The Tribune

By ALESHA CADET

Tribune Features Reporter

acadet@tribunemedia.net

ONE of the many talented faces at this year’s Bahamas National Trust (BNT) Christmas Jollification was Bahamian artist Dion Lewis.

Dion, an art vendor at the Nassau Straw Market, said the festival opened his eyes to how large of a following he has as an artist.

“The feedback has been great and someone said to me the other day that I have a following, and I didn’t really realise it until I saw people coming to these shows and events to specifically look for me and my work, and that was pretty good. They remember me and they want to see the new works that I may have. This just makes me want to create more new stuff,” Dion told Tribune Entertainment.

What started off as a hobby for him has turned into a career.

“In high school I did it as recreation and when I graduated I was trying to find a field to get into and I kept moving back to art no matter what I did. I have been in this field for over twenty years now and I have been doing a lot of shows locally. I was here for the Wine and Arts Festival, and I did the food festival prior to that. I work for myself so I set my own hours and this also allows me to travel to do shows. I just recently did a show in Green Turkey Abaco, and for about six years I have been doing a show in Miami Florida,” said Dion.

Displaying his work at the Nassau Straw Market for the past fifteen years, Dion said it is “pretty cool” that people often speak about reaching the international market, and at the straw market, the international market comes to him personally.

“I get to know and talk to a lot of tourists that come back just to look for more stuff from me,” said Dion.

On a daily basis, Dion said he is inspired by the reaction he receives from people that view his work.

“They are happy about my work and they give me their ideas so that I can create it for them, so it is like if they are happy, I am happy as well,” said Dion.

On display at Jollification, Dion offered a mixture of original paintings of the local scenes in Nassau and on the Family Islands. There were flowers, turtles, streets and more scenes painted in a wide range of outstanding colours.

“There is a painting here of the Queens Staircase, which is a piece that I wanted to paint for two years now and didn’t get a chance to do it. It was actually prepped and sketched about a year ago and when the shows were coming up, I decided to sit down and start working on it. It’s all done with acrylic on canvas and I used quality paint,” said Dion.

Dion advises up and coming artists to not only paint to their liking, especially if they are going to do it for a living. He said they should paint what sells.

“Try not to price yourself out of your market also, because you will find that you cannot sell your pieces. Also be open minded to criticism because it helps in terms of improvement. If someone tells you something is too dark, try to lighten it up. I find that some artists are close minded and they don’t want to take opinions from others when they should,” said Dion.