Craig Sibley knows what it means to be on the front line, or in the trenches, so to speak, as an artist.

A sculptor, the North Vancouver resident formerly owned and operated permanent and short-term galleries in Kelowna and has been employed by a number of local spaces.

"In this day and age it's hard to live off the grant system," he says. "Artists are always being bogged down with day jobs that may or may not conflict or enhance their art career. So many of them live hand-to-mouth or in challenging situations because the art comes first."

Interested in doing what he can to help artists succeed, Sibley opened Trench Contemporary Art, a commercial gallery in Gastown, Oct. 28.

"My mandate is really just to give an opportunity to artists to sell their work," he says.

In addition, Sibley is also interested in educating the public, both artists and art lovers alike, about emerging, mid- and late-career contemporary artists working in all media, those known as well as those who should be known as a result of their profound impact on the art world. To that end, Trench's inaugural show focuses on the late Ron Stonier, an important figure in the Vancouver art scene, both as a painter and an instructor.

"I'm a contemporary art gallery starting off with a deceased artist, which is kind of odd, but the way I look at it we really need to know," Sibley says. "Artists generally move from one historic context to another so you need to know what's happened in art history in order to reinvent it and move forward and add your own mark to it. So, I think it's really important to know where we come from in order to know where we're going."

The exhibition is the result of a friendship formed by Sibley and Stonier's partner, Sheila Cano, who are neighbours. Following Stonier's passing in 2001, as a result of health problems, his paintings were put away in a storage unit.

"It's been my dream all these years to bring his work to light and to have him take his place in the spectrum of modern artists in Vancouver," says Cano, who's also an artist.

Over the years, she donated some work to the Vancouver Art Gallery, and had been in contact with various West Coast galleries gauging their interest. Speaking with Sibley over coffee one day, it seemed Cano's vision for Stonier's work would finally come to fruition.

"We hatched this idea and as it evolved he decided to start a gallery," she says.

The show's name, Ouroboros, is a reference to the symbol of a snake biting its tail, creating a circle, and the idea of the repetitive nature of cycles in life, says Sibley. The exhibit serves as a survey of Stonier's paintings, spanning approximately 25 years, from 1963 to 1989.

Sibley feels Stonier's work is an important missing piece of the puzzle of the Vancouver art scene. A student of Gordon Smith, Peter Aspell, Jack Shadbolt and Don Jarvis, Stonier was also a contemporary of Audrey Capel Doray and David Mayrs.

"He was certainly one of the keynote young painters in the '60s and was exhibiting frequently and having work shown around the country," Sibley says.

Stonier became an instructor quite early in his career, teaching within five years of graduating from art school at the Vancouver School of Art where he was a faculty member from 1962 to 1978 before retreating to his studio.

"I never had the good fortune of knowing Ron," Sibley says. "Strangely enough I have some art friends who certainly were taught by him. What I've learned is that he was an absolutely incredible instructor who left a huge legacy of influence. The effect that art instructors have on young artists is profound. Ron's was quite substantial and he certainly influenced a lot of people in the way they paint, the way they think more than anything and how they approach the practice of being an artist."

In the late '60s and into the '70s, the Vancouver art scene moved in the direction of the avant-garde with new media--video, performance, photography and more conceptual-based work--taking over, says Sibley. "And painting fell out of favour," he says. "So it was suddenly hard to get exhibitions."

However, Stonier continued to create. "Ron kept painting no matter what," says Sibley. "It didn't matter whether things sold or got exhibited, he just kept painting and there's not a lot of artists who can do that who just keep going and going and going and going and on such a scale. He's kind of an enigma and now that he's gone it's even more mysterious."

Funnily enough, the new Trench gallery space is housed in the former Helen Pitt Gallery at 102-148 Alexander St. Due to funding cuts, Helen Pitt is currently on the move and for now located at 221A East Georgia St. "The ironic thing is that Ron Stonier was one of the founding members of the original Helen Pitt exhibition space in 1975," Sibley says. "It's kind of again full circle."

Ron Stonier: Ouroboros runs until Nov. 27 at Trench Contemporary Art, 102-148 Alexander St., with an opening reception Nov. 10, 6 to 9 p.m. For more details, visit trenchgallery.com.