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ONDAATJE, Betty Jane Kimbark Jones
- Born
- Toronto, Ontario, 1928
- Biography synopsis
- Ondaatje studied painting under Yvonne McKague Housser and in 1947 at Ontario College of Art and literature at McGill University in 1948; she later studied literature at Queens University receiving an MA in 1954. In 1964, taught as a part-time lecturer at Wilfrid Laurier University and Sherbrooke University. In the early 1960s she returned to the visual arts and in 1967 and along with Jack Chambers and Tony Urquhart, she founded Canadian Artists' Representation, which today is the Canadian Artists Representation/Frontes des Artistes Canadiens (CARFAC). She was also a member of the London Regionalist Movement. Along with abstract and impressionistic landscapes she composed three paintings series: a landscape group entitled the Hill Series; an interior-based group of paintings titled The House on Piccadilly Street; and a final group of large industrial landscapes entitled the Factory Series, completed in the mid-1970s. Ondaatje's research on traditional Ontario quilt-making and design led to a large national touring exhibition of patchwork quilts (1974–76), and a documentary film. Primarily a visual artist, Ondaatje also directed short documentary films and published books of photograph. In 2008 the Art Museum University of Toronto held a major retrospective entitled Kim Ondaatje: Paintings 1950–1975. In 2021, Kim Ondaatje: The House on Piccadilly Street, featuring a group of works, created between 1967 and 1969, depicting various scenes of the artist's Victorian house in London, Ontario, During the course of her career, she worked for Museum London, the Agnes Etherington Art Centre, the Art Gallery of Ontario, and the Emily Carr University of Art and Design outreach program as a travelling artist with her work from 1969 to 1981. She received the Governor General Award in 2009 for Visual and Media Award and also the Seattle Award for Printmaking. Her work is held at the Art Gallery of Ontario and the National Art Gallery of Canada.
- Education
- Ontario College of Art & Design (formerly Ontario School of Art)
- McGill University
- File & Archive locations
- Art Gallery of Ontario - Edward P. Taylor Research Library and Archives
- Hamilton Public Library, ON - Local History and Archives Department
- London Art Gallery, ON
- Montreal Museum of Fine Arts / Musée des Beaux-Arts de Montréal, QC
- National Gallery of Canada, ON - Library and Archives
- University of British Columbia - Fine Arts Library
- University of Calgary Library, AB
- Vancouver Art Gallery, BC - Library
- Winnipeg Art Gallery, MA - Clara Lander Library
- BIBLIOGRAPHY
Writings about- Kim Ondaatje, Paintings and Prints. London, Ontario: London Public Library and Art Museum, 1972
- Kim Ondaatje: Paintings 1950-1975 Toronto: 2008
- MacDonald, Colin S. The Dictionary of Canadian Artists. (Volumes 1-8 by Colin S. MacDonald, and volume 9 by Anne Newlands and Judith Parker) Ottawa: National Gallery of Canada, 2009.
- Ondaatje, Kim. Kim Ondaatje: An Exhibition of Paintings, Prints and Film. Charlottetown: Confederation Art Gallery and Museum, 1973
- Ondaatje, Kim. Toronto, My City: A Photography Memoir. Kingston, Ontario: Quarry Press, 1993
- Ondaatje, Kim and Lorna Senechal Carney. Kim Ondaatje: Paintings, 1950-1975. Toronto, Ontario: University of Toronto Art Centre, 2008
- Tastevin, Lola Lemire. Who is Kim Ondaatje?: the Inventive Life of a Canadian Artist. Toronto, Ontario: Sumac Publishing, 2022
- van der Andveroid, Renee. "studies of vacancy: Piccadilly Street Border Crossings 39.3 (Nov. 2020): 112-119
Writings by- Kim Ondaatje and Michael Bell. Tradition Plus One: Patchwork Quilts from South Eastern Ontario. Kingston, Ontario: Agnes Etherington Art Centre, 1974).
