Oxygen Art Centre’s Staff and Board of Directors bid a sorrowful but celebratory farewell to Education Coordinator Natasha Smith who leaves her role with the artist-run centre on October 3, 2024.
A founding member of the Nelson Fine Arts Centre Society (Oxygen Art Centre dba) in 2002 with fellow former writing and visual arts faculty at the Kootenay School of the Arts, Smith stepped into the role of Education Coordinator over ten years ago to support the artist-run centre’s educational focus and programming.
Oxygen is known for providing rigorous, inclusive, and responsive arts education for adults and youth across the two eight-week semesters each year. During her tenure as Education Coordinator, Smith worked with Oxygen staff and faculty to deliver classes, workshops, camps, and events with emphasis on incubating and supporting emerging artists and sustaining our vibrant arts community.
In addition to her work at the centre, Smith is a practicing artist and instructor, often offering printmaking and multi-media art classes in the region. Her background brought a unique sensibility to the program, supporting instructors and students alike with generosity, care, and professionalism that will be keenly missed.
While Smith steps out of this role, she will continue to be an ardent member and supporter of Oxygen Art Centre. We thank her for her time and lasting impact on the arts in the community and wish her the best as she begins a new, exciting phase!
Oxygen’s fall semester featuring arts, writing, and professional development classes for adults and youth is now open for registration.
Image Credit: Open House featuring Nature Still Life Drawing with Keiko Lee-Hem and the ArtSpeak Exhibition at Oxygen Art Centre, 7 September 2024
Press Contact:
Julia Prudhomme
Executive Director
Oxygen Art Centre
—
Julia Prudhomme (she/her)
Executive Director / oxygen art centre
info@oxygenartcentre.org
#3 – 320 Vernon St. Alley Entrance
Nelson, British Columbia , V1L 4E4
Oxygen Art Centre acknowledges with gratitude that we are located on the tum xula7xw/ traditional territory of the sn̓ʕay̓ckstx/the Sinixt People. As uninvited guests we honour their ongoing presence on this land. We recognize that the Sylix, Ktuxana, and Yaqan Nukij Lower Kootenay Band peoples are also connected with this land, as are Métis and many diverse Indigenous persons.
DEPARTURE
Oxygen Art Centre’s Staff and Board of Directors bid a sorrowful but celebratory farewell to Education Coordinator Natasha Smith who leaves her role with the artist-run centre on October 3, 2024.
Oxygen’s Fall semester registration deadlines are quickly approaching!
Letters to the Beyondwith Rayya Liebich
Embossing – For the Love of Paperwith Hildur Jonasson
Magic of Memory 2with Rayya Liebich
Remembrance Luminariawith Myra Rasmussen
Humour and Satire Writingwith Sophie Kohn
ONLINE Figure Drawing 2(No Instruction)
UPCOMING
SF HoResidency: 13 November – 18 December 2024Exhibition: 15 January – 8 March 2025
SF Ho is an artist, writer and organizer. They have been living as an uninvited guest on the unceded territories of the xwməθkwəy̓ əm, Sḵwx̱wú7mesh, and səl̓ílwətaʔɬ peoples for over fourteen years. Operating somewhere between words and whatever words can’t be, their work is informed by feminist methodologies, land-based practices, and grassroots community networks. Ho has presented their artwork and writing both regionally and internationally. They published a book about love and aliens called 
O2 EXHIBITION
Oxygen Art Centre’s fifth exhibition in the window project entitled O2, features new works by Hannah DeBoer-Smith from8 August – 10 October 2024.
Face Drawing for Graphic Novelswith Zen Wang
Two Coloured Lino Printing – Greeting Cards with Myra Rasmussen
Fine Art Screen Printingwith Marcus Dénommé
ROCK / PAPER / SCISSORSIN PERSONWhen: 6 classes: September 16 – November 4, 2024 (no class on Sept. 30 & Oct. 14)/ Mondays, 4:15 pm – 5.45 pmWho: Youth, 11 – 14 yrsWith: 2 artist instructors:// Brian Lye – Filmmaker// Jaymie Johnson – Multi-disciplinary ArtistStudent Fee: $150 (All materials included)Registration deadline: Sept. 9
Figure Drawing #3 (no instruction)
The Art of Submission: Submitting Creative Writing to Periodicals with Susan Andrews Grace 
Art Speak – Peer to Peer Work Sharing #3Facilitated by Emilie Leblanc Kromberg
WORM / HOLEIN PERSONWhen: 6 classes: September 27 – November 1, 2024 / Fridays, 4:15 pm – 6:15 pmWho: Youth, 15 – 18 yrsWith: 3 artist instructors:// Jaymie Johnson – Multi-disciplinary Artist// Myra Rasmussen – Multi-disciplinary Artist// Marcus Dénommé – Printmaker
Summer Residency
During the residency Chris host open studio gatherings and workshops to share the practices and invite folks to bring their own relational practices to ecologies. 
This program is generously supported by the Canada Council for the Arts and the Regional District of Central Kootenay ReDi program.ABOUT THE ARTIST
Chris Dufour (they/them) is an interdisciplinary social practice artist working between Kanien’kehá:ka and Lekwungen territory. Chris uses mediums of plants, gardening, ecological wandering, textiles, quilting, installation, darkroom manipulation, leather tanning, and sculpture to process questions of how do we cultivate a sense of belonging within and among systemic power dynamics? How do we push against empire while cultivating resilient communities and cultures of care? What practices of living can we recuperate, develop, and employ within contemporary cultures of crisis?
Oxygen Art Centre’s fourth exhibition in the window project entitled O2, features a new textile artwork by Tracy Fillion is extended to24 June 2024. 
Who: Youth (15 – 18 yrs.)
Dr. Michelle Jack is a syilx/Okanagan creative from the communities of snpintktn (Penticton, BC) and nisɬpícaʔ (Omak, WA). She has her PhD from Washington State University in Transnational (American Studies) with focus on Indigenous and Intercultural communication. She is a mother, working Abstract Image Maker/Scholar, who has a BFA from the University of New Mexico and an MFA from the University of Washington both in Studio Arts and Photography. Before her PhD studies she taught grades 6-8 on the Coeur D’Alene Reservation in Idaho. She has taught for 12 years at the En’owkin Centre which has a very diverse age range of learners from youth to elders. She uses her traditional sqilxʷ /syilx experiences to enhance her art practice and teaching methods as current head of Visual and Creative arts at En’owkin Centre, in snpintktn (Penticton) on the Penticton Indian Band reserve.
Tracie Stewart (mother of 2 residing in Stolo Territory) is an international collaborative installation artist -ECCAD ’95- Arborist/ Naturalist -ISA ’09. Interested in exchanging many ways of knowing with youth, she facilitates projects using Teen Talking Circle skills/ values with Artstarts, and ARTCI inc. From Terrace, BC, Tracie experienced being a settler youth raised in a logging town with high substance abuse and suicide rates. Art saves lives. Her roots of Doukhobor (Plotnikoff-meaning people that work with hands), and Scottish (Stewart) water people, farmers, and loggers influence a daily practice. Immersion in the elements, and the intersection of land + language, influences her practice of spatial linear drawing /sculpture using natural materials. “Geopoetic Symposium’ 22“, Walking the Stalew ’21”, “Salt water Skin Boats ‘18” Grimm collaborations,” PLOT medicine wheel + sharing garden” -Newton, “ACSS Mural“ ‘19 artstarts, Neel, ARTCI , “Tidewater Tales”, Brittania-Shipyard- Artistic innovation award, Coq125 -Artists rendering Tales Collective inc.ABOUT THE NARROWS
Founded in 2015, 
This program is generously supported by the Columbia Kootenay Cultural Alliance.
Pop! Up! PD DayIN PERSON @ OXYGEN ART CENTREWhen: 1 class: May 27 // Monday, 9 am – 2 pm (5 hours) Who: Youth, 10 – 15 yrsWith: 2 artist instructors: Natasha Smith – Multi-disciplinary Artist + Rayya Liebich – WriterWhat: Unconventional Portraits: Past, Present, Future!Following a series of fun prompts and exercises that will involve blind contour drawing, mirrors and metaphors, create three unique declarations of your identity! Who you were, who you are now, and who you imagine you will be!Using vinyl records as a canvas, create three poetically abstract self portraits of yourself using alternative materials like feathers and beads, collage and decoupage techniques, and letters and words. Symbolic of your individuality and personal freedom, these portraits can be as wild as you wish, especially since they will represent you as you have never seen yourself before. Bring a bagged lunch. All materials provided.Fee: $80
ARTful Fridays!IN PERSON @ OXYGEN ART CENTREWhen: 4 classes: May 24 – June 14 // Fridays, 9 am – 2 pm (5 hours)Who: Youth, 12 – 18 yrsWith: 2 artist instructors: Marcus Dénommé – Printmaker + Ruby Creighton – Multi-disciplinary ArtistWhat: Long live the Zine-Machine! 
ROCK / PAPER / SCISSORSIN PERSON @ OXYGEN ART CENTREWhen: 5 classes: May 27 – June 24, 2024 // Mondays, 4:15 pm – 5.45 pmWho: Youth, 11 – 14 yrsWith: 2 artist instructors: Brian Lye – Filmmaker + Rayya Liebich – Poet & WriterWhat: Join filmmaker Brian Lye and poet Rayya Liebich on a multidisciplinary adventure to create a stop-motion animation film using an altered book as a springboard for story. Rayya will demonstrate how to write blackout poems, create book folds, and use decoupage techniques inside a hardcover book. Brian will then show you how to bring objects, words, and drawings to life using stop-motion animation. The culminating project will be a short movie of your chosen figurine/narrator literally jumping out of your book to tell a story through voice, image, and fun filming techniques. Come ready to learn, explore, and be amazed!Fee: $120 (All materials included)
WORM / HOLEIN PERSON @ OXYGEN ART CENTREWhen: 4 classes: May 24 – June 14, 2024 // Fridays, 4:15 pm – 6:15 pm (2 hours)Who: Youth, 15 – 18 yrsWith: 3 artist instructors: Catherine McIntosh – Visual Artist + Myra Rasmussen – Multi-disciplinary Artist + Marcus Dénommé – PrintmakerWhat: Join artists Myra Rasmussen, Marcus Dénommé, and Catherine McIntosh to learn all things printmaking. Students will have the chance to experience a variety of printmaking techniques including lino printing, screenprinting, and intaglio printing methods (drypoint & tetra-pack printing). Whether you have never done any printmaking or are interested in developing your skills further, this class will be a lot of fun and a great opportunity to further your artistic journey.Fee: $120 (All materials included)
Creative Time – For New Parents
Interested in supporting Oxygen’s Education program? 
Figure Drawing #2 
Art Speak – Peer to Peer Work Sharing #2
Digital Photography – Getting Weirdwith Louis Bockner
Painting from a Model #2(No Instruction)
Beginner Painting: An Introduction to Colour (Part 2) with Deborah Thompson
Dream Journaling
Beginner Drawingwith Catherine McIntosh
DIY 16mm Film Processing + Intro to Bolex Camera with Brian Lye
The Labwith Deborah Thompson
Oxygen Art Centre’s fourth exhibition in the window project entitled O2, features new artwork by Tracy Fillion is now on view from 5 April to 5 June 2024. 
Writing Against Perfectionism, or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love Revision w/Corinna Chong
Praise, Gratitude, & Loss: Writing Odes & Elegies in an Age of Crisis w/Matt Rader
Magic of Memory 1
Nature Still Life
Dream Journaling
Oxygen Art Centre’s fourth exhibition in the window project entitled O2, features new artwork by Tracy Fillion is now on view from 5 April to 5 June 2024.