Artist Sheila Kernan
Title Floating By
Media mixed media on canvas on board
Dated
2023
Size 30 x 30 in. / 76.2 x 76.2 cm.
Estimate $1,500 - $3,000
Notes
signed lower right; signed, titled and dated verso; unframed
Provenance
this work was generously donated by the artist; proceeds will be donated to the Alberta University of the Arts (AUArts) Centennial Scholarships fund in celebration of the university's Centennial year. The Centennial Scholarships fund is a transformative initiative to provide future artists, craftspersons, and designers with tuition-free education. Centennial Scholarships will reduce financial barriers and provide students with a tuition-free year of study. For more information or to donate directly visit: auarts.ca/donate-now
Biographical Information
Sheila Kernan ~ [20/21st century] Canadian
Sheila Kernan is a contemporary Canadian painter whose work explores the energy, beauty, and emotion found within both the natural and urban landscape. Now living and working in Calgary, Alberta, Kernan creates vibrant, richly textured paintings that transform familiar places into immersive visual experiences. Drawing inspiration from her travels, everyday observations, and a lifelong fascination with colour and light, she captures fleeting moments that balance memory, imagination, and lived experience.
Working across acrylic, oil, and watercolour, Kernan builds her compositions through expressive layers of paint, bold colour relationships, and intricate surface textures. With thick impasto brushwork, unexpected patterns, and luminous passages of light, Kernan creates a dynamic visual language that moves fluidly between representation and abstraction. Whether depicting the excitement of a city at dusk or the quiet grandeur of a mountain landscape, her paintings invite viewers into joyful, contemplative spaces where emotion and atmosphere take precedence over literal interpretation.
A graduate of the Alberta College of Art and Design (now Alberta University of the Arts), Kernan has exhibited extensively across Canada and has received numerous honours, including the ACAD Alumni Legacy Award and the Julius Griffith Memorial Award from the Canadian Society of Painters in Watercolour. Her work is held in private, corporate, and public collections internationally, reflecting a practice that continues to celebrate curiosity, creativity, and the transformative power of paint.
for more biographical information and examples of work see the artist's website at www.sheilakernan.com; represented by Gibson Fine Art, Canada House Gallery, and BAU-XI GALLERY