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Roselyn Levin brings Sumi-e art to downtown Orangeville

September 26, 2024   ·   0 Comments

By Constance Scrafield 

Sumi-e artist Roslyn Levin has been having a wonderful year and the autumn is keeping up her pace.

Ms. Levin’s membership of ICCPS North America (International Chinese Calligraphy and Ink Paint Society) was her entree to submitting two paintings and one calligraphy to the Beaux Arts Brampton. These were submitted to their virtual Gallery Exhibit titled Oriental Fusion – Watch our Brushes Dance!

“I was asked if we want to take part and pay fee,” she told the Citizen. “And I agreed.”

Currently, there is a collection of Roslyn Levin’s paintings and ink drawings in the front window at Dragonfly Arts at 189 Broadway until the end of September. They are all about birds, some hunting, some calm; others in flight or quiet on a branch. There are drawings of fully detailed birds and more that are just the minimalistic essence of a bird.

Be sure to have a look.

Away from here, Ms. Levin’s work has been accepted at the online gallery of the Artists for Conservation Art Festival for the month of September. She considers this to be a “great honour.”

With the Sumi-e Society of America, likewise, is holding its 61st Juried Exhibition, as part of the Eighth Worldwide Internet Exhibition. Two of Ms. Levin’s pieces have been accepted: a sumi-e painting and a calligraphy piece. This extraordinary internet exhibition runs for the whole year of September 2024 through to September 2025.

The Sumi-e Artists of Canada has a show every weekend in the Japanese Canadian Cultural Centre in Toronto.

Bouncing into Nov. 9-10, she will participate in-person at the Sumi-e Artists of Canada at the Sumi-e Exhibition and Sale of Oriental Brush Painting in the Japanese Canadian Cultural Centre, where she has won first prize or honourable mention over many years.

“You submit through online groups,” she said. “I don’t get accepted to every show I submit. I have asked for a critique of why not and other Sumi-e artists who were surprised I was not invited.

“It’s a niche. Not a lot of people know it and people just don’t get it. It’s very difficult. It’s not like oil painting. It’s different with Sumi-e.”

Once again, Ms. Levin has been invited to return to the McMichael Volunteer Committee Autumn Sale at the fabulous gallery of the McMichael Canadian Art Collection in Kleinburg, 10365 Islington Avenue.

Ms. Levin said, “The last time I was at McMichael Autumn Sales was 2019. I was one of the bestselling artists. They called and asked me to come again and I said yes. The McMichael is very prestigious.”

Ms. Levin is on the “automatically invited back” list of artists for this autumn sale.

Keen for the participating artists to do well and, as the autumn sale is also a fundraiser for McMichael and its volunteer committee.

As Ms. Levin explains: Each artist has a wall six feet by seven feet, which they fill with their art. As their works sell, they add another piece to ensure a consistent inventory for the entire weekend.

To create is to expand and explore.

Ms. Levin began her life as an artist by abandoning her intention to study watercolour and move to Sumi-e ink pen art and calligraphy, of which she had no knowledge but loved immediately.

She told us, “First time I won a juried event, a friend who talks to angels told me that I have had many lifetimes in the orient and was always painting. That made perfect sense.”

Always prepared to share the joy of sumi-e, Ms. Levin does teach. She has a private student traveling from Barrie every Monday morning, who “took a while to ask to be a private student because she’s learning things. So she keeps coming.”

Ms. Levin has taught at the Wellington Township Museum, telling us “There is often a student who has not done this before. It’s not an easy medium but it can come into other mediums.”

There are ambitions for sure and embarking “on an adjunct to carve all my signature Hanko from stone. Just before COVID, in using silver clay,” for which she explained, “take a stamp and stamp in silver clay – that stamp means heart, mind, spirit.”

She speculates about making other stamps in silver clay and is waiting to take a class with Tracy Lai someday.

Ms. Levin heard about another silver clay teacher, www.lizreynoldsstudio.com. Who offers lessons delivered by Zoom.

“I’m going to embark on making stamps of silver jewellery,” she said, “Another avenue of creativity.”

Speaking of teaching, Ms. Levin has also been teaching tai chi since 1991. She is teaching this year at the Odd Fellows Hall in Orangeville and is looking for students who have done some tai chi or who want to learn, in full vigour now.

She promised, “tai chi is amazing for the body; relaxation, balance; it’s good against osteo, for muscles, ligaments, and it is known to be beneficial against diseases like Parkinson’s.”

You can contact her at roslyn@artbyroslyn.on.ca or call her on 519-941-5249. You can visit her at her studio at Dragonfly Arts at 189 Broadway.

The dates for the autumn sale in the Grand Hall at McMichael Canadian Art are Nov. 29 to Dec. 1.

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