Dianne Pearce (St. Thomas, 1965) holds a BFA from the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design (1988), and an MFA from the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México (1993). She is an artist, art educator and art facilitator. // The artist has received grants from governing bodies in both Canada and Mexico, and has participated in two artists residencies at the Banff Centre for the Arts. She has exhibited in artist-run centres and museums in her native Canada, as well as galleries, art centres and museums in Mexico City, Guanajuato, San Miguel de Allende and León. Internationally, she has shown in Paris, Madrid, Marbella, Milan and Miami. // Her curatorial work includes "Anatomical Permutations: Ten Canadian Artists" for the 1998 Festival Internacional Cervantino, followed by "Sticks and Stones" in 2005 for the Universidad Iberoamericana in Mexico City. // She has been teaching art since 1996 at the bachelor and masters levels in Toronto, Montreal and Mexico City, where she was a full-time professor at the Escuela nacional de pintura, escultura y grabado "La Esmeralda" from 1999 to 2007. // Dianne currently resides in London, Ontario, where she is the Coordinator of Public Programs at Museum London.

The terms ‘carnival’, ‘joy’ and ‘festival’ have been taken up by different writers to talk about basically the same thing: a view of the official world from below, in hopes of overthrowing oppressive social structures. Bakhtin, living in communist Russia a generation ago, once said that laughter has no place in the East, that it belongs to the capitalist West, for it is the language of subversion, satire and parody. // In my work, I have come to embrace carnivalesque environments and encourage ‘indiscipline’, which I translate into unruly encounters between the public and the work: not only do the environments I create tend to look like parties or school rooms, but the pieces often invite the public to touch or otherwise interact with them. As an art professor and museum educator, didactic-like materials riddle my work, encouraging a DIY philosophy of unschooling. As such, my work is no brow and participatory--it is for all ages. // These interests have come about from having lived in Mexico City for 13 years, and raising a bi-cultural family. My work has undoubtedly been informed by Mexican popular culture, and it manifests the aesthetic influence that country has had on my art.

IMAGES

Top:

Stammer and Rustle, 2006-2007, spiral on floor, made of porcelain letters, the public can walk through it, approximately 20 ft diametre, porcelain: Tlalli Barro

Middle:

Polyphonic Novel, 2006-2007, 516 rubber stamps with images from the Ninth New Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, plastic containers, sheets of paper in various sizes and colours, stamp pads, tacks, cork bulletin board, tables and chairs, school-room environment, variable dimensions, stamps: González Sellografic

Bottom:

Wallflowers, 2003, handmade plaster filigree based on Colonial decoration in Mexican homes (silicon molds made from wood filigree bought at Home Mart, Mexico City), variable dimensions