Jeff Tallon is a Canadian contemporary artist who presently lives and works in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. He is noted for synthesizing mobile technology with traditional oil painting and publicly displayed Canada’s first QR Code painting at the 2010 Toronto International Art Fair.

Biography

Tallon was born in

St. Catharines, Ontario St. Catharines is the largest city in Canada's Niagara Region and the sixth largest urban area in the province of Ontario. As of 2016, it has an area of , 136,803 residents, and a metropolitan population of 406,074. It lies in Southern Ontari ...

. He attended high school at E.L. Crossley and in his final year he co-opted under the tutelage of Ken Cosgrove, a.k.a. Groundskeeper Willy, at Niagara College in the Creative Arts and Design program. At 18, Tallon moved to Calgary, Alberta to attend the Alberta College of Art & Design ( ACAD). While at ACAD he played an active role in the community and volunteered at the Stride and Truck galleries. Tallon majored in

Drawing Drawing is a form of visual art in which an artist uses instruments to mark paper or other two-dimensional surface. Drawing instruments include graphite pencils, pen and ink, various kinds of paints, inked brushes, colored pencils, crayons, ...

and jockeyed between

animation Animation is a method by which image, still figures are manipulated to appear as Motion picture, moving images. In traditional animation, images are drawn or painted by hand on transparent cel, celluloid sheets to be photographed and exhibited ...

and oil painting. He studied under, among others, Richard Halliday, Bev Tosh, Mary Scott,

Don Mabie Don Mabie (born January 9, 1947), also known as Chuck Stake, is a Canadian artist based in Nakusp, British Columbia. Mabie has been performing, drawing, assembling, trading and mailing art since the early 1970s. Career Born in Calgary, Alberta ...

and Chris Cran. Upon graduating from ACAD in 2003, he moved to Gunsan, South Korea where he lived and worked for six months. In 2004, Tallon moved to

Dublin, Ireland Dublin (; , or ) is the capital and largest city of Ireland. On a bay at the mouth of the River Liffey, it is in the province of Leinster, bordered on the south by the Dublin Mountains, a part of the Wicklow Mountains range. At the 2016 cen ...

where he studied at the Dublin Business School. Throughout this period he lived in Dublin’s affluent

Ballsbridge Ballsbridge () (from historic Ball's Bridge) is an affluent neighbourhood of the city of Dublin, the capital of Ireland. The area is largely north and west of a three-arch stone bridge across the River Dodder, on the south side of the city. Th ...

neighbourhood and continued to

paint Paint is any pigmented liquid, liquefiable, or solid mastic composition that, after application to a substrate in a thin layer, converts to a solid film. It is most commonly used to protect, color, or provide texture. Paint can be made in many ...

. In 2005, Tallon traveled through

Northern Europe The northern region of Europe has several definitions. A restrictive definition may describe Northern Europe as being roughly north of the southern coast of the Baltic Sea, which is about 54th parallel north, 54°N, or may be based on other g ...

to Saint Petersburg and

Moscow, Russia Moscow ( , American English, US chiefly ; rus, links=no, Москва, r=Moskva, p=mɐskˈva, a=Москва.ogg) is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Russia by population, largest city of Russia. The city stands on t ...

. He then journeyed south to Israel and Egypt and moved onto Western Europe before returning to Canada. When Tallon returned to Canada he moved to Welland, Ontario and presented designs to the Welland City Council for an 8 ft. x 10 ft. painting commemorating the development of the new Civic Square. A motion was passed to explore the project, however, the work never came to fruition. Later, in 2007, Tallon attended and graduated from Sheridan College where he studied

Interactive Multimedia Multimedia is a form of communication that uses a combination of different content forms such as text, audio, images, animations, or video into a single interactive presentation, in contrast to tradition ...

. In 2008, he began sharing a studio space with approximately 40 other artists at Walnut Studios in Toronto, Ontario, Canada.

Early work

At ACAD, Tallon explored

classical animation Traditional animation (or classical animation, cel animation, or hand-drawn animation) is an animation technique in which each frame is drawn by hand. The technique was the dominant form of animation in cinema until computer animation. Proce ...

and fused together drawings, paintings and photographs with ethereal sounds by musicians like Sigur Ros. He would alternate, year-by-year, between rich, textural paintings and animations that synthesized image and sound, which referenced work by the Canadian animator

Norman McLaren William Norman McLaren, LL. D. (11 April 1914 – 27 January 1987) was a Scottish Canadian animator, director and producer known for his work for the National Film Board of Canada (NFB).Rosenthal, Alan. ''The new documentary in action: a caseb ...

Recent work

Since moving to Toronto, Tallon has been creating pieces that fuse together mobile technology, photography and oil painting. The works are Toronto-centric, yet global in nature. Subject matter includes the 2009 Tamil diaspora protests in Canada, the

2009 City of Toronto inside and outside workers strike The 2009 City of Toronto inside and outside workers strike (also known as the 2009 Toronto strike) was a legal strike action that was undertaken by the Toronto Civic Employees Union Local 416 and CUPE Local 79, two locals of the Canadian Union of ...

Queen Elizabeth II Elizabeth II (Elizabeth Alexandra Mary; 21 April 1926 – 8 September 2022) was Queen of the United Kingdom and other Commonwealth realms from 6 February 1952 until Death and state funeral of Elizabeth II, her death in 2022. She was queen ...

’s 2010 visit to Canada and the

2010 G-20 Toronto summit The 2010 G20 Toronto summit was the fourth meeting of the G20 heads of state/government, to discuss the global financial system and the world economy, which took place at the Metro Toronto Convention Centre in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, during J ...

. These works explore notions of nationalism, identity, truth, commerce,

commercialism Commercialism is the application of both manufacturing and consumption towards personal usage, or the practices, methods, aims, and distribution of products in a free market geared toward generating a profit. Commercialism can also refer, positivel ...

and communication. Tallon participates in Walnut Studio group exhibitions at Walnut Studios and throughout Toronto. Recently, he has shown works at the Toronto International Art Fair and The Artist Project.Jeff Tallon - 2011 TAP
Retrieved 03-03-2011.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Tallon, Jeff Living people Canadian contemporary painters 21st-century Canadian painters Canadian male painters Canadian multimedia artists Artists from St. Catharines Sheridan College alumni Year of birth missing (living people) 21st-century Canadian male artists