Artist Bettina Forget invites you to take a trip to the moons.

On show at the artist's open studio-gallery are a series of paintings featuring the moons of the solar system. Bettina Forget is an avid hobby astronomer, and her latest work combines her passion for astronomy with her passion for art.

However, don't expect the usual fare of sci-fi -style lunar landscapes. Forget's canvases are heavily textured, resembling the surface structures of each moon. Some of the canvases have holes cut into them, allowing for a look into the interior of the stretched canvases - and the moons.

Besides providing an interesting new look at our neighbours in the solar system, the artist takes her subject-matter one step further and explores the possibility of the development of life on some of our sister moons. Moons like Europa, Ganymede and Callisto harbour liquid water beneath their frozen crusts, and scientists believe life may develop there. Bettina Forget's moons are inhabited by amoebas, protozoae and other, strange life-forms. Evolution is a central theme of her work.

Part of the Moon Series exhibition is "Project Europa", named after Jupiter's moon Europa, whose vast ocean of liquid water is covered by a fractured, icy crust. Drawing a parallel between the moon's icy surface and the fridgid Canadian winters, the artist submerged seven paintings into Lac Archambauld in the Laurentians on January 2003 and documented the progress of the paintings and surrounding ice-structures by taking regular photographs. The paintings were then recuperated as the lake-ice melted in spring. The project's paintings and photographs are also on display at the Moon show.

Because access to art is important to the artist, she operates in what she calls an "open studio". Located in down-town Montreal in the Alexander building on Ste-Catherine street, her studio is open to visitors whenever she's at work. So, if there's anything you'd like to know about art, her work, or the moons of the solar system, drop on by.