September 15.

While there are many artists who paint the landscape, the flora and the fauna of Bermuda, there are few who depict its people. For this reason alone, Sharon Wilson occupies a special place on the local art scene. The fact that she is supremely talented makes any exhibition of her work a major -- and highly enjoyable -- event.

In her third solo show, 21 of her pastels, some familiar and some new, are on view at the Arts Centre at Dockyard. This is not a large number but it does reveal how her draughtsmanship has matured: she has now reached a point where technique can apparently take care of itself, freeing her to concentrate on her strongest attribute, which is an uncanny gift for revealing the spirit of the people she portrays. This she does with remarkable sensitivity and even in her earlier work, a sure eye for composition was always apparent. Her pictures also evoke a strong sense of place which, in this case, is unmistakably, Bermudian.

This quality was already apparent in "Women at the Beach'', created some five years ago. A trio of women in loose white shifts, seen through a haze of blue tones reflective of the sea, are preoccupied in a world of their own as they hang garments out to dry in the sun.

Similarly, her "Institution Life'', from 1985, relates a rather sad little scene as a nurse combs an elderly woman's hair. Even then, she was able to establish atmosphere through her attention to little details, such as the knee-high hosiery tumbling down the frail leg, feet ensconced in comforting blue slippers.

Sharon Wilson's forte was, and is, an ability to observe and celebrate the minutiae of everyday life, of people absorbed in a very private world. There is a Proustian "remembrances of things past'' in the way she evokes the flavour of childhood and the intimacies of family life; it is timeless and almost idealised in its sense of innocence. A quiet humour continually surfaces in her work, however, which averts any suggestion of contrived sentimentality.

She likes to paint, with an unusually radiant range of pastel colours, the lives of ordinary people as they earn their living. There are some wonderful studies of farm workers (some in Bermuda's few remaining fields and a couple in the lusher setting of Montserrat) and of local fishermen cleaning fish against the limpid, blue-flecked waters of a quiet quay.

In a recent interview Ms Wilson said that she often works from photographs but there is no way that a photographer could conjure up the sense of eternity, which is almost palpable in her "Moment of Silence''. In a triumph of pictorial composition, she has captured a little old, bespectacled lady of stoic chin, who sits in meditative mood on a whitewashed tomb in a lonely churchyard. She gazes into the distance -- and we long to know what or who occupies her thoughts.

It comes as no surprise to learn that Ms Wilson spent several years teaching art to primary school children before moving on to become a resource art teacher for the Department of Education. Her empathy with children is immediately obvious and it is her pictures of children (especially little girls) that are the most successful.

Is it mere coincidence that many of them are clad in virginal white? At any rate, it works, and certainly complements the brilliance of burnished brown skin which she achieves through her mastery of pastels. It is probably the sustained use of these two shades that make her occasional use of bright colours rather startling -- there is a sudden burst of blue flowers, a flash of pink satin ballet shoes, the gleaming foliage and flamboyant blossoms of a Bermuda garden.

There is a marvellous narrative quality to some of these works. "Saturday Morning'', for instance shows a little girl, raising her eyes heavenward in an agony of boredom as she endures a hair-cut: a glimpse of sea outside the open door heightens the sensation of impatience which permeates the scene.

With this show, Sharon Wilson confirms, if any is needed, that she is one of the most accomplished artists working in Bermuda today. -- Patricia Calnan SOLITUDE -- One of the pastel studies featured in artist Sharon Wilson's solo show currently on view at the Arts Centre at Dockyard.