Woven willow sculptures embody interdependence

Myers is a professional weaver who has created thousands of baskets.

Willow baskets shaped by Dawn Myers — the focus of a new exhibition at the Sunshine Coast Arts Centre — are coy about what they might actually contain. Basketry by Myers was unveiled on June 26 during a public reception to open the summer showcase, titled Splendour: Celebrating the Connections in Our Natural World. Myers is a former resident of Roberts Creek who relocated to the quieter environs of the qathet region.

“Dawn’s work blows me away,” observed curator Sadira Rodrigues. “In particular, this body of work feels to me so much of the body and the scale of the body and the kind of sensuousness of the body.” It’s easy to anthropomorphize Myers’s creations.

While the tight-woven Birth Rebirth (Nature’s Endless Cycle of Renewal) resembles a traditional basket in form, it is mounted so its oculus faces the viewer. The parallels to a nurturing womb are unmistakable. In Portal (Nature Gives Knowledge by Experience, Stepping Into and Through It), the willow weaving assumes certain proportions of a human figure, the arch of its upper extremities surmounted with loose-wrapped vines.

The weavings were inspired by Myers’s daily walks through second-growth forest near her home in Powell River, accompanied by her partner Paul and excitable dog Charlie. “It’s the highlight of our day,” she said. “What I see and experience there is a deep well of inspiration.”

She observed that nature is obstinate, determined to grow. “We may fell the trees,” she said, “but nature is more stubborn than our greed. She grows and grows, and she does not tolerate scarred or empty places.”

Myers cultivates similar feelings in her garden, which is a blend of perennials and vegetables. The interplay of botanical independence and ecological cooperation became a