The landscapes portrayed by Garry Kaye are not born of an overly-calculated, self-conscious process, but more due to a history long spent amongst a rural, if not backwoods setting. Garry was born, third generation, to a large family on an island that sits between Victoria and Vancouver, British Columbia. Vast amounts of time spent on Salt Spring Island, as a child on a then less populated island, many days farming and simply the years spent living there – have shaped his development of a different sensibility regarding landscape and beauty. His work twists the often overlooked mess of impenetrable underbrush to focus on the intricate yet subtle beauty the island has revealed to him. Garry’s paintings are not of typical beauty.

Since graduating from the Vancouver School of Art (now Emily Carr Institute) where he studied drawing, painting, and (mainly) sculpture, Garry has visited and revisited the island landscape as a source of his art making. Recently, Garry has come to favour painting as his mode of art making.

Widely exhibited, Garry’s work has been commissioned both privately and publicly as well as finding its way into collections nationally and internationally.