Local artist Dawn Schmidt is the new featured artist at the Fairmont Winnipeg. Although primarily a landscape painter, Schmidt’s collection for the Fairmont blends a bold, vibrant colour palette with the lively study of Winnipeg’s iconic places and historic streetscapes.
Schmidt debuted her collection at the private Fairmont Gold Lounge on January 17. Her work will now be displayed throughout the main lobby of the hotel and the Velvet Glove restaurant.
The residency also involves live painting events and exclusive meet-and-greets for Fairmont Gold guests. Schmidt’s Fairmont residency concludes mid-April.
A Local Start
It has taken time for Schmidt to establish herself as a professional artist. Despite life casting a few shadows along the way, she is ready to step into the limelight.
She lived in Niverville until the age of five when the family moved to Winnipeg. After becoming a self-proclaimed “city girl,” Schmidt said she would never move back to Niverville—but things didn’t turn out that way.
Along with her husband, Schmidt moved back to the town after they had children and realized they wanted to raise them in a rural environment.
“It’s a funny thing and you get to eat your words sometimes,” Schmidt says. “It was back when we’d had kids and they were younger and I thought we’d move and just stay awhile in Niverville and see how it was. And then we made it home.”
Schmidt was the primary caregiver for her family. When the kids all entered school, she took a job at the Niverville NCU Manor in various caregiving and administrative roles before settling into events management at the Heritage Centre.
“Both my grandma and my oma were at the Heritage Centre at the time. So it was really fun to be seeing them daily. But planning weddings and event management was really a great stepping stone for me and I loved it.”
While she had always been an extrovert, Schmidt felt a desire to explore her creative side. She had begun to paint for fun, and to relieve stress, and realized that she wanted to take her art from a hobby to a more disciplined pursuit.
She started by taking painting classes at the Steinbach Arts Council (SAC), including in acrylic, watercolour, and abstract. She also joined a painting group that met once a week to support and critique each other’s work.
The slow process of learning to paint reminded Schmidt of studying jazz music in university.
“In jazz, they tell you that you should learn by being inspired by the masters,” says Schmidt. “First, before you could find your own voice in something, you sort of had to know how this thing worked. I don’t know if that’s how everybody does it, but for me, I didn’t know how else to start.”
Stepping into the Light
Schmidt amassed a large volume of work and began to book herself as a vendor at local craft shows.
“It was great to talk to people, but it wasn’t the right place for my art,” she says. “People wanted to buy, you know, easy gifts. Crafts. Not the type of art I was there with.”
When she realized it wasn’t the right fit for her style of art, she applied to bring her work to Winnipeg shows dedicated to visual artists, such as Artarama, Local Colour, BrushWorks, and the Winnipeg Art Expo.
“I found I had a passion for that. I loved it. I was creating way more than I was selling, because I couldn’t stop creating work.”
Schmidt also began visiting art galleries for visual stimulation. In 2018, she visited the Pulse Gallery in the Johnson Terminal at The Forks in Winnipeg and found herself chatting with owner Lesly Dawyduk, who asked to see some of her work.
Dawyduk then offered her a spot as a guest artist, enabling Schmidt to show a small collection of pieces at the gallery. And the paintings began to sell.
From the guidance she received at Pulse Gallery, Schmidt was able to refine both her art style and business model.
“Lesly really believed in me. She really saw something in what I was doing.”
Pulse Gallery features diverse, ever-changing collections of artwork, created by established artists as well as emerging talent. Schmidt was supplying scenic landscapes.
“I grew up in the prairies, so it was fields,” she says. “And we went to the lake a lot, so it was Canadian Shield. It was rocks and trees. Or yellow fields… I think in the gallery at the time, they didn’t have an artist that was really doing that one thing. So it was a good fit.”
From sun-kissed lakes to winter evergreens laden with snow, Schmidt’s work makes an impact with its depth of field and shadow. Using contrast, she has been successful in bringing light to the forefront of a piece.
“I would say I am visually attracted to light and where light comes from and how it reflects. And how it makes something glow,” she says. “There’s a million ways in which light reflects. It’s in the shadows and in the depths. There is so much complexity and beauty and I love trying to analyze that. Like, how can I make that come to life on a canvas?”
In 2023, as demand for her paintings began to increase, she quit her job in property management to focus on producing more pieces in new styles. She takes commissions and is always willing to try new subject matter, including a recent collection of cityscapes featuring the Winnipeg Exchange District.
“My goal this year was to be accepted into the Manitoba Society of Arts and into the Federation of Canadian Artists, which is in Vancouver. And so I’ve now been accepted into those. And once you get accepted, then there’s chance to do more shows.”
Creating Bravely
Even though she finds her recent accomplishments affirming, Schmidt is humbled by her acceptance in the art community.
“I’ve had lots of rejections, too,” she says. “You end up feeling like you’re not good enough and you look at other people’s art and you go, ‘I’m just a baby at this.’”
Schmidt knows that many creative people don’t receive the accolades they should.
“You can be a great actor and not get big parts in TV shows. Or you can be an artist and be overlooked. You just have to believe that you’re worthy of doing this… and it’s worth putting out there just to see what you can see happen to it in the world.”
It can take a lot of bravery to make art and Schmidt credits some of her creative bravery to a choice she made to pursue gaining self-confidence. She recommends the book The Artist’s Way by Julia Cameron. Cameron helps her readers harness their creative talents and skills, removing artistic blocks and fostering confidence.
“What this did was open my heart to believe that I had all of this inside of me,” says Schmidt. “But I think life tramples some of it out of you, or maybe your art teacher told you you were terrible, or your parents said you’re not creative, or other outside forces spoke things into you so you felt like you just couldn’t. This book helped my heart to see that I was worthy of it. And I was.”
Schmidt says that her way of seeing the world is intensely personal and that when she struggles with self-doubt, she only tells herself to paint one more painting.
“It’s about taking it one step at a time, in life and in art. And sometimes I ask my self, ‘What can I do?’ I can do one more painting. And I put that out into the world. And then you know what? I can do one more painting.”
