The Lake Country Museum and Archives has a new piece hanging on its wall.
Vernon artist Bob Kingsmill made a purchase at a recent auction of some local paintings. One of the works proved to be an original work from the late Kelowna artist Mary Bull of the cabin in which Father Pandosy had lived. Kingsmill has donated the painting to the Lake Country Museum to be enjoyed by all who visit there, said the gallery.
The painting is on display at the museum and is considered by other artists to be one of Bull’s finest works, said the gallery.
Bull represents a unique part of the Okanagan’s history. She was born in Scotland in 1919, but moved to the Okanagan Mission area when she was four months old. Bull’s father inherited land in the area from his brother who had died in the First World War.
Bull’s father had lost an arm in the same conflict and was released from the service but still was known by his rank (Captain) as was common at the time. Bull lost her mother when she was four and was under the care of a nanny for her early years.
She attended a private girls school in Vernon for several years and traveled between Vernon and Kelowna by train during holiday periods. Her father returned to Scotland for a short while and came home with a new wife with whom he had a son, Tony. Capt. Bull had sufficient financial resources to provide Bull with the opportunity to refine her artistic talent. She attended the Vancouver School of Art in the late 1930s and then went east to The Ontario College of Art in the early 1940s.
The Kelowna Archives has papers and materials that belonged to Bull and they suggest she had a strong interest in feminist concerns and would have been quite comfortable in today’s world, said the art gallery.
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