April Bending

April Bending

April Bending, The artist, whose work is in collections in Canada, Japan, Great Britain and the Cayman Islands, has always been interested in art. As a child she experimented on her own. Then as a teen she earned a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree from the University of Alberta, on the Canadian prairies.

In 1990 she had a solo show of subtle paintings in Tokyo and Yokohama, Japan. The simple watercolour washes appealed to the Japanese taste that had developed the ancient art of Sumi-e ink painting.

Moving to Grand Cayman in 2001 with her husband, Patrick, her artwork was once again strongly influenced by these vastly different surroundings.

She began painting realistic impressions of day-to-day sights such as roosters, parrots, butterflies etc around which she painted playful festive borders containing many images of Caymanian interest, including hibiscus, turtles, lizards and conch shells. The overall effect of this border running around the outer edge of each piece is that of a painted story.

Hurricane Ivan in 2004 affected her deeply. Her style changed once again. Rather than capturing the visual images of Cayman, she went back to her roots in abstraction, this time with subtle figurative references evoking a variety of emotions.

In these new paintings, images of landscapes, people and animals are subtly revealed through loose layers of gestural abstract strokes. The overall effect is one of mystery, which requires the viewer to participate by bringing a personal history with which to interpret the piece.