Gillian Mcconnell

I was born in Cooma NSW Australia and and grew up in Montréal Québec Canada. I have been living on Salt Spring Island in British Columbia since 2006, where I work as an artist, picture framer and art teacher.

An interdisciplinary artist, I incorporate painting, drawing, collage, printmaking, photography and found objects in my art. The message dictates the medium. My belief that dichotomy is an illusion is a strong theme that underpins much of my work. We live in a divide-to-conquer world. None of us is immune to the subtle and not-so-subtle conditioning that pits male against female, black against white, rich against poor, democrat against plutocrat, representational against abstract.

I attained a Bachelor of Fine Art (Hons) with a major in etching and a minor in Art History from Queen’s University at Kingston, Ontario (1980). I subsequently studied Textile Design, Fashion Design, Multimedia, Web Design, Direct Marketing and Picture Framing.

I have participated in numerous solo, group and juried exhibitions in Australia and Canada since 1997. In 2009, I co-founded OXOgraphy, a conceptual art collective. I have applied my curatorial skills to the conception, staging and promotion of many successful group and solo exhibitions since 1998, including a critically successful, inaugural OXOgraphy exhibition in 2012.