Artist: Laurie Wonfor Nolan
Medium: Acrylic on canvas
Dimensions: 36''x 30''

Bidding on this artwork will take place at the Live Auction event, Friday, April 4. Tickets available at the link at dvsa.ca. Absentee bids can also be placed in advance – request a form at the school office or email bid@dvsa.ca.

About This Piece
I love the arranging part of making still life paintings… imagining how objects will connect and fill the space before the painting process begins. Figurines and statues show up a lot because they amuse me and mess with the scale of things. Here is this tiny cat among giant bottles and vases. It's really all about him.

Artist Statement
As a child I made miniature animals out of plasticine... every animal I could think of or imagine. Someone smart said all children are artists. I had the encouragement of my family who thought I was miraculous. I had lovely art teachers in public school that were also very encouraging. I went to Sheridan College and studied illustration and graphic design and worked as a commercial artist for many years. At Dundas Valley School of Art, I studied with Catherine Gibbon and Jody Joseph and learned to paint from observation and with my heart. I look at art history closely and attempt to follow in the path of great painters. I ask questions, try not to bore myself and consider everything an experiment.

Biography
A graduate of the Sheridan College Illustration program, Laurie had a long career as a commercial artist. With much inspiration from Catherine Gibbon, she combined those skills with her love of the land and had her first solo show of large-scale plein-air landscapes in Toronto in 1996. Her fate was sealed as an art maker after further study with Jody Joseph. Her immediate approach to painting in the landscape expanded to subjects including still life, interiors, abstractions and recent experiments with mixed media and sculpture. Drawing and painting from life, both in and out of the studio, remains at the core of her art practice.

Laurie’s rural home, studio and gallery space – once a former country church in Roseville (Ayr), Ontario – has become her haven and a creative sanctuary for her students. Her work can be found in corporate and private collections in Canada, the USA, Italy, Germany and Austria. 

Awards include the Bernice Adams Memorial Award for Visual Art and the KW Women of Distinction Award for Arts and Culture.