Michaela Davidson’s work appears in private and corporate collections around the world. She has shown her work in galleries across Vancouver Island, from her own space in Lake Cowichan to a solo show planned at the gallery in the Cowichan Performing Arts Centre. But this September, the acclaimed artist is trusting her instincts and hanging her paintings in the café of the Country Grocer in Ladysmith.
“I go by my gut feelings,” Davidson said.
She had been out with fellow artist Rohana Laing, discussing potential gallery spaces, when they stopped for coffee the Country Grocer Café.
“I walked in there and I saw all these lovely little paintings and I said to the gal at the counter, ‘Do you have artists in here?’ And she said, ‘Yes.’ I said, ‘Oh, is it possible to have my work in here?’ And she said, ‘Sure, what month would you like?’” Davidson said with a laugh. “That’s how it all evolved. It just felt good.”
Davidson’s instinctive approach doesn’t stop with where she chooses to show her work. It’s also how she creates it.
“Watercolours are a very difficult medium. They’re probably the most difficult medium to work in, in painting. Because they have their own agenda,” she said. “I’ll start a painting with an idea and all I work from is a tiny little value sketch. It gives me my composition and I make notes on what time of day it is, where the light's coming from, the mists and so on. But at a certain point, the painting will take over and I have to be brave enough and trusting enough to let it do that and not try to push it in a different direction.”
She describes each painting as having its own energy.
“Sometimes I’m astounded at the result,” she said. “Because I really feel I almost didn’t have anything to do with it, if that makes any sense.”
While she also paints florals and figurative work, Davidson said the Country Grocer Café exhibit will feature her West Coast landscapes. It’s what she’s best known for and what she loves painting.
“We live in such an incredibly beautiful area. It's very hard not to be enthralled with it and influenced by it.”
However, she can’t say which pieces she will hang as the final selection will be made the morning she arrives to install the show. Once again, she’ll follow her gut.
“I’ll take a selection of work up there and I’ll adjust as I go along,” she said.
The award-winning artist previously operated a gallery in Duncan before stepping back to care for her husband during an illness. She now works and exhibits out of her own art and gift gallery in Lake Cowichan as well as the Sandsmark Gallery in Cowichan Bay. A solo show at the Cowichan Performing Arts Centre is booked for 2027.
Despite her extensive career and multiple gallery shows, Davidson said it’s the creative process itself that continues to bring her joy.
“I feel very, very blessed and excited and enthusiastic when I'm doing a piece because it gives me more than I give it, you know? It's a gift,” Davidson said. “And I'm just delighted that I'm going to be able to share it with Ladysmith.”
Learn more about Michaela Davidson and her work on her website.
