Over the years I have enjoyed painting the marine industry around the British Columbia waterfront, and the two paintings that I describe below were purchased by one of these industries; The Canadian Fishing Company, CANFISCO.

I especially enjoy painting the historic buildings owned by the various companies that have grown up here – including CANFISCO. My painting of the “Home Plant” their current headquarters, records the working site that has been in continuous operation since 1906 at the foot of Gore Street in Vancouver.
While some of my works bring to life scenes from past history, I have also worked hard to record current fishing scenes before they are lost to change. See “Herring Time off Comox” which was painted after I ran safety patrols on my boat “Steveston Lifeboat” for the Canadian Lifeboat Institute.

We run the herring safety patrols for the industry as this is an extremely dangerous fishery and we want to be in the vicinity of the boats in case anything happens.  Why is it potentially dangerous? Because the herring can become startled and dive to the bottom inside a net, and possibly roll the boat over. Don’t be silly you say – a small 10” long herring capsize a 75’ fishing vessel? It can be ‘the perfect storm’ when you have millions of them in a huge ball in the middle of the net – it is not impossible! Also 200 tons of fish in the net, or shifting cargo, can cause dangerous stability problems.  So the herring fishing process has to be very skillful and careful. That is why we are there. To help in case a boat gets into trouble and we have to provide rescue services. So I will be there again in March to assist the fishers participating in the herring fishery.”