Sylvie Bélanger (8 May 1951 - 8 October 2020) was a Canadian interdisciplinary artist using sound, video, photography and installation. She lived and worked in Toronto as an Associate Professor of Visual Studies at SUNY Buffalo until her retirement in 2017. Where after, she moved to Montréal.

Early life

Bélanger received an MFA from

York University York University (french: Université York), also known as YorkU or simply YU, is a public university, public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is Canada's fourth-largest university, and it has approximately 55,700 students, 7,0 ...

, a BFA from Concordia University and a Baccalauréat in Philosophy of Religion from

Université de Montréal The Université de Montréal (UdeM; ; translates to University of Montreal) is a French-language public research university in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. The university's main campus is located in the Côte-des-Neiges neighborhood of Côte- ...

Work

Bélanger exhibited her multimedia installations across Canada, USA, France, Germany, Spain, England, the Netherlands, Japan, Thailand, Philippines and China. Joan Murray discussed her works such as ''He'' and ''She'' (1992) in "Canadian Art in the Twentieth Century" (1999) saying it was witty and mysterious. In 2002 Bélanger was commissioned to create

public art Public art is art in any media whose form, function and meaning are created for the general public through a public process. It is a specific art genre with its own professional and critical discourse. Public art is visually and physically acce ...

for the Bessarion subway station in Toronto. The work is a series of

friezes In architecture, the frieze is the wide central section part of an entablature and may be plain in the Ionic or Doric order, or decorated with bas-reliefs. Paterae are also usually used to decorate friezes. Even when neither columns nor ...

of hands, feet and backs of heads, which represent the users of the station. The feet images appear on the concourse level while the heads appear on the platform level. The hand images appear along the stairs between the

Sheppard Avenue Sheppard Avenue is an east–west principal arterial road in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The street has two distinct branches near its eastern end, with the original route being a collector road leading to Pickering via a turnoff, and the main ro ...

side entrance/exit and the concourse.

Death

Bélanger died on 8 October 2020 of cancer at the age of 69.

Collections

*Gemeente Museum, The Netherlands, *Oakville Galleries, Ontario * Art Windsor-Essex, Ontario *

Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec The Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec ( en, National Museum of Fine Arts of Quebec), abbreviated as MNBAQ, is an art museum in Quebec City, Quebec, Canada. The museum is situated in Battlefield Park and is a complex consisting of four bui ...

The Canada Council for the Arts The Canada Council for the Arts (french: Conseil des arts du Canada), commonly called the Canada Council, is a Crown corporation established in 1957 as an arts council of the Government of Canada. It acts as the federal government's principal i ...

Art Bank The Canada Council for the Arts (french: Conseil des arts du Canada), commonly called the Canada Council, is a Crown corporation established in 1957 as an arts council of the Government of Canada. It acts as the federal government's principal in ...

Art Gallery of Guelph The Art Gallery of Guelph (AGG), formerly the Macdonald Stewart Art Centre, is a public gallery and adjoining sculpture park in Guelph, Ontario. The AGG has a collection of over 9,000 works and focusses on research, publishing, educational progra ...

*Woodlawn Arts Foundation, Toronto

Awards

Bélanger was the recipient of the Stauffer Prize awarded by the

Canada Council for the Arts The Canada Council for the Arts (french: Conseil des arts du Canada), commonly called the Canada Council, is a Crown corporation established in 1957 as an arts council of the Government of Canada. It acts as the federal government's principal i ...

* Bélanger, Sylvie and Lorenzo Buj. "Meditation." ''Reading the Gaze.'' C. Barber, S. Kivland and C. Leyser, (eds). London: Bookwork, 1991. 51-70. * C. Christie. "Sylvie Bélanger." ''Canadian News Makers''. Toronto: Gale Canada, 1997. 48-51. * Allucquère R. Stone, M. Heim, D. de Kerckhove, L. Dompierre ''Press Enter, Between Seduction and Disbelief''. Toronto: The Power Plant. 1995 * Cheetam, Mark. ''Remembering Postmodernism: Trends in Recent Canadian Art''. Toronto: Oxford, University of Toronto, 1991. * The Cutting Edge Women's Research Group, editor. ''Desire By Design: Body, Territories and New Technologies.'' 1999. 82. * Grande, John K. "Intertwining: Artists, Landscape, Issues, Technology" 1998. 105 * Jolicoeur, Nicole. ''Emettre du silence in Trans-mission''. Montréal: La Centrale/Powerhouse Remue-Ménage, 1996. 68-73. * Marks, L.U. "Press / Enter", ''Artforum'' (Sept. 1995): 97. * Murray, J. ''Canadian Art in the Twentieth Century''. Toronto: Dundurn Press, 1999. 272-93. * Ylitalo, K. "Sylvie Bélanger." ''Redaktion Allegmeines Kunstlerlexikon.'' München-Leipzig, Germany: K.G. Saur Verlad 2008. * "Tu me manques" ''Art Forum Azamino.'' (vol. 3, June 2007) * "Sylvie Bélanger at Portside." ''Madame FIGARO.'' #342 (06/06/2007): 78.

References

External links

Official Website
{{DEFAULTSORT:Belanger, Sylvie 1951 births 2020 deaths Canadian video artists Women video artists Canadian multimedia artists Artists from Quebec French Quebecers Canadian contemporary artists Canadian women artists Canadian installation artists Interdisciplinary artists Concordia University alumni 20th-century Canadian artists 21st-century Canadian artists