Artist and author Robert Amos has released a comprehensive collection of his watercolor paintings celebrating Victoria, British Columbia, in his new book "Painting Victoria: Fifty Years of Memories from a City by the Sea." The book, published by TouchWood Editions on October 7th, features selected works spanning five decades of the artist's career, capturing iconic local landmarks from the Albion Ironworks to the historic Turner building.
The collection includes Amos's 2005 acrylic painting "View from the Flag Deck of the Empress Hotel," created during his eight-month residency at the famous hotel in 2011. The artist recalls climbing to the hotel's roof and being struck by the breathtaking view over the legislature buildings. His painting captures the CPR steamship terminal building, designed by Francis Rattenbury and P.L. James in 1924, which Amos describes as "a sort of classical Temple of Neptune on the waterfront." The building was constructed to welcome ships arriving in Victoria on the All Red Route, a travel system that allowed passengers to circumnavigate the globe without leaving the British Empire.
Among the featured works is "Pic-a-Flic and Cook Street Looking North" from 1994, which documents the transformation of the Cook Street Village neighborhood where Amos lived with his young family in the 1980s. The painting shows the legendary Pic-a-Flic video rental store, where customers could rent both films on videotape and video players in the pre-digital era. Amos witnessed the neighborhood's evolution, including the arrival of Vancouver Island's first Starbucks coffee shop, which replaced the Workers' Compensation Board offices, followed by rival Moka House across the street.
The book explores Victoria's distinctive architectural styles through works like "Hollywood Grocery in Montague Court" (1996), showcasing what Amos describes as "something modest and slightly whimsical with a hint of the seaside holiday." Montague Court on Fairfield Road, built in 1940, represents a brilliant example of garden suburb design with townhouses clustered around an interior courtyard and shops along the Lillian Street frontage. The development features gabled storefronts with hints of half-timber construction sheltered beneath red-and-white awnings.
Amos's connection to Victoria's cultural institutions is evident in his 1994 ink drawing of the "Shinto Shrine, Art Gallery of Greater Victoria." Initially attracted to the city by the gallery's unparalleled collection of Japanese art, Amos worked there for five years as the director's assistant. The shrine, constructed in 1900 for the Hayashi family of Hanami, Tottori Prefecture, Japan, was decommissioned in 1921 but preserved rather than destroyed. After changing hands several times and even being gambled away in a mah-jong game, it was eventually purchased by the gallery through the efforts of curator Barry Till and a Seattle antique dealer.
"Turners by Night" (1996) captures a unique curved storefront at Fort and Richmond Streets that housed Turner's newsstand and confectionery alongside Ian's Coffee Stop, described as "the last of the old-time diners in Victoria." Nurses from the nearby Jubilee Hospital would escape to Ian's for hamburgers and pie, using upstairs rooms to change out of their uniforms for nights out. When Amos approached to photograph the scene, the observant Ian beckoned him over, gave permission for the photo, and offered homemade donuts.
The artist's fascination with Victoria's industrial heritage is showcased in "Albion Iron Works, later known as Victoria Foundries, 622 Pembroke Street" (1993). The foundry, which began as Victoria Iron Works around 1888, was one of many enterprises developed by Robert Dunsmuir and other industrial leaders. The facility manufactured steamships for Dunsmuir and produced decorative cast iron columns for Victoria's finer stores, with their popular Albion Wood Stove becoming their bestselling product.
One of the most vibrant pieces featured is "The North Side of Fisgard Street from Our Studio" (1982), created when Amos and his wife lived in Chinatown above the Fan Tan Gallery. The dazzling neon signs outside their windows inspired a five-part panorama of the streetscape, with the artist crawling onto the fire escape night after night to complete his drawings. The signs, including those for Golden Horse, Wong's, and Morley's City of Hong Kong, were rented rather than owned by the businesses they advertised and were grandfathered under city bylaws despite prohibitions on illuminated signs extending over streets.
The collection concludes with "Iechinihl, Francis Rattenbury's Home on Beach Drive, Oak Bay, later Glenlyon/Norfolk School" (2001), depicting the renowned architect's 1898 residence. Named Iechinihl, meaning "a place where good things happen," the house exemplified what architectural historian Martin Segger described as "a potpourri of old world charm, Arts & Crafts architectural innocence, and English country rusticity." Rattenbury, who served as Oak Bay's reeve in 1908, was instrumental in the municipality's development before scandal and tragedy marked his later years. Following a scandalous affair with much-younger Alma Pakenham, Rattenbury divorced his first wife, married Alma, and moved to England, where she fell in love with their nineteen-year-old chauffeur who ultimately murdered Rattenbury with a carpenter's mallet in a case that became the subject of a popular London West End play.
