Douglas Coupland revisits his Girlfriend in a Coma in a new West Vancouver photography show

B.C. artist and writer Douglas Coupland is looking back with some nostalgia at West Vancouver scenes from his 1998 book Girlfriend in a Coma.

In a new photography show just opened at the West Vancouver Art Museum, the present-day images of his childhood Rabbit Lane neighbourhood mirrors the themes of his sixth book.

The story, set in West Vancouver, involves a groups of friends from their teen years into middle age, and revolves around Karen McNeil, who falls into a coma that lasts 17 years.

Upon awakening the book's characters come together to face an impending apocalypse. 

Several of the photographs from the new exhibit also echo the novel's apocalyptic themes, with titles such as "Doom" and "The End."

"The star of the show is in one sense the houses in the show," Coupland told CBC's Lisa Christiansen, with The Early Edition. "It's this neighbourhood in West Van … and most people who go there get this weird sense of time having stood still somewhere around 1966."

The Rabbit Lane area is where Coupland spent time in his childhood, he explained during a tour of the show.

The museum's curator and administrator Hilary Letwin said she approached Coupland about two years ago to discuss a West Vancouver-themed show.

"We took a lot of walks and talked about how West Vancouver influences [his] writing and art," she said. 

Coupland came up with the idea of a photography exhibition looking back on some of the locations and scenes in his acclaimed novel.

"It became very quickly apparent that the exhibition was not only about the book and how much has changed or not changed in the last 25 years since the book was published," Letwin explained. "But it also became apparent the houses in the neighbourhood took on a starring role."

Models photographed for the exhibit were all local volunteers, solicited through a call in the North Shore News. Many people "overwhelmingly" responded to offer their homes, time, and cars for the shoots, Letwin said.

"I'd like to think [visitors] look at them and say, 'Gosh, I could easily be in that photo somehow,'" Coupland said. "It's nice the neighbourhoods we actually did grow up in — as opposed to all these showcase homes you see on the cover of magazines — are getting their day in the sun, maybe."

His Rabbit Lane exhibit is open to the public until May 28 at the West Vancouver Art Museum.