| ARTIST BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH: | As a young girl in Holland, Neel De Wit-Wibaut often went with her parents and siblings to art galleries to see paintings by famous Dutch artists, including their relative Vincent van Gogh. Her mother encouraged her to keep a sketchbook and draw, but she did not practice art seriously until she emigrated with her husband to Canada in 1948, had three children, and, after living in Ottawa and Regina, settled in Calgary. She enrolled first in a Chinese painting class and then at the University of Calgary, from which she graduated with a BFA in Painting at the age of 60 (1975). At this time De Wit-Wibaut also became a founding member of the Calgary Philharmonic Orchestra, where she played the viola for many years, as well as in other ensembles and numerous informal chamber music groups. She played the accordion on horse-back riding expeditions in the Rocky Mountains with the Trail Riders of Alberta as their Musician in Residence, and continued to play both the viola and the accordion with her friends until the final weeks before her death.
The large abstracts De Wit-Wibaut painted in the 1970s evolved to more conventionally scaled watercolours, which were followed by oils and then by oil pastels. Her works sensitively interpret scenes from nature, animals she had known, moonscapes, and interiors, and they reflect her exceptional sense of atmosphere and mood. She worked from 1980 until her 2016 death in a circular log building with no electric heat or running water built for her by friends in the foothills of Alberta. After many years of keeping her practice private, BlueRock Gallery hosted De Wit-Wibaut’s first exhibition, Alberta Light: A Retrospective, in 2012 when the artist was 97 years old.
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