Visit the year-round Pop-up Art Show on display at the Steveston Museum and Post Office. Shop for creations by local artists, with a percentage of all sales going toward the Steveston Historical Society’s programs and events that support our community. For the latest information on featured artists, follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.

If you’re a local artist and would like to be considered for a future date please contact Lori Gelz at postoffice@historicsteveston.ca

Pop-up Art Show Artist for June 2023 – Dona Nabata

Dona crouches on the ground next to a large art piece that she has created.

If you are walking down Moncton Street in June and see little bright pink heads in the window of the old Bank Managers Office at the Steveston Museum and Post Office, be sure to step inside and see the work of DONA NABATA. NABATA is a Sansei, or third generation Canadian Japanese. She is based on Granville Island and will be featured Pop Up Artist for the month of June inside the Steveston Museum & Post Office.

One room of the exhibition will house a very large, 4’ x 5’ painting based on the Tale of Genji, and also some smaller paintings done in oil on canvas. The main Post Office will feature many works inspired by old photographs found in Dona’s own Grandmother and Grandfather’s photo albums. Please enjoy the 12” x 12” mandalas on wood and portrait paintings of fishermen and Asian women.

The showcases will feature little vignettes on wood using original photographs, origami paper and found objects. These little dioramas celebrate the people in the photographs whose identity has been lost to us with the passage of time. No one who might remember them is still alive.

Dona will also show small works on paper featuring historical people and the Steveston waterfront. A post card titled: “Salmon Woman” which was made from a 4’ x 8’ woodblock print created in Steveston in September 2022 will be available for sale and can be mailed from the Post Office.

This pop-up ties together the historical nature of the Canadian Japanese diaspora in the Museum, with Nabata’s contemporary work in the Post Office, bringing the past into the present.

@donanabata
https://japanesecanadianartists.com/artist/dona-nabata/
Dona’s exhibition at the Richmond City Hall Galleria “Outside of History” ran from April – June 2022 https://www.richmondartgallery.org/outside-of-history

Dona is creating something in her studio at a table.

Dona's artwork shows one large-scale person surrounded by other smaller people and objects.