The Luminous Linda Dayan Frimer

In a world in crisis, Linda Dayan Frimer seeks to inspire others to find more joy, love, purpose, and connection.

Linda’s imaginative journey began at a tender age in the Cariboo District of central British Columbia. From there, every new creative endeavour for the esteemed Canadian artist carries an aura of enchantment.

“It’s magical and exhilarating to approach each new blank canvas as if I’m painting for the first time, no matter how many works of art have preceded it,” says Linda, from her home in Steveston. “I am entering both a creative and receptive world that is waiting for me to move the coloured light I absorb from creation onto it and to bring something new into existence that never existed before.”

As a child growing up in the Gold Rush town of Wells, near Barkerville, her hands were always in motion, drawing every day as she roamed the nearby forests. The natural world, she recalls, lit up her soul and filled her with wonder.

“I realized very early—just like Chagall—that colour was love. I have spent my life reaching out to connect with nature,” Linda remembers. “What I wish I knew then, but understand better now, is that every time I am outwardly making connections with nature, I am also inwardly absorbing an abundance of awe.

“I can actually visualise nature bringing herself to me and residing within my own heart. Just as I’m here for the universe, the universe is here for me.”

The granddaughter of pioneers who fled Eastern Europe in the early 1900s, she would overhear stories of cultural persecution as a child. Though she could not fully understand their meaning, the stories left a lasting impact.

The forest was a nearby haven where she could experience both darkness and light-filled wonder, and through painting, she found release for both the cultural stories and the forest’s enchantment. Her art would go on to demonstrate the inherent unity in all of life’s forms and, in the process, serve as a steadfast channel for promoting environmental and health issues.

From Wells, Linda and her family moved to Prince George before she settled in the Lower Mainland. In her twenties, she raised her children while continuing to develop her artistic skills with the guidance of mentors. When her youngest child started school, Linda, then 33, began formal training, completing a four-year degree at Emily Carr University in just three years.

From childhood to the present, Linda has had a deep affinity for Indigenous culture. She has worked closely with Plains Cree artist George Littlechild, whom she describes as her best friend and “soul brother.” To Linda, they were bonded by their shared reverence and love for their intimate stories, families, and brilliant colours.

In 1994, they illustrated In Honour of Our Grandmothers, a collection of visual art and poetry exploring the cultural heritage of First Nations and Jewish people, celebrating their survival. Reisa Schneider, Garry Godfriedson, and Littlechild co-authored the book.

“We have shared our life’s journeys and held our individual people with one voice of honour, compassion, and pride, without ever appropriating anything from each other’s culture,” Linda explains.

“I draw doves every day. They symbolize my longing to cleave to the Creator and always reflect my state of being. Just a short while ago, as I revisited my childhood trauma, George sent me a beautiful wooden dove and a card expressing his unconditional support—it genuinely lifted me.”

Working alongside Littlechild on their mixed-media paintings for the book cover, Linda remembers feeling the presence of their forebears as she gifted symbols of their families and cultures.

A firm believer in the healing power of art, in 1998 Linda co-founded the Gesher Project in Vancouver to help survivors of the Holocaust and their children express their traumatic experiences through art, words, and therapy. Gesher is the Hebrew word for “bridge.”

“My work in the Gesher Project felt, in some ways, channeled,” Linda recalls. “I often awoke in the middle of the night, dreaming of creative concepts to help generations of Holocaust survivors release fear, connect deeply to their core selves, to their symbols that ground them in meaning, and to find safety from which to feel renewed hope.

“In the process, I created art exercises designed to release blocked energy, comfort the effects of trauma, ground meaning, inspire hope, and honour memory.”

Participants in the project created a large memorial from mixed-media paintings using enlarged family photos, words, and drawings on fibre-based paper bordered with personal symbols. These, Linda says, became powerful memory banks, expressions of resistance and resilience, and astonishing works of art.

In 2022, Linda released Luminous, a coffee-table book featuring scores of her vivid paintings, many influenced by a childhood spent in the wilderness, and paying homage to First Nations culture, her Jewish roots, and the history and significance of colour.

Subtitled An Artist’s Story as a Guide to Radical Creativity, the book includes dozens of exercises for aspiring artists of all levels, highlighting creativity as a positive force connecting humanity and nature.

One can be radically creative at any age, Linda asserts. To do so is “to return to your foundational core of self, where, as long as you are moving your vital energy from your integral essence, real change in a creative manner can occur at any age and at any time. Keep playing outside of the box, for that’s where the magic is.”

When writing books, Linda felt it was important to express her life as art. Always longing to know her ancestors, she needed to write Luminous for future generations to know her heart and her story.

“My writing is driven, purposeful, researched, and carefully crafted, while my painting is an absolute flow of coloured light and radiant exhilaration pouring from my receptive soul onto canvas or paper,” Linda muses.

A previous book, A Wilderness Journey, published in 1994, examines the inextricable link between her ancestral story, love of the wilderness, and cultural resilience.

With a vast body of artwork encompassing commemorative, educational, and powerful pieces that honour the sanctity of life, Linda has exhibited widely. She has also collaborated on large-scale murals at UBC Hospital, Richmond Hospital, and Beth Tikvah Synagogue in Vancouver.

Collections and donations of her works have supported the Canadian Red Cross, the Canadian Cancer Society, Vancouver General Hospital, Children’s Hospital Foundation, and the Vancouver Art Gallery, among others. She has received many awards, including an Honorary Doctor of Letters from the University of the Fraser Valley.

Linda’s art consistently reflects the efforts of environmental organisations such as the Trans Canada Trail and the Raincoast Conservation Foundation.

Her work has also supported the Western Canada Wilderness Committee, which promotes Canada’s cultural and geographic diversity, wilderness preservation, and education on endangered species. Paul George, the organisation’s former director, says Linda’s work touches “the emotional and spiritual cords where real change occurs.”

Not one to put her brush or pen down for long, Linda is beginning a series of large-scale forest paintings to express “the profound wonder and life-nurturing force of our living forests and our vital need to remember always to protect them.”

She is also writing and painting about her childhood experiences in Wells and working on a project titled Magical Moments with author and motivational speaker Darryl Segal, focusing on art, play, and reflection. With every brushstroke and every word, Linda brings light into the world, weaving together memory, culture, and nature into a tapestry of enduring beauty and inspiration.

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