‘The Forgotten’ Project is comprised of sixty-nine portraits of women that went missing and murdered in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside over the course of decades. Believing that it is society’s collective responsibility to support and empower individuals of high risk, Artist Pamela Masik painted each woman on an 8’ x 10’ canvas employing a style powered by raw emotion and passion.

Canadian filmmaker Damon Vignale met Masik when she first embarked on the 6 year journey to create ‘The Forgotten’ Project. Following Masik through her creative process and ensuing emotional struggle is what inspired Vignale’s first full-length feature film documentary, ‘The Exhibition.’ The film saw its international debut in 2013 as a part of the Chicago International Film Festival, The San Francisco United Nations Association Film Festival, and the Bergen International Film Festival in Norway.  It has since aired on the Superchannel, been bought for rotation by the CBC, and in November of 2014, received an award in the programming arts category at the International Emmy Awards. 

Reflecting upon and reacting to censorship surrounding the artist’s work, Masik’s ‘Caged Bird’ Collection seduces its viewers with outward personal expression as it delves into themes of masculinity and femininity, and sexuality. It pushes the boundaries of our preconceived notions of the body and what it has the ability to convey, be that a sense of power, vulnerability, or a form of communication unachievable with simply written or spoken word.

Elaborating upon Masik’s previous collections, the images we see in ‘Caged Bird’ utilize the artist’s remarkable use of mixed media, incorporating elements of collage, oil paint, and resin. Furthermore, much like surrealist writings founded in the stream of consciousness, an automatism in the movement of Masik’s painting style explores a compelling level of spontaneity and whimsy.

‘Clean Dirty Girl’ perhaps best exemplifies these many components that made the ‘Caged Bird’ Collection a point of extreme intrigue for artists and collectors alike at Art Basel Miami, 2010. Pieces from the collection have since travelled around North America to pop-up galleries in Toronto, and San Francisco. 

The artist’s interest in mixed media is highlighted in Masik’s ‘Revelation’ Collection, where complex textures shine amongst the dreamy resin coated explorations of classic mythology as the artist reinvents works by the masters. Masik’s ‘My Ophelia’ lay upon deep hues of blue and green, unable to utter a word, a ball-gag held tightly by her lips. The take on Millais’ own ‘Ophelia‘ also blends elements of 60’s pop art à la Rauschenberg with its’ inclusion of the artists own gloves. These gloves work both as a creative representation of the foliage within the image, as well as an insertion of the artist herself, into the painting.

The complexity of these works does not stop here. The ‘Revelation’ Collection marks an exciting moment in Masik’s career where her interest lay in marrying the art of performance with the beauty of an attainable afterthought. This often led Masik to her studio during her time creating the pieces from ‘Revelation’, working on those unresolved elements of her performance art, and honing a process which ushers the viewer into the beginnings of her most recent collections.

A world of whimsy is unearthed in the ‘Corkscrew Follies’ Collection, where Masik explores the fables of love in contemporary society through the use of classic symbolism and all-enveloping visual theatrics. Throw yourself into brush strokes guided by the fervor of automatic painting, where surrealist and graffiti influences present themselves through hypnotizing lines and bright pops of colour. 

Masik, whose love for performance painting is solidified in the belief that it is her truest form of creation, recognizes those instances where performance works have yet to find their resolve. Massive in scale, there is plenty to see, to find, and to look for in these paintings. Search for those indications where a work was born out of performance: a particular erratic movement in a line, or an emerging hue of blue which harmonizes the vibrant canvas. ‘The Breakaway,' is Masik’s first piece in the ‘Corkscrew Follies’ Collection. This body of work has lent its hand in the developments of Masik’s 2016 collection, 'Quarry of the Shrine.' 

‘Quarry of the Shrine’ is the organic continuation, yet propelled diversion from Masik’s ‘Corkscrew Follies’ Collection. With a similarly eye-popping palette, and swerving brush strokes, the viewer is challenged to combat the sheer visual stimuli, and negotiate the struggle of the empowered deities that find themselves in the foreground of these heavily symbolic illustrations. 

Female figures dominate the canvases of ‘Quarry of the Shrine,’ constantly pushing and pulling as they tell their story of adoration and sexuality. Finding the balance between owning their right as the subjects of these works, whilst evading objectification, the deities of 'Quarry of the Shrine’ are complex; they carry the plight of women of ancient mythologies throughout to today.