Marianna Schmidt (1918 – May 27, 2005) was a Hungarian-Canadian artist who worked primarily as a

printmaker Printmaking is the process of creating work of art, artworks by printing, normally on paper, but also on fabric, wood, metal, and other surfaces. "Traditional printmaking" normally covers only the process of creating prints using a hand proce ...

and painter.

Life

Schmidt was born in Nagybecskerek, Hungary (later Yugoslavia) in 1918. Her early life was disrupted by war and the loss of her entire family. She spent years as a displaced person in Europe before arriving in Canada in 1953. She graduated in

Printmaking Printmaking is the process of creating artworks by printing, normally on paper, but also on fabric, wood, metal, and other surfaces. "Traditional printmaking" normally covers only the process of creating prints using a hand processed techniq ...

from the Vancouver School of Art in 1965. She Emigrated to Canada in the late fifties.

Collections

Schmidt's work is held in numerous Canadian public collections including the Vancouver Art Gallery, the

Burnaby Art Gallery The Burnaby Art Gallery (abbreviated as BAG) is an art museum in Burnaby, British Columbia, Canada. The museum is located on the northern periphery of Deer Lake Park, situated off of Deer Lake Avenue. The museum occupies Fairacres Mansion, a histor ...

, the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, the Winnipeg Art Gallery, the Art Gallery of Alberta, the National Gallery of Canada, the Canada Council Art Bank, the National Gallery of Australia, the

Museum of Contemporary Art Museum of Contemporary Art (often abbreviated to MCA, MoCA or MOCA) may refer to: Africa * Museum of Contemporary Art (Tangier), Morocco, officially le Galerie d'Art Contemporain Mohamed Drissi Asia East Asia * Museum of Contemporary Art Shangha ...

in Lima, Peru, the Museum of Fine Arts, Caracas, Venezuela, the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Seattle Art Museum, and the

Stedelijk Museum voor Actuele Kunst The Stedelijk Museum voor Actuele Kunst (commonly abbreviated as S.M.A.K., translated as ''City Museum for Contemporary Art'') is a relatively new museum located in Ghent, Belgium, and is renowned both for its permanent collection (Art & Languag ...

in Ghent, Belgium.

Education and work

Schmidt's artistic practice included painting, drawing,

printmaking Printmaking is the process of creating artworks by printing, normally on paper, but also on fabric, wood, metal, and other surfaces. "Traditional printmaking" normally covers only the process of creating prints using a hand processed techniq ...

, and

collage Collage (, from the french: coller, "to glue" or "to stick together";) is a technique of art creation, primarily used in the visual arts, but in music too, by which art results from an assemblage of different forms, thus creating a new whole. ...

as well as " etching, lithography, computer art, plastic sculpture, and photography." At age 42, Schmidt entered the Vancouver School of Art (later Emily Carr Institute of Art & Design, and now Emily Carr University) where she studied from 1960 until 1965. Schmidt was the oldest in her class that included

Ann Kipling Ann Kipling L.L.D (1934 August30, 2023) was a Canadian artist who created impressionistic portraits and landscapes in drawings and prints on paper from direct observation. Kipling's distinctive style of overlapping, temporally suggestive line ...

, Richard Turner, Irene Whittome and Anna Wong. Influential instructors included

Orville Fisher Orville Fisher (November24, 1911 July13, 1999) was an Official Canadian war artist, muralist, graphic artist and painter. He was the only Allied war artist to take part in the D-Day invasion of Normandy. He came ashore with the 3rd Infantry Divis ...

and

Jack Shadbolt Jack Leonard Shadbolt, (February 4, 1909 November 22, 1998) was a Canadian painter. Early life Born in Shoeburyness, England, Shadbolt came to Canada with his parents in April 1911. He was raised in Victoria, British Columbia. He studied at ...

. An early history of dislocation underpins Schmidt's work. The tone of her work ranges from distraught and angst-ridden to whimsical. " l Schmidt's art manifests her paradoxical sense of whimsy and brutality, humour and despair, anxiety and fierce conviction." She was "encouraged by postwar abstractionism surrealist juxtapositions and the general freeing up of aesthetic restraints." In the later part of the 1960s, she focused on the expression of eccentric figuration. She moved from etching to lithography, screen printing and even a number of sculptures during the 1970s. She exhibited widely and received numerous accolades. Her printmaking was recognized internationally. In 1997 she was among 96 artists invited to participate in the 10th International Biennial Exhibition of Prints in Tokyo.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Schmidt, Marianna 1918 births 2005 deaths Artists from Vancouver Canadian printmakers 20th-century Hungarian women artists 20th-century Canadian women artists 21st-century Hungarian women artists 21st-century Canadian women artists People from Zrenjanin Hungarian emigrants to Canada World War II refugees