The World of Joyce Kamikura: 2011 July Geneva to Sweden

Artist's Statement

My Paintings represent my personal response to my environment. My ideas are not whole but fragments of what fascinate me and are seeds from which my works begin to develop. As a result, although my works undoubtedly have roots in my daily living, they may be a good deal removed from reality; some of them may be quite representational while others become abstracts.

By exaggerating vibrant colours, entertaining visual textures and other elements of design I take my painting mediums beyond their traditional execution; into mixed water media, acrylic, collage and oil. A subject leads to an idea. Then it becomes an immediate cause for me to paint, ultimately experiencing fun and struggle of permutations and possibilities deriving from that idea. It is not so much in the final product, but in the process and struggle to bring all elements together to function in harmonious presentation in a painting, that I derive so much satisfaction and pleasure as an artist. Visit my other site: http://joycekamikura.wordpress.com/

Sunday, September 4, 2011

2011 July Geneva to Sweden

July and August in Europe.

UN, Geneva

With Ronny's family

Lysekil

We visited Vivienne and Ronny, our daughter and her fiancee in Geneva, Switzerland in their lovely new home. Our first visit was to the UN, Geneva where Ronny works. From Geneva, four of us drove through Germany, and Denmark to Sweden, to a beautiful resort town called Lysekil on the west coast of Sweden (Ronny’s home town).

We took a night ferry from Puttgarten, Germany to Denmark, then a long bridge to Sweden. Much of northern Europe was quite cool and rainy. That is, until we took another ferry, this time a short one, and got to a small picturesque resort town of Lysekil. We were met with extremely and unusually hot weather (around 30-40C) there and throughout the region. A short boat ride from there is another beautiful and charming resort town of Fiskebackskil. We took a longer excursion to a tourist town of Smogen, famous for shrimp. And of course our lunch was, as you can guess.....shrimp. All around the area is true fjord: a long, narrow inlet with steep sides and sometimes barren cliffs, unlike the familiar BC west coast scenery we are used to. For five days we’ve met some wonderful people and ate Sweden’s savory seafood.

Smogen, Sweden

Gerald and Philippe

Our return trip to Geneva was uneventful with rain much of the way. The highlight of it though, was a beautiful overnight ferry from Trelleberg, just south of Malmo in Sweden to Germany. The TT line ferry was much like a cruise ship feeling with beautiful cabins and luxurious lounges. Back in Geneva, we were treated to our friend’s sumptuous and magnificent dinner to end our visit to Europe.