Jack Wise, artist, poet, teacher, and long time British Columbia resident, found great solace in the painting process. A deeply spiritual man, he believed in the importance and meaning of individual brushstrokes and that each stroke "has a unique singular voice" and tale to tell (ibid). He was extremely well read in many subjects including physics, world religions, and Asian art. Along with his friend and mentor, Lin Chien-Shih, he hoped to reduce the gap between East and West. This desire is reflected in his art, which often takes images from the natural surroundings of the Pacific Northwest, and other inspiration considered to be Western, and approaches them with a technique based upon the strokes of Chinese calligraphy.

Jack Wise 1994

Jack Marlowe Wise was born on April 27, 1928 in Centerville, Iowa. He completed a Bachelor of Fine Arts degree at Washington University, St. Louis. In 1955, Wise received a Master of Science in Art degree done at Florida State University. Once out of university, he started teaching and lecturing about art and producing abstract expressionist paintings. Wise met Toni Onley while living in San Miguel de Allende, Mexico from 1958-1961 (George Woodcock, "Dragons, Mandalas, and Secret Writings: Paintings of Jack Wise," Artscanada (October 1976), 1). Onley was the first person to tell him of British Columbia. Upon return from Mexico, although successful, he quickly became unhappy with what he was producing and gave up painting for a few years. At this point he took a position as an art director at an advertising firm in San Francisco. (ibid.) Shortly after, in 1963, he immigrated to British Columbia, and decided to try living off the land in the interior of the province.