With delicate brush strokes and crooked-branch hand lettering, Sarah Burwash is creating a new Canadian folklore. In her beautiful first watercolour collection, The Far Woods, she draws upon the earth as muse, the collection largely a reflection of time the young artist spent in the Canadian northwest. Flesh and earth tones are accentuated by the vivid palette of a natural world that is at turns sinister and friendly. And interestingly, although not surprising since the earth is often cast as female, all of the bodies here are of women. Some are pioneers, others, like sprites, are almost flora. They are cradled, hidden, and protected by the ever-giving life that is found in the deepest recesses of the "far woods." There is a sense of both impending action and never-ending movement—perpetuated by an infatuation with the circular, the cyclical. A truly rich collection that imposes no story, but suggests there are many you'll never know.
