Internationally renowned gay artist Steve Walker, who died from a reported heart attack in his home in Costa Rica on January 4 at the age of 50, will be eulogized at a funeral service this weekend in Canada. The service will take place on Saturday, February 25, at Our Lady of the Visitation Parish, 5338 Bank Street in South Gloucester, Ontario. Walker was an Ottawa native.

Walker’s paintings are immediately recognizable by both seasoned art lovers and novices alike, and some of them were completed in South Florida. The majority of his work depicts men interacting with each other or with nature. Fort Lauderdale Beach, including the famed Wave Wall, served as the setting for several of his pieces.

Art consumed much of Walker’s earliest childhood. Friends say that he started
drawing at the age of three or four. Self-taught, Walker began painting after
a trip to Europe when he was 25, where he spent much of that time touring
the great galleries and museums. It was the first time he was exposed to classic
work, and the recognized the potential power of the art form.

“As a homosexual, I have been moved, educated and inspired by works that
deal with a heterosexual context,” the outspoken artist once said. “Why would
I assume that a heterosexual would be incapable of appreciating work that
speaks to common themes in life, as seen through my eyes as a gay man? If the
heterosexual population is unable to do this, then the loss is theirs, not mine.”

While recognized worldwide for his universal themes, Walker’s work has
been exhibited in galleries in Toronto, Montreal, Los Angeles, Key West, Florida,
and Provincetown, Massachusetts as well as Fort Lauderdale where his work is
represented by Gallery XO. “Any minority wants and needs to find artistic voices
that reflect their own personal situations,” Walker said, “and, in doing so, validate
and record their lives and cultures for themselves and for the larger world.”

The universal themes he depicted were done without respect to race, gender,
socio-economic class, culture, or sexual orientation. However, his work is unique
because he conveys these themes through the subjects in his paintings: young
gay men. “Remove the gender of the painting’s subjects and what we have
is human relationships in general, and one’s relationship to the world itself,”
Walker explained.

The focus of his paintings often depicted sadness and loneliness, to reflect
the reality that much of life is sad and lonely. Walker often portrayed people in
relationships as separate entities; that is the way he viewed them. He also used
a small and consistent palette of colors with which he was comfortable and
which became associated with his signature style.

When news of Walker’s death reached art collectors, demand for his work
increased, according to Tommy LaFashia, the owner of Gallerie XO, who has
four Walker originals. Walker’s family, who initially wanted to keep news of the
artist’s death a secret, has placed an embargo on further sales of his work until
his estate is settled. Walker’s original pieces at Gallery XO are titled “Platano
y Pipa,” “Sculpture Series No. 1,” “Two Umbrellas,” and “Vintage Twilight.”

Walker is survived by his parents, Gloria and Gilbert Walker, his brother, Kevin,
and sister, Marjorie. Another brother, Bruce, predeceased him.