Fraser River Brick Pigments

The paintings featured in this series are made up of images from the Fraser River that date back roughly a century. These images were chosen as they line up with when bricks sourced across British Columbia were used as weight in the ballasts of ships throughout the Fraser River ports. Being dumped into the water to clear the hull, the bricks can still be found today scattered across the riverbed.

I then grind down these bricks and refine them with a process called levigation to sift out the sand and filter the pigment from the salt from the river. The oil paint made from this pigment is the same paint found in the final works