Marlene Creates (born 1952) is a Canadian artist lives and works in
Portugal Cove,
Newfoundland
Newfoundland and Labrador (; french: Terre-Neuve-et-Labrador; frequently abbreviated as NL) is the easternmost province of Canada, in the country's Atlantic region. The province comprises the island of Newfoundland and the continental region ...
. Born in
Montreal, Quebec
Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the second-most populous city in Canada and most populous city in the Canadian province of Quebec. Founded in 1642 as '' Ville-Marie'', or "City of Mary", it is named after Mount Royal, the triple-pea ...
, Creates studied
visual arts
The visual arts are art forms such as painting, drawing, printmaking, sculpture, ceramics, photography, video, filmmaking, design, crafts and architecture. Many artistic disciplines such as performing arts, conceptual art, and textile arts al ...
at
Queen's University, then lived in
Ottawa
Ottawa (, ; Canadian French: ) is the capital city of Canada. It is located at the confluence of the Ottawa River and the Rideau River in the southern portion of the province of Ontario. Ottawa borders Gatineau, Quebec, and forms the core ...
for twelve years, moving to Newfoundland in 1985.
A major theme of her work is the relationship between human beings and the
land
Land, also known as dry land, ground, or earth, is the solid terrestrial surface of the planet Earth that is not submerged by the ocean or other bodies of water. It makes up 29% of Earth's surface and includes the continents and various islan ...
; she often photographs subtle traces and marks of human presence in natural environments. Her work has been shown in over 300 exhibitions across the world.
In 2001 Creates, was elected to the
Royal Canadian Academy of Arts
The Royal Canadian Academy of Arts (RCA) is a Canadian arts-related organization that was founded in 1880.
History 1880 to 1890
The title of Royal Canadian Academy of Arts was received from Queen Victoria on 16 July 1880. The Governor General ...
,
and in 2013 she won CONTACT Photography Festival's BMW Prize for her exhibition ''Marlene Creates: selected works from 30 years, 1982-2012''. The exhibition "gently invites us to think about how we belong to the land, and how we leave our touch upon it." Creates was a 2019 recipient of the
Canadian Governor General's Award in Visual and Media Arts.
Education
Creates attained her bachelor's in art education at Queens University in
Kingston,
Ontario
Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central Ca ...
, attending from 19701974.
["Artists with their Work" Art Gallery of Ontario Winter 1981 – 1982] She traveled to
Venice
Venice ( ; it, Venezia ; vec, Venesia or ) is a city in northeastern Italy and the capital of the Veneto Regions of Italy, region. It is built on a group of 118 small islands that are separated by canals and linked by over 400 ...
,
Italy
Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical re ...
in 1973 as part of the university's Art and
Architecture
Architecture is the art and technique of designing and building, as distinguished from the skills associated with construction. It is both the process and the product of sketching, conceiving, planning, designing, and constructing building ...
Study.
In 1975 she was selected as a Canadian delegate to France for an Architecture Study Program.
Artistic career
Initial Career 1980-1985
As part of the
Art Gallery of Ontario
The Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO; french: Musée des beaux-arts de l'Ontario) is an art museum in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The museum is located in the Grange Park neighbourhood of downtown Toronto, on Dundas Street West between McCaul and Beve ...
Extension Services "Artist with their Work" Program, Creates exhibited a collection of thirteen
cibachrome
Ilfochrome (also commonly known as Cibachrome) is a dye destruction positive-to-positive photographic process used for the reproduction of film transparencies on photographic paper. The prints are made on a dimensionally stable polyester base as ...
photographs of landscapes on the east and west coasts of
Canada
Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...
,
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...
,
Wales
Wales ( cy, Cymru ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by England to the Wales–England border, east, the Irish Sea to the north and west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the ...
, and
Ireland
Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...
.
["Newsletter September - October 1983" Thunder Bay National Exhibition Centre and Centre for Indian Art September 1983] In describing the exhibit she says:
"The actions of nature may seem random or unpredictable; the way smooth stones sit naturally at the shore appears to have no organization. I have found though, that if I manipulate any of them, the interference is obvious. The kind of order I impose is unlikely to occur naturally. But the imposition is slight. The next high tide will disturb my arrangement and re-organize the elements again. Nature is never finished."
As a part of the exhibit, Creates also hosted an illustrated lecture and landscape art workshop with local participants in the
Thunder Bay
Thunder Bay is a city in and the seat of Thunder Bay District, Ontario, Canada. It is the most populous municipality in Northwestern Ontario and the second most populous (after Greater Sudbury) municipality in Northern Ontario; its population ...
region.
Creates also toured with the exhibit to
Windsor
Windsor may refer to:
Places Australia
* Windsor, New South Wales
** Municipality of Windsor, a former local government area
* Windsor, Queensland, a suburb of Brisbane, Queensland
**Shire of Windsor, a former local government authority around Wi ...
.
Recent career
Creates has centered her recent work around six acres of woods (owned by the artist) in
Portugal Cove, NL. There she has established the Boreal Forest Poetry Garden, which sees annual thematic programming of live art, poetry readings and collaborations between artists, while making thematic links between art and science.
2]
A major
retrospective
A retrospective (from Latin ''retrospectare'', "look back"), generally, is a look back at events that took place, or works that were produced, in the past. As a noun, ''retrospective'' has specific meanings in medicine, software development, popu ...
of Marlene Creates’ work called ''Marlene Creates: Places Paths and Pauses'' toured across Canada from 2017 to 2019. Curated by Susan Gibson Garvey (independent curator; former Director/Curator, Dalhousie Art Gallery) and Andrea Kunard (Associate Curator of Photography,
National Gallery of Canada
The National Gallery of Canada (french: Musée des beaux-arts du Canada), located in the capital city of Ottawa, Ontario, is Canada's national art museum. The museum's building takes up , with of space used for exhibiting art. It is one of the l ...
), and organized by
The Beaverbrook Art Gallery and the
Dalhousie University
Dalhousie University (commonly known as Dal) is a large public research university in Nova Scotia
Nova Scotia ( ; ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada. It is one of the three Maritime provinces and one of the fou ...
Art Gallery, the exhibition was hosted by The Dalhousie Art Gallery (Halifax, NS), the Beaverbrook Art Gallery
/sup> (Fredericton, NB), The Rooms
The Rooms is a cultural facility in St. John's, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada. The facility opened in 2005 and houses the Art Gallery of Newfoundland and Labrador, the Provincial Archives of Newfoundland and Labrador and the Provincial Muse ...
Art Gallery (St. John’s, NL), Confederation Centre Art Gallery
The Confederation Centre Art Gallery (CCAG; french: Musée d’art du Centre de la Confédération) is an art museum that forms a part of the Confederation Centre of the Arts in Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, Canada. The art museum pavilion ...
(Charlottetown, PEI), and Carleton University
Carleton University is an English-language public research university in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. Founded in 1942 as Carleton College, the institution originally operated as a private, non-denominational evening college to serve returning World ...
Art Gallery /sup> (Ottawa, ON). An accompanying catalogue presents the work from the exhibition, with text by the curators (published by Goose Lane Editions
Goose Lane Editions is a Canadian book publishing company founded in 1954 in Fredericton, New Brunswick as Fiddlehead Poetry Books by Fred Cogswell and a group of students and faculty from the University of New Brunswick associated with ''The Fid ...
, Fredericton, 2017).
Awards
* Queen's University Bursary for study in Venice, Italy 1973−
Ontario Arts Council Grants
Canada Council Grants
*Governor General's Award in Visual and Media Arts
The Governor General's Awards in Visual and Media Arts are annual awards for achievements in visual and media arts in Canada. Up to eight awards are presented annually with the prize amount is $25,000
Created in 2000 by then Governor General Adrie ...
2019
* Order of Newfoundland and Labrador
The Order of Newfoundland and Labrador (french: Ordre du Terre-Neuve-et-Labrador) is a civilian honour for merit in the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador. Instituted in 2001, when Lieutenant Governor Arthur Maxwell House granted Roya ...
(2021)
Bibliography
*
References
External links
Artist's Website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Creates, Marlene
1952 births
Artists from Montreal
Artists from Newfoundland and Labrador
Canadian multimedia artists
Canadian photographers
Canadian women photographers
Living people
Members of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts
People from Portugal Cove-St. Philip's
Queen's University at Kingston alumni
20th-century Canadian women artists
20th-century Canadian artists
20th-century women photographers
Governor General's Award in Visual and Media Arts winners
Members of the Order of Newfoundland and Labrador