studied Art History at the Univeristy of British Columbia, holds a BFA from Emily Carr University of Art + Design, and a B.Comm from Dalhousie University, alongside valuable mentorships in Folk Art and Craft while living in Japan.
She approaches painting from a sensibility influenced by the poetic, the philosophical, love of literature, and enthusiasm for material craft. She loves abstraction for its potential to reveal something of what lies outside of language.
Each work is a renegotiation, a hope to discover and recognize glimpses of what is felt by the body but limited by language. Surfaces are layered and encoded with signs and fragments from the web and matrices of interior life and the natural world; resulting in a visual syntax suggesting memory and the passage of time – the present camouflaging a past that inevitably seeps through. In seeking out tensions her work attempts to investigate perception, instinct, and experience in all of their contingently meaningful intricacies.
Heather lives and works in North Vancouver. Her work is held in collections in the USA, Mexico and Canada.
Brandon Leung | brandonjleung.wordpress.com | @breandoan
Brandon Leung is a photographic artist born and raised on the unceded and ancestral territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and səlilwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) peoples. His research and artistic interests range from underrepresented historical narratives, the intersection between art and archives, the urban environment, and everyday uses of photography.
Naomi Leung | linktr.ee/naomiimayaa | @hippo_dr4g0n
Naomi Leung 梁珮恩(they/them) is a Han Cantonese settler, mixed media artist and photographer, and climate justice education facilitator and organizer. With familial connections to Malaysia and Hong Kong, exploring the queer Sinophone framework has driven them to critically (re)imagine how livable and liberated histories and futures can feel, look, and sound like. Naomi is in their 4th year at UBC studying BSc Global Resource Systems and Psychology where they are integrating environmental and climate change studies with global health, the study of climate emotions, and the Asian diaspora. Naomi desires to create anti-colonial spaces centering racialized queer and trans peoples to process intergenerational trauma, grief, and to co-create possibilities and programming for hope and healing. Their organizing work with Asha Collective, Climate Education Reform BC, The Climate Justice Organizing HUB, Sustainabiliteens, UBC Climate Hub, and UBC Sustainability transformed them and informed their practices for love and liberation. Naomi’s photography has been published in Dear Asian Youth Literature, Solastalgia zine, Petal Projections, UBC ACAM student journal, and their art has been exhibited in Hatch Art Gallery and Imagination for Liberation art show.
Khim Mata Hipol | khimhpl.com | @khim.hipol
Filipino-born Khim Mata Hipol is an emerging interdisciplinary artist based on the unceded territories of the Squamish, Tsleil-Waututh, and Musqueam peoples. Through photography, Hipol examines how a sense of identity can be manipulated through commercialization. He explores the intersections of tourism, souvenir objects, and official government symbols, demonstrating how countries establish identity through these representations. Through portraiture, he illustrates how individuals use these objects to express patriotism and nationalism while simultaneously questioning their meanings and invoking ideas of colonialism and the “foreign”.
Mata Hipol graduated with a Certificate of Photography (2019) and a Bachelor of Fine Arts Major in Photography with a Minor in Art and Text (2023) from Emily Carr University of Art + Design. Hipol was awarded the Audain Travel Award (2022), the Chick Rice Award for Excellence in Photography (2023), Fund for the Arts on the North Shore (2024) and an honorable mention for the Seymour Art Gallery New and Emerging Award (2022), and long listed twice for the Lind Prize (2022, 2023). His works have been featured in group shows at FotomotoPH, Philippines (2025), Griffin Museum of Photography, Massachusetts (2024), Filter Photo, Chicago, Illinois (2024), Pendulum Gallery (2024), Access Gallery (2024), The Center of Fine Arts Photography, Fort Collins, Colorado (2022), Exposure Photography Festival, Calgary (2022,d 2023), and Ciano Umuk Gallery, La Union, Philippines (2023, 2024). His works have been acquired by Union Christian College (Philippines) and Ciano Umuk Gallery (Philippines), and can be found in private collection in Canada, USA, and Germany.
Yin Mei | meltedepiphanies.ca | @melted_epiphanies
Yin Mei (She/Her) (b. 2002, Xi’an, China) is a photo-based mixed-media artist whose practice uses photography with both digital and physical intervention and typography and print. She uses these techniques to explore and confront issues relating to queer Chinese trans bodies and specifcally the trans-fem experience in context with Chinese diaspora and generational trauma. Through queerification, her work seeks to confront pre-existing stereotypes, imagery, and histories and bring them to the present to support rather than suppress. Her work is also an exploration on love in context with trauma in all its forms and degradations. She received her BFA at University of British Columbia in 2024 and is currently practicing as an emerging artist in the stolen and traditional territories of the Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Waututh First Nations, “Vancouver, BC.”
Katie Rodgers | katierodgers.ca | @katierodgersart
Katie Rodgers is an artist working in both traditional landscape and abstract style, primarily with acrylic on canvas. Her paintings capture the atmosphere and emotions associated with specific locales. Katie is living and painting in beautiful North Vancouver. Katie is an active member of the Federation of Canadian Artists, North Van Arts, and the West Vancouver Community Arts Council. She is also currently on the North Van Arts Board of Directors, acting in the role of Treasurer.
Michael Rozen | michaelrozen.com | @m.rozen
Michael Rozen (b. 1995) is an artist based in so-called Vancouver, which exists on the traditional unceded territories of the xʷməθkʷəy̓əm (Musqueam), Sḵwx̱wú7mesh (Squamish), and səlilwətaɬ (Tsleil-Waututh) peoples. He studied political science and history at McGill University in Montréal and learned how to paint through years of hands-on apprenticeship with other artists.
During two residencies in Spain, studio painting in France, and work on over 35 murals in four North American cities, Michael created distinct sets of artwork based on different environments—urban and rural—and produced on a large, building-size scale. Michael’s art has been influenced by visits to galleries in Beirut, Berlin, and Sarajevo where he learned how art can educate, empower, and connect people to the past and compel them to change the present. He often teaches painting, drawing, and mural workshops in elementary schools. These experiences inspire the stories and symbols in his work, documenting humanity’s psychological and material struggles.
Michael held his first solo exhibition in Vancouver in 2019, then May 2022 at Red Gate Arts Society, and most recently in October 2024 at AO Studio. He has shown in group exhibitions in Vancouver, Montréal, New Jersey, and Barcelona.
Mahin Sharilli | sites.google.com/view/mahinsharilliartca | @m.sharilliart
Mahin Sharilli is a North Vancouver-based artist whose passion for art was ignited early on in her life. She pursued her dreams by earning a B.A. in Stage Design from the University of Art in Iran and went on to teach the fundamentals of visual art. Mahin’s paintings aim to capture the extraordinary beauty and harmony of nature, offering a universal appeal that goes beyond technical expertise. She is actively involved with the Federation of Canadian Artists and North Van Arts. Her work has been featured in numerous exhibitions and has received considerable recognition and attention from art lovers who have purchased her artworks.
Tala Shayegan | @talayeh_shayegan
Tala Shayegan is a Canadian-Iranian visual artist specializing in sculpture. Currently based in North Vancouver, she has showcased her work in numerous exhibitions in Iran. With a professional background in finance, Tala’s passion for art led her to train under renowned Persian artists, honing her skills in both painting and sculpture.
In her sculptural practice, Tala explores a variety of mediums, including papier-mâché, bronze, copper, stone, and wood, with a particular preference for bronze. Her work focuses primarily on figurative art, often highlighting the human form.
Tala’s conceptual piece, presented at the 2017 “Tehran – Tehran” exhibition, received critical acclaim for its thought-provoking critique of the city’s architecture. Currently, her artistic vision is centered on creating works that evoke joy, happiness, and hope, as reflected in her upcoming series.
James Stewart | @jamesstewart1999
James Henry Stewart (b. 1934) was born in small town, Richmond Hill, Ontario. He lived on the family farm all his childhood and actively helped with the farm chores. He started to learn drawing aged twelve but abandoned art at twenty-one to concentrate on his career as an IT Marketing Executive.
For the next 35 years he rarely undertook any artistic endeavours, but after being transferred to Malaysia in 1989, his interest in art was rekindled. Malaysia’s many shades of green and the multi coloured flora stimulated his desire to paint.
His interest in local watercolour art encouraged him to have his company support local artists, with various art exhibitions. During this time, he met Malaysian artist Teh Yew Kiang, who has, over the years been a continuing source of advice, guidance and encouragement. James has been an art collector for many years, his collection, includes works from Malaysia, Canada, Thailand, Indonesia and Myanmar.
James likes to experiment with different materials and textures as he explores abstract and impressionist styles. In addition, he enjoys the challenge of traditional landscape painting. His motivation is his love of nature and the works of masters like Monet. James is self-taught. His works can be found in private collections in, New York, Toronto, Calgary, Kuala Lumpur and Thailand.
Andrew Tavukciyan | tavukciyan.com | @tavukciyan
I’m a Vancouver-based Canadian-Armenian visual artist and designer, with a focus on murals and painting. A graduate of Emily Carr University’s industrial design program, my artistic practice explores the balance between instinct and intention. It often feels like these two sides of me are at odds, but recently, as I’ve been trying to develop and understand my practice, I’ve found that embracing these opposing perspectives to overcome creative impasses feels more natural to me. The subject matter of my work is centered around abstract forms that reference industrial/mechanical elements, as well as biological/organic elements. I often start with gestural mark-making to let loose and express raw ideas and then switch to an intentional and analytical approach, refining what I’m trying to convey and its execution. I alternate between these two processes until the work is complete. Right now, my work is less about the end result and more about learning how to further develop this visual language and my voice as an artist.
Jing Xia | jingxia.ca
Born in China and trained in industrial design at Emily Carr University in Canada and Lund University in Sweden, Jing Xia is a Vancouver-based artist whose practice is rooted in playful curiosity and intuitive exploration. Her work has been featured in exhibitions, including Milan Design Week and CICA Vancouver.
Xia draws inspiration from the vital energy of chaos, architectural composition, and hybridity. Embracing imperfection, errors, and accidents as essential to her process, she sees these moments as opportunities for transformation and discovery. Through a fluid and iterative approach—making, unmaking, and remaking—she creates works that reflect the unpredictability and beauty of the creative process.
Each piece emerges as a composite of elements that oscillate between the familiar and the abstract, inviting viewers to explore their own associations and interpretations. Xia’s work creates a dialogue between material presence and imaginative possibility, highlighting the interplay of stability and flux, structure and spontaneity.
Grounded in the richness of human experience, Xia’s practice celebrates transformation and the unexpected. Her works, often correlated as microcosms of interconnected ideas, capture energy, tension, and beauty while fostering an open-ended engagement with the world around us.
Ketty Haolin Zhang | kettyhaolinzhang.com | @kettyzzz
Ketty Haolin Zhang (b. Chaoyang) is an emerging interdisciplinary artist currently living and working as an uninvited guest on the unceded and ancestral territory of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh Nations, colonially known as Vancouver, Canada. She is a 1.5-generation immigrant, having spent half of her life so far in China and half in Canada. Informed by her diasporic experience, her art practice navigates her relationship with placelessness, liminality and (non)belonging in a hyper-globalized world. She is interested in creating works that embody both closeness and distance—the simultaneous desire to belong and to resist being defined.
Zhang holds a BA in Visual Art and Art History from the University of British Columbia. Her recent work has been shown at The Reach Gallery Museum, CICA, Seymour Art Gallery, Centre A, Deer Lake Gallery, Canton-Sardine, and Surrey Art Gallery, among others.