EASTEND — Trea Jensen and Bronwyn Schuster are both accomplished artists. This mother-daughter duo combined their talents and collaborated on a large-scale project, transforming the exterior of Trea’s house into an eye-catching series of colourful murals on the corner of Redcoat Trail and Poplar Avenue in Eastend.
“We initially moved to Eastend in 2007. Bronwyn was just 15 at the time and she wanted to paint a mural on the house then. It’s a good thing we didn’t at that time; we’ve had a couple of bad hailstorms since that damaged the exterior of the house.”
Bronwyn eventually moved to Vancouver, B.C. where she had the opportunity to do a full-size mural and a couple of smaller ones. She moved to Denman Island, B.C. during the pandemic and received a grant to do a mural there. During a summer visit in 2023, the two began their work, having chatted about their plans on the phone since 2022.
Jensen gives full credit to her daughter for 小蓝视频 the catalyst on their project, bringing that experience to her house mural project. “Her experience and knowledge are what made the mural as successful as it is.”
During a summer visit in 2023, the two began their work.
Jensen says, “When we first started painting, people were just recovering from the aftereffects of the lockdown. Nurses from Wolf Willow (long-term care) would bring residents down every day to watch us paint. Locals would stop to watch and ask questions. People driving by on the highway would literally hit the brakes when they noticed the mural. It’s a good thing there were two of us working, so one could answer questions and the other could keep painting.”
The design is a blending of the two artists’ works and styles, featuring Jensen’s popular poppies, moons and dragonflies and Schuster’s whimsical creatures.
“Poppies have always been important to me. I’ve painted poppies forever; they seem to follow me, no matter what I’m doing.”
When asked how time-consuming the project was, Jensen explains, “We took two weeks for the west side in 2023, but a week of that was priming, and it was very hot, so we could only paint in early morning and at night. It took at least five days to prep the west side of the house and repair fractures and damage from previous hailstorms. We scraped loose paint, filled in cracks, and then primed it 2 or 3 times.”
Schuster used her digital skills, taking a photo of the house and then digitally adding the images onto that, creating outlines that were projected onto the house to capture the image in the correct scale. Background colour was painted around the outlines, and then the images were completed using a variety of vibrant colours chosen by Schuster.
“We used exterior paint. We probably used between 20-30 cans of paint, including primer.”
Another mural was added on the east side in 2024, which features a deer goddess.
“The Deer Lady was my way of trying to honour the deer and also the First Nations people.”
Jensen’s goddess images have been displayed in exhibitions and form a significant portion of her body of work.
“I wanted to create a ‘me’ piece for the house, even though my poppies were incorporated in the collaborative piece with Bronwyn. I wanted a goddess on the house.”
All the mural imagery is rich with symbolism and viewers will notice a hummingbird, sunflower, and cat along with a deer and the goddess, all surrounded by an aura, halo or the sun. “It honours nature, First Nations culture, the divine feminine and the deer who have been so important to First Nations food, clothing and protection.”
Nearly every surface of Jensen's house is now adorned with a variety of original images painted in murals. | Photo courtesy The Shaunavon Standard
“People stop by all the time to take pictures of the murals. Sometimes I go out to chat with visitors, and I have met some lovely people. They ask questions and start following me on Instagram. I know the house has been featured in some blogs, and locals often suggest that tourists check out the murals.”
Bronwyn will be back this summer and it could be a busy June and July with further work on the house and potentially some other projects. Additions to the house mural may include a coelacanth, which is a prehistoric fish, and a mermaid.
While this project was the largest mother-daughter collaboration these two have tackled, they have another collaboration in the works, an exhibition entitled “Small Song.”
“Music has been important to our family,” Jensen explains. “Bronwyn and I will explore 30 songs and then paint them. We might illustrate the same song, in different ways, or do different songs.”
The show is slated for exhibition at the Jasper Centre in Maple Creek in July/August 2026. Jensen is also working on a solo exhibition, “The Peace of Me,” She currently hosts a monthly ‘New Moon Meditations and Intentions” art session at Moonsdottir Studio in Eastend and is a regular participant at the Eastend Friday Night Market.
