"Pursuing Art as a Vocation"
John J. Kalmakov
My grade six elementary school teacher in my former home town of Grand Forks, BC, seemingly recognized a degree of artistic talent in my skribbles, and at one point in time suggested, surely in jest, that I had no further need for schooling, and could abandon classes right there and then, and pursue art as a vocation. Thankfully I must have had a modicum of common sense, and didn't do so immediately, but I did at least in part, take his advice after graduation ... from the University of British Columbia.
I acquired my Bachelor of Education Degree in the Secondary Program from UBC in the late 1960s, with options in Fine Arts and Geography. And I shortly thereafter, commenced my career as an art teacher on Vancouver Island in Nanaimo, with later West Kootenay assignments in Trail, and finally Castlegar. Married, with young children, and living south of town in Kinnaird in the early 1970s, I first carpooled with other teachers to Trail Junior Secondary. Then after the closure of the school in the early 1980s, I taught art at the Castlegar Stanley Humphries Secondary School, retiring from School District No.20 in 2005. By that time, Castlegar had become a second home town.
While teaching, I had also pursued my interest in painting. Fully aware of trends in contemporary "modern" arts while living in Vancouver, my focus on my return to the interior, was more on times past, and the remnants of a once thriving rural cultural landscape. My initial watercolours and acrylics depicted derelict farm buildings, abandoned implements, old wagons, and vintage work trucks, many of the paintings essentially simulating the textures of weathered wood and rust on a masonite substrate. In my later work I attempted to recreate the nostalgic ambience of small-town life, this series painted on large format canvas, the "urbanized" subject matter requiring a very different approach to render concrete, stainless steel, chrome plating and reflective glass. Selections of these "Cultural Landscapes" were ultimately shown at the Penticton Art Gallery in 1983, which was my most ambitious public exhibit ... and as it turned out, also my last.
Different Perspectives - A Grade Six student pencil drawing, and a later canvas painting of a Grand Forks main street on a “Sunday Morning, in 1980”
The arrival of the Apple Macintosh computer and LaserWriter in Castlegar two years later was a milestone moment, ushering in the desktop publishing revolution. In my case, it was also a pivotal moment, redirecting my attention away from painting to a more practical form of visual arts. I fully embraced computer technologies and digital photography, contracting and donating my graphic design and web development services to individuals and local non-profit organizations, including the local Doukhobors. I have continued these activities, off and on to this day, although now as a near-octogenarian, to a much lesser degree.