From log cabin to luxury

LIFESTYLES – The Cowichan Leader

It’s a long journey from an Alberta homestead to one’s own art gallery at Shawnigan Lake.

c late 1980s

By KEITH NORBURY

John Ransak has come a long way since he was born in a log cabin on his parent’s homestead 75 miles north of Edmonton.That was 53 years ago. Since then, he has completed a 33-year career with Woodward’s department stores, the last 10 as a buyer; taken up painting, first as a hobby and now as his profession; and built a spacious home complete with art gallery on Shawnigan Lake.

Ransak and his wife Johanna, who moved into the home this summer, will open the J. Ransak Gallery this weekend with a show of John’s works. The show is entitled “Weasel Creek Cold Winters,” a reference to the small farming community of his youth.

The home is as much a work of art as his watercolors and oils. Situated on a hairpin corner on West Shawnigan Lake Road, the house is built on three levels on a rocky cliff which had to be blasted away.

The gallery, John’s studio, and Johanna’s office, occupy the top storey, which is at road level. The two lower levels serve as their living space.

Their backyard, which overlooks the lake, isn’t a yard at all. It is made entirely of terraced decks which lead down to a private dock and a beach hut on a quiet cove. They look out on a thickly-treed island in the middle of the lake.

It’s the kind of scene artists must dream about. John credits Johanna, who was a designer for Woodward’s, with bringing him to the island and to Shawnigan Lake.

“Actually, when we met, she was living on the island and one of the places she really liked was Shawnigan Lake. We were looking for lake property or ocean front property and we came back here every time.”

The trouble is there isn’t much frontage left on the lake. And the lot they did finally settle on at first seemed impossible to build on. At least that is what they were told.

All it took was to blast away a few tons of rock and they had a clear enough space to build their three-storey, 3,000-square-foot home. Once the house was built, primarily by local contractors, there wasn’t much space for anything else.

West Shawnigan Lake Road bisects their property. So parking is off to the upland portion as is their septic field.

“We were lucky we had lots of land (on the other side). Nothing was easy,” he said.About the only drawback to the property is that it is on a blind corner. Visitors to the gallery will want to drive carefully and keep their eyes peeled as they cross from the parking area to the house.

In any event, this dream home is nothing like the first home of his childhood.

“I lived on a farm,” John said. “My dad built a log cabin. I was born in a cabin right on the farm. In those days we were many miles away from the nearest hospital. And you had to get there by horse and wagon.”

The second oldest of seven children, John remembers living in the cabin until her was six when his dad built a little bigger house.The Ransaks weren’t very eager to volunteer what was their dream home cost. But it seems obvious from the intricate tiled entry, paved circular driveway, and plush carpeting, that they did not skimp.

“Actually, we were really bad,” Johanna said. “We didn’t have a budget.”

“This is the kind of house that both of us decided that all the things we wanted in a house we would put into this one,” John said.

His spacious studio, which is about the size of the log cabin he grew up in, even contains memories of his Woodward’s days. He has two sturdy work tables, which used to do duty as cutting tables in the fabric department.

“They were just getting rid of them. So I picked them up and they have worked really well.”

Ransak also does his own matting and framing.

“So I don’t have to go outside for anything.”

There’s also plenty of room should any of their five children, from the couple’s previous marriages, visit.

ARTISTS PROFILE - JOHN RUSNAK

John Rusnak is a Shawnigan resident and member of the Shawnigan Artists Group. John was born in a one room log house, on a homestead, seventy-five miles north east of Edmonton in a place called Weasel Creek.

Images that have been frozen in his memory are subjects of paintings today. The quiet peaceful scenes of spruce and birch trees and farm machinery buried in drifts of snow. Recently, the rose has become his passion and challenge along with the rugged misty west coast.

He started painting in oil many years ago, but watercolour has become his choice of medium and works well on subjects he loves to paint.

Mostly self-taught, John has worked with a number of renowned watercolour artists. He is an active member of the Federation of Canadian Artists and past-president of the Victoria chapter.