NEW ZONE ARTIST COLLECTIVE
Eugene's Premier Gallery for Experimental Visual Arts
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Lara Martina
Lara Martina
RR #1, Box 2
Newport, Nova Scotia BoN 2Ao
902.757.0550
lara.martina@ns.sympatico.caArtist’s Statement
Newfoundland’s West Coast has strongly influenced my aesthetic, my art and my personal identity. My collection of life experiences, social encounters and personal ordeals in this place has created a relationship between this island and myself. It has played a large part in determining how I read my world and how I give expression to that reading. This association has been shaped by what has come before: my family’s history, the island’s history, and the history of its traditions of craft, song, and story, creating a connection between the sense of self and sense of place.My work is sometimes a musing or thinking aloud. It reflects the spiritual and physical connections that I feel with certain elements of the natural world: the land, the sea, the color of light, the smell of the marsh. The source material stems from my own cultural upbringing in the French outport of Cap-St.-Georges, located on the edge of the Port-au-Port Peninsula on Newfoundland’s West Coast. This culture is steeped in the oral traditions of story telling and singing. It is infused with symbolic motifs that stem from French and Native morality, myth, religion and work ethic. It is an endless incantation to which I endeavor to give visual form.
To me, as a native of this geographical area, narrative comes naturally. As an artist it is often an appropriate style. A layering of myth, history, social commentary and humor, my art is an accepted and necessary part of my existence; it is how I think. It is who I am. I am creating, through the use of paint and written word, a message that expresses an understanding of my world. I am attempting to give form to a contemporary concept of my own sense of time. My art also explores the cultural and sociological changes occurring in Newfoundland, where, traditional narratives are being unraveled by an influx of contemporary culture. Communities are being fragmented as the population decreases. There is a loss of the unifying power of symbolic language as people migrate and elders die. The vital symbols of that culture, once a way of understanding our humanity, and a means of furthering spiritual life are being changed by technology. I like to think that my work, and the work of other Newfoundland artists, gives expression to these changes. Finally, my art, at its best, documents and comments on the traditions I value and perhaps is a form that continues that tradition.
Research Interests
Diaspora subjects of Eastern Canada; Space & Time: Ideological & Vernacular; Issues of Culture & Identity; Culture & Tradition; History & Landscape; Interpretation of Cultural Identity; Body & Self; NS Regional Plein Air Painters.Education
PhD Candidate 2006 European Graduate School
Media & Communications
Research M.A. 2002 Mount St. Vincent University Thesis: The Process of Being Created by Words
Book I: Passed On By Word of Mouth: A History of Place & Story
Book II: How I Got This Way: An Experience-Bound Memoir
Book III: Interpreting & Capturing Memory
Thesis Exhibition: Enislied
Advisor: Dr Blye Frank, Director of Faculty Education, Dept. Medicine Dalhousie University
B.F.A. Ed 1989 Nova Scotia College of Art & Design
B.A. Art Ed 1989 Nova Scotia College of Art & Design (Grades P-12)
B.F.A. 1987 Nova Scotia College of Art & Design
Minor: Art History; Area of Specialization: Crafts of Newfoundland's French West Coast
Studio: Interdisciplinary
Grants/Awards
2001 Nova Scotia Art Bank: Africville Sunday School
1999 Nova Scotia Art Teachers Association: Dora Baker Trust Award
1989, 1986 Nova Scotia College of Art & Design: Entrance Scholarship
1987 Nova Scotia College of Art & Design: A. Murray Endowment Scholarship
1986 Newfoundland & Labrador Arts Council: Award & Tuition Grant
1981 Newfoundland Rural Agricultural & Northern DevelopmentUpcoming Solo Exhibitions
2006 Centre Stage, Kentville, NS
2007 Pere Leger Comeau Gallery, Université Ste Anne, Church Point, NSSolo Exhibitions
2006 ArtCan Gallery, Kentville, NS
2002 Enisled
2000 Common Ground: Landscapes of Rural Nova Scotia
1999 N.S. Designer Showcase
1986 LSPU Hall: Preliminary DrawingsGroup Exhibitions
2003 Visual Arts Nova Scotia Cobalt, V.A.N.S. Halifax, NS
2003 N.S. Designer Showcase: Lara Martina / Chris Lloyd
2001 Government House Celebrates: Women Artists of Nova Scotia: A Twenty-Five Year Contribution to the Visual Arts
2001,02 Newport Landing Heritage Museum: Big Little Art Show
1999,2000,01 Mount St. Vincent University Art Gallery
1999,2000 Nova Scotia School of Art & Design: Night Moves
1997 NS Art Teachers Provincial Show: Outside the Frame
1987 NSCAD: Showing for HRH Prince Andrew
1987 Ecphore 1987
1986 11th International Women's Day Exhibition, LSPU Hall
1982-4 Festival des Métiers des Arts, Moncton
1982-4 Salon des Artisans de Quebec, QuebecInvitational
1998 Art Gallery of Nova Scotia: Call & ResponseCollections
Nova Scotia Art Bank, Halifax NS: Africville Sunday SchoolPublished Work
2005 CBC Radio Vinyl Café: Saturdays Had a Distinct Smell
1995 Journal of Nova Scotia Art: Three Dimensional Art© Reproduction without permission is prohibited.
The artist reserves all rights under US and International Copyright Law.
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