Ira Hoffecker: Transitions

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Ira Hoffecker, "Transit" and "Corridor," 2021

acrylic and oil on canvas, 30" x 30"

​Transitions and was originally scheduled for May 2020. But a global pandemic intervened. Hoffecker returned from an artist residency in Buenos Aires in mid-March, and immediately went into quarantine. To manage the stress of isolation, she began to grow seeds in trays. Her dining room table became a mini-greenhouse, the seedlings later transplanted into garden beds. When nurseries re-opened, she joined the lineups and came home with more plants and flowers.

​“My garden flowers soothed and cheered me,” she says, “their blossoms showed the abundance of nature’s life-giving power.”

Daily forest walks attuned her senses to landscapes. Gradually, she returned to the studio to paint. Her flowering plants, with their unique shapes, colours and textures, became her subjects. Her Flower Studies series showed in July 2020 at the Gage Gallery and delighted collectors. The Gage group show was titled Out of the Silence.

In the fall of 2020, Hoffecker returned to her previous style of painting. The artist explains: “Formerly, my art practice encompassed the assimilation and reconfiguration of historical urban maps and architectural elements.” Her multi-layered paintings employed abstracted shapes and gestural mark-making to suggest particular urban spaces. Her new settings began to change. She introduced organic shapes into the geometric structures. The new series of twenty paintings still use geometric shapes and architectural mapping to create depth. “But they no longer refer to a specific place,” she says. “They now show elements of urban architecture in a landscape setting.”

A significant shift in mediums took place within the evolving compositions. “I found oils to be a fantastic medium to work with when painting plants or landscapes,” she says. Brush strokes of oil paint dry slowly, blend easily and allow subtle tonal shifts. Once applied, oils retain their original colour and can be reworked if necessary. Working "wet on wet" adds luminosity and colour transparency. Acrylic paint dries quickly, so is handy for building the multiple layers of urban environments. “Oil on top of acrylic works fine,” she says, “but not the other way around.”

Not all paintings in the upcoming show include organic forms. Many of the paintings slated for the 2020 show have been sold. Remaining are geometric abstractions like Transition, Conjunction V and Convergence.

“Colour is an essential part of my large multi-layered abstractions,” she says. And colour abounds in these three paintings. Transition’s blue-green flowing forms are immersive and soothing, suggesting  sea-scapes and deep sea diving. Conjunction V presents a cool summer palette of turquoise, rose, ochre and purple.

Convergence uses a vertical format to lift us skyward. We could be flying above this rainbow-hued puzzle of shapes and lines. In the distance, a misty horizon beckons, blending into a soft pink sky.

​Hoffecker emigrated to Canada from Germany in 2004 with her husband and two small children. In her forties, she began taking classes at the Vancouver Island School of Art (VISA). Now 16 years later, she has completed a BA in Fine Arts (First Class Honours) and a MFA, and is an active member of the Federation of Canadian artists. She has exhibited in England, America and Germany, and received several awards for her painting and documentary filmmaking.

Transitions is a success story. It shows that our world may change overnight. But we can adapt, and stay balanced and productive. For Hoffecker, isolation re-affirmed the important things in life. One being that art-making kindles her feelings of happiness. And sense of connection to self and others. “I have learned that giving joy to others, through kindness and effort, makes me joyful as well,” she says.

​It’s a creative circle that visitors to The Fortune Gallery are invited to experience May 1-23, 2021.

--Kate Cino