Jan Yates, SCA

photo: Joanne McDonald, Niagara This Week, Sept 07

ABOUT

 
Jan Yates, SCA, spent her childhood in the agricultural region of Niagara, Ontario, Canada. As an artist and young adult she lived and practiced in the city of Toronto but did not pursue art professionally until she moved to Southern California in her late twenties. Yates studied independently and worked under master artists Urania Christy Tarbet, Michael Jaques, Steven Doherty and Manuael de Leon.

Since moving back to Canada in 1995, Jan Yates has been elected as a member of the Society of Canadian Artists and Landscape Artists International. Her work is held in collections throughout North America, Southern Ireland, France, England and Australia and she has been awarded numerous grants from the Ontario Arts Council. As well, Yates has garnered recognition and awards from selected juried exhibitions in Canada and the United States.
      
For the past decade, in every season and in all weather, Jan's practice has comprised of visiting agricultural regions and painting with oil on canvas ‘en plein air'. Growing a painting this way allows the artist to investigate the parallels in cultivating works of art and cultivating the land and Yates' body of work unearths a strong connection to the cycles and seasons of life.

Jan Yates has been an influential figure in the Niagara art scene, contributing her time and ideas to many community endeavours. Currently, as a partner in the Greenbelt Collective, the artist is documenting the impact of Greenbelt legislation on agricultural land in Southern Ontario. Yates is also expanding her agri-cultural investigations to include rural communities outside of Canada. Past ventures encompass the Niagara Wine Region Painters' Alliance travelling exhibition series and mentoring at-risk youth for community mural projects. She continues to teach painting and her work is represented by the Jordan Art Gallery, of which she is a partner.
      
 

 

 To visit Jan Yates' blog, click here