Myfanwy MacLeod
b. 1961, London, ON
Myfanwy MacLeod lives and works in Vancouver. She is best known for her irreverent artworks that draw upon conceptual and minimalist themes, often exploring the overlapping and intersecting of pop culture, art history and folk traditions. Articulated through themes of fantasy, humour and allusions to forbidden desires, MacLeod draws parallels between how art and mass media are created, circulated and consumed. Her works, which range from photography and painting to large-scale installations and sculpture, examine how perceptions of “high” and “low” culture are interpreted through themes of gender, privilege and value.
MacLeod was a recipient of the VIVA Award (1999), presented by the Jack and Doris Shadbolt Foundation for the Visual Arts, Vancouver. She has had solo exhibitions at Libby Leshgold Gallery (2019); Contemporary Art Gallery (2018); Or Gallery, Vancouver (2015); Vancouver Art Gallery (2014); Museum London, Ontario (2013); Presentation House: Gallery, Vancouver (2012); and Contemporary Art Gallery, Vancouver (2006). Selected group exhibitions include “Displacement” at Vancouver Art Gallery, Vancouver, BC (2019); “Unexplained Parade” at Catriona Jeffries, Vancouver, BC (2019); “zero ground” at Griffin Art Projects, North Vancouver, BC (2018); “N. Vancouver” at Polygon Gallery (2017); Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto (2013); “Builders: Canadian Biennial 2012“ National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa (2012); MASS MoCA, North Adams (2012); Justina M. Barnicke Gallery, Toronto (2008); Agnes Etherington Art Centre, Kingston (2006); Kunstverein Wolfsburg, Germany (2004); The Power Plant, Toronto (2002); Fruitmarket Gallery, Edinburgh, Gasworks, London (2002); Canadian Pavilion, Melbourne International Biennial (1999); The Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery, Vancouver (1998).
Myfanwy MacLeod lives and works in Vancouver. She is best known for her irreverent artworks that draw upon conceptual and minimalist themes, often exploring the overlapping and intersecting of pop culture, art history and folk traditions. Articulated through themes of fantasy, humour and allusions to forbidden desires, MacLeod draws parallels between how art and mass media are created, circulated and consumed. Her works, which range from photography and painting to large-scale installations and sculpture, examine how perceptions of “high” and “low” culture are interpreted through themes of gender, privilege and value.
MacLeod was a recipient of the VIVA Award (1999), presented by the Jack and Doris Shadbolt Foundation for the Visual Arts, Vancouver. She has had solo exhibitions at Libby Leshgold Gallery (2019); Contemporary Art Gallery (2018); Or Gallery, Vancouver (2015); Vancouver Art Gallery (2014); Museum London, Ontario (2013); Presentation House: Gallery, Vancouver (2012); and Contemporary Art Gallery, Vancouver (2006). Selected group exhibitions include “Displacement” at Vancouver Art Gallery, Vancouver, BC (2019); “Unexplained Parade” at Catriona Jeffries, Vancouver, BC (2019); “zero ground” at Griffin Art Projects, North Vancouver, BC (2018); “N. Vancouver” at Polygon Gallery (2017); Royal Ontario Museum, Toronto (2013); “Builders: Canadian Biennial 2012“ National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa (2012); MASS MoCA, North Adams (2012); Justina M. Barnicke Gallery, Toronto (2008); Agnes Etherington Art Centre, Kingston (2006); Kunstverein Wolfsburg, Germany (2004); The Power Plant, Toronto (2002); Fruitmarket Gallery, Edinburgh, Gasworks, London (2002); Canadian Pavilion, Melbourne International Biennial (1999); The Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery, Vancouver (1998).
Past exhibition at MRG
"High Anxiety" curated by Mina Totino
High anxiety. Our default setting for the last 18 months. So many uncertainties around health, livelihood, and social codes. As a friend observed, she has felt it all so keenly that words fail her. The exhibition’s title is an expression of our collective state of mind. How better for artists to express themselves (and to a degree the mindset of their viewers) in this uncertain period, and in life, than through their work? Mina Totino, this exhibition’s curator has assembled six artists who have explored this state of anxiety, either recently or pre-Covid, in a way, pulling a thread in a garment of clothing until it unravels or picking at a scab until the fresh skin below becomes visible.
Totino has had a long-standing relationship with all but one of the artists here. She and Jan Wade were employees at a coffee bar together ain the 1980s. She has been friends with Myfanwy MacLeod for many decades: recently, MacLeod has used Totino’s studio to continue her ceramic work, a new direction in her practice. Totino has long shared her ceramic studio and kiln with Nicole Ondre, exhibiting with her in The Eyes Have Walls, an exhibition at the West Vancouver Art Museum in 2020. She has known Philippe Raphanel for many years, an admirer of his highly precise paintings. She knows the production of her partner, Stan Douglas, intimately, observing the development of his projects since they met in art school. In other words, her ties to each of these artists have been strengthened by age and life. Russna Kaur is the one artist with whom she has become recently acquainted, woven into this mix because of her sympathetic approach to Totino's own attitudes towards painting.
continue reading here
Tex by Hilary Letwin
Totino has had a long-standing relationship with all but one of the artists here. She and Jan Wade were employees at a coffee bar together ain the 1980s. She has been friends with Myfanwy MacLeod for many decades: recently, MacLeod has used Totino’s studio to continue her ceramic work, a new direction in her practice. Totino has long shared her ceramic studio and kiln with Nicole Ondre, exhibiting with her in The Eyes Have Walls, an exhibition at the West Vancouver Art Museum in 2020. She has known Philippe Raphanel for many years, an admirer of his highly precise paintings. She knows the production of her partner, Stan Douglas, intimately, observing the development of his projects since they met in art school. In other words, her ties to each of these artists have been strengthened by age and life. Russna Kaur is the one artist with whom she has become recently acquainted, woven into this mix because of her sympathetic approach to Totino's own attitudes towards painting.
continue reading here
Tex by Hilary Letwin
Exhibition view "High Anxiety" curated by Mina Totino with works by Myfanwy MacLeod, Jan Wade, Stan Douglas, Nicole Ondre and Philippe Raphanel. Image credit: Rachel Topham Photography.