Propeller Member Since 2019
Elizabeth Greisman is an international visual artist, curator and educator based in Toronto, Canada. She earned an BFA in Visual Arts with Honours from York University, BA in Education from York University, Diploma in Dance Education from the Laban School of Dance (Trinity Laban Conservatoire) in London, Diploma in Landscape Design with an emphasis in Horticulture from Ryerson University with additional post-graduate course work in interdisciplinary visual art at Central St. Martins in London. She has developed collaborations with dancers, poets, musicians, actors, physicians and cooks and is the Founding Director of the Artist Cooperative of Canada and the Nascent Art Science Collective. Her work has been the subject of solo exhibitions at the Canadian Embassies in Dublin, Ireland and Buenos Aires, Argentina, and in Toronto, Canada at Gallery 50, Tanenbaum Centre for the Arts, Tapestry Opera, and RE-Max Unique Windows Project. Selected group exhibitions include shows at La Maison Verte du Jardin Botanique (Marnay-sur-Seine, France), Propeller Gallery (Toronto, Canada), Spadina Museum (Toronto, Canada), BROTA House (Buenos Aires, Argentina), Parkdale Biennial Gallery (Toronto, Canada), Rhizome Collective at Plymouth University (Plymouth, UK), and the University of Buffalo (Buffalo, NY).
I work in an organic manner, starting from perceptual sketches of nature to tap into the transcendent beauty of the landscape. I paint in minutiae and in vast expanse, notating nature in reference to changes in light and colour. Artworks reach for the concept of “thin places”, a term meaning a space on earth where the distance between the world as we know it and the supernatural world are poised to merge. Working rapidly and directly from nature to capture the fleeting light and weather, small sketches are done using water-based oils on canvas.
My practise also concentrates on a visual notation of the performance Artist, creating portraits of the character in theatre, ballet and opera. These sketches become the foundation for large works on unstretched canvas and mylar that are completed in the studio. No power tools or toxic materials or solvents.
