09/02/2026
The Community Arts Council of the Alberni Valley is thrilled to continue our Featured Artist Series, shining a spotlight on one of our remarkable local artists. These profiles appear across our social media, website, and in the newspaper, celebrating the creativity thriving in our community.
This installment highlights Sandi Offerein, a mixed-media painter whose colourful, whimsical work reflects her own vision of how the world could be. Working on canvas, rock, wood, and just about any surface that strikes her fancy, Sandi creates pieces that are meant to bring joy and lighten a heavy heart.
Sandi grew up in Australia, the daughter of a French Canadian mother and an Australian father, surrounded by the sunburned earth tones of the outback and the striking patterns of Indigenous Australian dot art, both of which left a lasting impression on her eye for colour. As a child she was always doodling, and that instinct followed her into her teenage years, when her youth pastor put her in charge of poster art for group events and her mother's words, “Sandra, you're an artist,” planted something that never left. She carried that encouragement through art classes in high school, doodling on any bit of paper with space to spare.
In her twenties, Sandi met and married a West Coast fisherman and moved to Ucluelet, where she spent her first summer of marriage out on the water. She fell in love with the marine life she encountered there, orcas, grey whales, porpoises, and everything in between, with orcas becoming a particular favourite that continues to surface again and again in her work. The years that followed were devoted to raising her large family, which she describes simply as her proudest creation and a constant source of colour and life in her art.
Her path toward painting more seriously began at Boomerangs Cafe, where owners Laura and Darren noticed her experimenting with dot work and invited her to paint for the restaurant, work that is still sold there today. Sandi credits that encouragement as the push that moved her further into an art-filled life.
Her creative process begins with noticing, catching ideas as they come, screenshotting or photographing art that makes her feel something, and paying attention to which colours seem to call out to her from her collection of paints. From there, she builds an image and carries it onto whatever surface has caught her eye that day, working until a piece feels finished rather than stopping at any set point. She is currently developing a series exploring the place where water meets air, painting underwater and overwater worlds within the same piece, a boundary she describes as a kind of veil between two connected universes.
Sandi has become increasingly active in the local arts community, joining the Alberni Valley Chamber of Commerce and placing her work throughout the community. She is currently working on a small series for a gallery in Parksville, and recently painted a fire hydrant in the community as part of the HGTV show Town Takeover, with a few additional projects for the show still under wraps.
For Sandi, art is deeply connected to her faith. She describes creating as an act of participating in the nature of God, likening it to walking down a long hallway past life's busy distractions and arriving in a quiet room where she can simply create for hours at a time.
When asked what advice she would give to emerging artists, Sandi shared:
“Go for it! Get inspired. Just do it! Art a lot! Find new skills. Keep playing. If it's not fun, why bother. Find you in art. You are unique. Keep arting and growing. You will find your people. Paint what moves you and don't compare yourself to others. It's not a race or a competition. There is room for all of us. Keep making the world more beautiful. Paint your feelings, paint what makes you happy, and let it flow out of you. It will bring joy to others.”
Sandi lives on the West Coast, and her work can be found at Boomerangs Cafe. To follow her work, find her on Instagram at .art or on Facebook as So.art.
Follow our social media, website, and check the newspaper to discover the next incredible local artist in the Featured Artist Series!
