about the artist
Randall Shier – Canadian Oil Painter & Architect
Born in Vancouver, Shier’s early fascination for drawing and painting sparked a lifelong passion.
Architecture as Influence
A pivotal moment came during a family trip to New York City, where Shier was captivated by historical and modern skyscrapers.
This passion led him to pursue a degree in architecture at the University of Southern California in Los Angeles, where he studied the art of the built environment.
A Return to Painting
Returning to Vancouver after graduation, Shier brought with him a profound understanding of how art and architecture intertwine with people and place. His travels throughout Europe, where he sketched and painted landscapes and townscapes in watercolor, further enriched his artistic perspective.
Shier moved to the Okanagan in 2004 and immediately connected with the picturesque landscape of orchards, vineyards, lakes, and mountains. This move helped spark a renaissance in his artistic endeavors, prompting him to pick up his brushes after a twenty-year hiatus. Experimenting with new mediums such as acrylic and oil, Shier honed his craft through exploration and study, including professional workshops and explorative art classes in Italy.
Today, Randall Shier is a member of the FCA Central Okanagan chapter. When faced with a blank canvas, he believes in the ability of line, shape, color, and texture to convey the essence of his subjects. Whether capturing the timeless beauty of nature or finding inspiration in the built environment, Shier’s art invites viewers to glimpse beyond the temporal and see beauty in the commonplace.
A Mission Group Original Production
Crafted Lives: An Artisan Series Feature
Dive into the making of Randall’s public art installation in this a three part docu-series
Episode 1
A Portrait of the Artist
I was that kid that just left to paint and draw.
It never left me and here we are.
As an artist, I’ve really gone through a very interesting journey.
It really started off falling in love with buildings of all things and started drawing house plans at the ripe old age of seven years old.
To me, art and architecture, they’re different, but they’re the same.
You know, it’s, it’s, it’s creativity, it’s visual.
Our architecture is space for people.
You’re, you know, you’re creating these, these beautiful spaces.
It’s a 3 dimensional world and a painting is a 2 dimensional world that your mind can get lost in and experience that same 3D feeling.
So those are two passions of mine and they have been my whole life.
And it’s not because I determined that this is what I was going to do.
I couldn’t help it.
It’s who I was.
I’m very interested in urban landscapes, but I also equally love nature and the beauty and majesty of mountains and lakes.
I hope people will feel a sense of hope, a sense of joy.
It might be dark now, but there’s a brightness potential around the corner.
My name is Randall Shire, also Randy, and I’m an oil painter.
Episode 2
The Method
You’re letting your feelings flow and your emotions flow, and you’re just letting stress and worry just fade away. You’re, you’re focused in an unfocused way.
I have used different techniques over the years. I usually start with applying a color to the entire canvas rather than working on a white canvas,
which can feel daunting, like, where do I start? But if there’s an overall color, let’s say it’s a pale yellow, then you start,
then you start putting your marks on the painting kind of outline some of the shapes. One technique is strictly using a pallet knife
where you’re applying paint and mixing paint on the pallet and putting it on the canvas with a pallet knife.
The second technique, which most people are familiar with, which is the brush, and I have different shape of brushes, different sizes
of brush, and they all have a use. One of the things I love about oil paint is you can,
you can have different textures. It can be a very gentle, uh, smooth surface, or you can be thick with the brush strokes visible at,
or the pallet knife scrape visible with lifted edges. Again, that’s something that we don’t see in real life,
but when you’re looking at a piece of art and the surface itself speaks to you, there’s an incredible beauty
and interest, visual interest to the viewer. What I get actually most excited about as it comes to life is when you, when there’s maybe mistakes
or there’s things on the canvas that just are like, okay, what happened there? And there’s, there’s some magic that happens when I’m painting.
I feel like I am flying or I’m soaring like an eagle over some beautiful place. I’m just living completely in that moment.
It just feels good.
Episode 3
The Art
I think we have a yearning deep inside us to express ourselves artistically. It’s a real privilege to be, to be asked to make art
that people can enjoy. To come into a bland building with just painted drywall and not having any sort of sense of design, uh,
or any sense of place is, that’s sad because I think, uh, as human beings we’re much more than that.
The Bernard Block is very significant because it’s part of the revitalization, the rejuvenation of downtown. We’re building on the legacy of
what others have, have started. There’s a history here. And to acknowledge that history, I felt being trained as a,
as an architect. Wouldn’t it be great to include some of the lost architecture that actually was once in the city
on Bernard Avenue? It’s about memory, it’s about place, it’s about people. There’s two pieces. One is the Royal Ann Hotel
and the Royal Ann Hotel that I painted is one that doesn’t exist anymore. Unfortunately, the building that I painted burnt down in 1971, so it’s part
of the Lost Kelowna. It was sort of a delight to, to work from old archival photographs to be able
to piece together, um, the painting. And then the one across from it is, uh, also a part of the Lost Kelowna series, and it’s the old post office.
Uh, it was built in 1937. Uh, in my mind, it’s a, it’s really a masterpiece of art deco design.
Uh, yellow is a, is a, a color that’s also feels very Okanagan, you know, sunshine, warmth. And hopefully it makes people happy when they come into the
office, whether they’re visiting someone in the office or they, they work here.