Artist Bio

Leilani Ambrose is an acrylic and watercolor artist from Salmon Arm. From 2006 to 2008 she studied Fine Arts at Langara College in Vancouver. She strives to portray the simultaneous sense of peace and wonder that nature brings in her work. Having spent some of her formative years living overseas in Papua New Guinea, she draws inspiration from both tropical and the more temperate local flora and fauna. Leilani has participated in the 2022 “The Pollinators”, the 2023 “Le7 Tmicw”, and the 2024 “Fantastic Fungi” exhibitions at the Salmon Arm Arts Centre. She has also shown work in the 2024“Place for Pollinators” exhibition at the Armstrong Spallumcheen Museum and Art Gallery and the “Place for the Pollinators” exhibition at the Kamloops Arts Council courthousegallery. Her goal is to capture the beauty of our environment, showcase the intricate patterns and vibrant colors that nature abundantly provides and to bring awareness to how precious and important it is to preserve.

Artist Statement

Leilani’s aim is to create works of art that exude the joy, vibrancy and wonder that nature offers, and to help bring awareness and attention to different environmental issues and the urgency of the climate crisis. She believes that art can be emotionally moving while also being educational and informative. Taking an immersive approach to her process, she spends time in the forest hiking and snowshoeing, always searching for inspiration. Using reference images, she collects during this time spent out in nature, her process involves initial sketches for composition to creating detailed colorful acrylic works on wood panel and smaller studies in watercolour. She has focused her work on the integral role that pollinators play in our ecosystem by creating works that showcase a variety of insects and butterflies and the habitats they abide in. She has also created a series that bring attention to the essentiality of wetlands when it comes to carbon sequestration. Recently she has been painting images of a variety of local fungi with an interest in how the small root-like structures of fungus that create a network underground called mycelium.