What started as therapy for Kale Barr has blossomed into a career.Nigel Midwinter/Handout
Kale Barr’s transformation into an artist started six years ago, inside his friend’s garage in Calgary.
The makeshift art studio was dark and often cold, with paintbrushes scattered about and music – electronica or classic rock – playing on a laptop. Mr. Barr would stare at a blank canvas before glancing at his inventory of paint colours and picking whatever palette suited his mood. His work, he explained recently, allowed him to unpack his dark and complicated past: the sexual abuse he suffered as an eight-year-old at the hands of a priest, the freak knee injury that ended what seemed like a promising pro hockey career and the near-decade he spent as a gang member.
“It was my first place of freedom and self-discovery,” Mr. Barr said in an interview. “I didn’t hide who I was or hide my art anymore, or that vulnerable side. ... Art definitely saved my life.”
What started as therapy has blossomed into a career. Today, Mr. Barr’s raw, expressionist acrylic paintings have a growing following in Alberta and elsewhere. His art consultant, Allison Thompson, estimates the 33-year-old has sold more than 40 works priced in the $10,000-to-$25,000 range in the past six months.
“This is incredibly fast growth for an artist, and I strongly believe he will continue to grow,” said Ms. Thompson, a graduate of the Sotheby’s Institute of Art. “He is constantly producing in order to get his emotions and feelings out in a positive way.”
On the opening night of his solo exhibition at the Cascade Plaza in Banff this past December, a crowd that included art connoisseurs and Mr. Barr’s family milled about the space. They mingled and surveyed the canvasses on the walls, each covered with jagged slashes of bright colour that defied easy interpretation. Mr. Barr, with tattoos peeking out from his sleeves and shirt collar, was on hand to answer questions.
Artist Kale Barr painting at his home studio in Calgary in 2021.Nigel Midwinter/Handout
Growing up in Calgary, he gravitated to the arts at a young age – particularly painting and poetry. But his male peers mocked his talent, he said, so he carved out an identity as a hockey player instead. He acted as an enforcer on the ice.
Mr. Barr rose up the ranks, playing for the Seattle Totems of the Northern Pacific Hockey League in the 2008-09 season. He was deciding whether to join a minor-league team in Texas or move to Europe to play on a German team. Then he blew out his meniscus, dislocated his knee and pulled his ACL.
Without hockey, Mr. Barr bounced between jobs, mainly in hospitality or on oil rigs in northern Alberta. Even during his hockey career, he was building connections in the criminal world. He said he started selling cocaine at age 19, during his off-seasons in Kelowna, B.C.
“It was really hard not knowing what he was involved in, always worried about his well-being,” said his father, Errol Barr.
Before long, the younger Mr. Barr said, he was reprising his role as enforcer – this time for a gang, leveraging his 6-foot-3, 220-pound frame to sell drugs and collect debts, often violently.
“I had to witness rival gang violence, shootings, stabbings, breaking bones. Honestly, about as bad as they can go, I was witness to,” he said.
Mr. Barr was charged with assault in 2016 after a fight outside a Fort McMurray bar. Thanks to a good lawyer and a lenient judge, he was able to walk away with probation, on the condition that he no longer associate with his gang.
Removed from his criminal life, he said he started to dissect 20 years’ worth of trauma and guilt.
“I was searching for reasons for being so angry,” Mr. Barr said. “It was like, ‘Kale, maybe you should acknowledge that sexual abuse you went through. Maybe you should start searching in your soul and finding out who you are.’”
“And all those reasons I needed validation finally made sense.”
As he worked on healing, he channeled that trauma into his art – into paint strokes sometimes interspersed with words and symbols.
By 2020, Mr. Barr’s art was gaining traction on social media. Nick Hissom – the operator of Wynn Fine Art and a stepson of Steve Wynn, the owner of Las Vegas hotels like the Mirage and the Bellagio – included Mr. Barr’s paintings in an exhibition in Miami last year.
This year, Mr. Barr is scheduled to exhibit in China at the Yudian Gallery, and at ARTME Limited Edition galleries in Poland and Germany. Because of his criminal record, travelling to the United States for shows is a challenge for him.
Mr. Barr said that whatever price he pays for his past will be well worth it. He cherishes his platform and the idea that his story can reach and inspire those who are struggling or in need of second chances. In collaboration with his Banff gallery, he has hosted mental health events that have addressed sexual abuse, depression and trauma.
Ryan Smith, a 36-year-old art collector from Calgary, bought a painting titled “Black and White” for $12,500 during the show in Banff. It was one of four pieces sold that night.
“You just see it and it just hits so hard,” Mr. Smith said. He noted that he had experienced sexual abuse as a child himself. “I was able to kind of see his heart, see what he went through as a kid.”
Mr. Barr’s father, Errol, now has one of his son’s canvases hanging in his living room – a large piece full of brilliant blue, grey, white and black. “Our drive home that night back from Banff, my wife and I could not stop talking about the event,” Errol said. “And how proud we are of him.”
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