(Brantford)
I grew up in the presence of people whose roots were deep in Ontario soil and whose minds and hearts expressed authentic regard for our region’s geological and social history. Their influence and the formative years spent on family farms have bound me to the land that inspires so much of my recent work. It was on our 250-acre farm that I found my first employment as an artist when my father had me record the markings that distinguished each calf born into our Holstein herd. From that time on life as an artist held great appeal, but in young adulthood the practical demands of supporting four children led me instead to a decades long rewarding career in arts education.
Years passed as I worked in elementary and secondary classrooms as well as in faculties of education teaching Visual Arts and Drama to children, young people, preservice teaching candidates and experienced educators seeking additional qualifications in the arts. In the mid eighties arts curriculum development, implementation and review processes were central to my successive roles of Art and Drama Curriculum Assistant and Arts Co-coordinator for the local Board of Education. In the 1990’s I served as Arts Education Officer for the Province of Ontario as a member of the Curriculum Policy and Assessment Team at the Ministry of Education, Queen’s Park.
The formal education which assisted me in my work includes a B.A., a B.Ed. with a focus on Visual Arts, a Visual Arts Specialist Certificate and additional university courses in Drawing and Painting and Art History. I have completed a Master’s degree in Arts Education and only the severe illness that ended my career interfered with the final stages of my Doctoral studies at the University of Toronto.
Now, as my recovery progresses, I once more seek contact with the larger creative community and count it a privilege to have worked recently with such distinguished Canadian artists as Governor General’s Award winner Tom Dean, internationally acclaimed painter Harold Klunder, outsider artist Casey McGlynn, and the accomplished Montreal artist Jennifer Hornyak.
In my current work I have been expressing my love of and concern for this land we inhabit and depend on and the people whose stewardship maintains it. Colour, form and surface texture recall and honour the past, allude to the landforms, vegetation, watercourses and atmosphere of our region or make reference to the human and environmental issues with which we grapple.
RURAL ROOTS
Arlene Laskey (Brantford)
Mixed media in acrylic on canvas with drawn and collaged elements
Each panel 10 x 30 inches – four panels
Faded, blurred and tattered images float up from memory and collect in compartments upon the surface of this nostalgic work. It recalls with warmth the personally-significant people places, events and objects from a long-ago childhood in rural Ontario. $ 800
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