Although you may not be familiar with artist Deb Baillie’s face, you may be very familiar with her art.
Late last month, Baillie was announced by the Blue Mountain Foundation for the Arts as this year’s winner of the Murray Clerkson Award. She will receive a $1,000 prize for her efforts and a one-month artist residency at Studio Ciel.
“It’s such an honour to be given this award because I feel like I’ve found my niche. I cried. I was thrilled,” Baillie said. “I want people to feel something.”
Baillie’s artistic process sees her working from reference photographs of everyday scenes to create much of her art, which plays with shadow, colour and light.
“I’m not just a landscape or portrait painter. It’s about moments in time, and I really like that,” she said.
Baillie has had a long artistic career, starting with a bachelor’s degree in fine arts from York University. She had intended to teach art, and picked up a bachelor of education degree before moving to Collingwood in 2016.
But her love of art started in childhood. Baillie remembers first finding art through a finger-painting exercise in Grade 4.
“It was this joyous experience of moving paint around, seeing colours overlapping. There was something so playful about it, and yet I had control,” she said.
She worked in galleries for years and served as a publisher of Canadian Art magazine.
When she moved to Collingwood, she had difficulty getting on supply teaching lists, so she reverted to her first love instead.
“I thought it was a perfect opportunity to work on my art full-time,” she said.
Baillie is the artist behind two key murals in town: JUMP!, which resides in Collingwood’s Art Alley on Simcoe Street, and Jump In, which is in the entrance to the Central Park Arena.
The Murray Clerkson Award was created in 2010 through the Murray Clerkson estate and continues through a donation from the Conning family, owners of Clerkson’s Home Store in Collingwood. According to the Blue Mountain Foundation for the Arts, Clerkson’s wish was that the award would recognize an evolving or emerging artist, not yet professionally established but who has reached a stage where they now possess a body of work that indicates strength, purpose and commitment.
Other participants and finalists this year for the award included Leslie Kamps, Alex Kostecka-Silva, Jess Graham, Margaret Cora Schmor and Elaine Scheider.
“I don’t like art competitions, because I feel like we all won. Everyone put their heart into it,” said Baillie. “There’s so much great talent. To be a part of it feels really huge.”
Baillie’s paintings, as well as paintings done by all of this year’s finalists, are on display at the Simcoe Street Theatre until July 21.
More information on the Blue Mountain Foundation for the Arts can be found here.
