Brenda Isaak Takao

Brenda Isaak Takao is a multi-media artist living on beautiful Vancouver Island, in British Columbia, Canada. While in university, Brenda’s minor was art. She also has a diploma in interior design for which she earned the Governor General’s Collegiate Bronze medal.
She displayed an early aptitude for drawing and has a vague memory of her mother furiously scrubbing her artwork off the walls.
Brenda enjoys exploring many media – mild steel, felted wool, paper, paint, and wood all make their home in her art. Recently, she has begun to explore unconventional ways to bring some of her media together, for example, bringing felting into her metal sculpture.
While this eclecticism exists with media, the sources of her inspiration remain the same. Brenda’s infatuation with the natural world and her love of colour, as well as her obsession with the organic line are evident. Curves, vines, trees, flowers, seed pods and spirals all grace her work. Their soft lines pull the eye, create movement, and transport the viewer into their own liminal space.
Artist Statement
I have always wondered how my art, being so tied to my own inspiration, could contribute to the world, but in the last few years it has occurred to me that what I want to give the world lives and breathes in my work. You see, within the range of possibilities of any given moment there lives a state of enchantment – the chance to find and follow our bliss. When I work in my studio, that is the place where I reside. It is where I want my work to pull the viewer, as well. Essentially, my mission is to seed the world with wonder and joy.
There is an alchemy that never ceases to amaze me when working on my metal pieces, how hours of drudgery spent grinding and buffing small pieces of metal and then bending and forming begin to turn them into a beautiful shape. The same can be said when working in other media, as well. There is always that ugly teenager stage that is utterly terrifying, but must ultimately be pushed through to reach for your vision.
My pieces also tend to take on very feminine forms, vines, flowers and seed pods. They are not always realistic. They move with a natural grace. They are not what you would expect. They are open and vulnerable, soft and giving. But don’t let this gentleness fool you. They are made of the all the passion and strength of iron.