A Dignity of Shovels Drawing

Reid was born in Pointe Claire, Quebec, Canada in 1964 but moved with his family to the eastern edge of Ottawa where he grew up. Obsessed with drawing as a teenager he was accepted into the art program at the High School of Commerce in Ottawa where he learned the fundamentals of drawing and painting. He was then granted advanced standing into second year Fine Arts at the Ontario College of Art in Toronto. Reid spent his final year of studies at the O.C.A. campus in Florence, Italy and graduated with honours and a number of awards in 1987. Since then he has painted continuously and prolifically, first in Toronto, then in Ottawa, and for the last 13 years at his studio in Chelsea Quebec. He has exhibited in Canada, the U.S. and Italy and his work can be found in collections throughout North America and Europe. See Reid's website at have been painting and exhibiting for twenty years now and at this point in my career I find myself more passionate, angry and determined to express myself visually than ever before. Although I realise that in our current post-modern, cynical world a genuine and sincere approach, especially in painting, may be considered somewhat anachronistic I cannot and will not deny the fundamental, inherent drive that compels me to create and communicate visually. In my work I explore issues that concern and move me personally. But the paintings will also speak to the hopes, worries and fears in all of us as I believe that it is our personal stories that can be the most universal. Be it the unanswerable questions of faith and mortality, the ecstasy and anguish of love, the blight of urban sprawl or the dualistic Manichean style dogma of some governments and religions that prod me to look deeper for insight and understanding, inevitably I find that the hints, clues and partial answers I discover arent black and white but various subtle shades of grey. It is these grey areas that I am compelled to explore and express.