Alethea Lewis was born in the small town of Weyburn, Saskatchewan. At the age of 12, she relocated to Sidney, British Columbia on Vancouver Island, where she lived for many years. In school, she dabbled at art with pastel, pen and ink, and charcoal. Taking a short course in oil painting as a teenager, she painted her first work… a dead tree. In the later years, she moved to Calgary, Alberta and remained there for 16 years. She discovered Fish Creek Provincial Park where she explored the many deer trails that led to the river. She became fascinated with the devastation that nature can unleash and was inspired to paint again to tell the stories that unfolded all around her. Then returning to the island, Campbell River, where the forests and streams are so abundant, she continues this theme and continues building on it to include the ocean and Arbutus trees. She uses oil paints with palette knives to create the heavy texture of the trees to capture the circle of life within the forest. Her work can be recognized by her realistic bark and has been described as “…so lifelike” and “Her trees come alive.” Some see only devastation, she sees… HOPE, STRENGTH, AND BEAUTY