Fishing with Fred at Port Ed Cannery, BC

Oil on canvas (24w36h) unframed

Slow Go

In the spring of 2018, I went halibut fishing with Fred Morrison Starr, who was my dear friend and later became my husband. Fred was a legendary Gitxsan commercial fisherman who knew the waters around Port Edward and Prince Rupert intimately.

I remember worrying that we were going to sink the boat if we brought in all the salmon along with the halibut already lying on the bottom of the boat. Fred thought that was ridiculous.

Fred also had something to say about my painting.

“Hey, Slow Go wasn’t that small.”

I agreed that his boat was considerably bigger than I had painted it, but I had a perfectly good artistic explanation. When I had a halibut almost the size of me lying in the boat, somehow the boat felt very small.

So I painted it the way I remembered feeling in that moment rather than according to its actual proportions.

I worked on this painting over several years. It captures one of the many experiences Fred and I shared and a part of his life that was deeply connected to the forests, waters and people of Northwestern British Columbia.

Port Edward and Prince Rupert are incredibly beautiful and friendly coastal communities, surrounded by mountains, forests and extraordinarily rich waters. Fishing is woven deeply into the history and life of this region, and Fred belonged to that world.