Ian Wallace

Ian Wallace OC, RCA is a pioneering figure of Vancouver photoconceptualism and a central influence on the so-called “Vancouver School.” Since the mid-1960s he has developed a practice that juxtaposes monochrome painting with large-scale photography, often as photolaminate on canvas, to examine the studio, the museum, and the street as sites where representation and abstraction meet. A major survey, Ian Wallace: At the Intersection of Painting and Photography (Vancouver Art Gallery, 2012–13), consolidated his contribution to contemporary art over five decades. Earlier surveys were organized by Kunsthalle Zürich, Witte de With (Rotterdam), and Kunstverein für die Rheinlande und Westfalen (Düsseldorf) in 2008; The Economy of the Imagefollowed at The Power Plant, Toronto, in 2010 . Wallace studied art history at the University of British Columbia (BA 1966; MA 1968), taught at UBC (1967–70), and then at the Vancouver School of Art—now Emily Carr University of Art + Design—where he was on faculty from 1972 to 1998. His teaching and writing helped shape Vancouver’s art discourse; among the artists he taught or mentored are Jeff Wall, Rodney Graham, Ken Lum, and Stan Douglas. Notable bodies of work include the film, photo, and painting iterations of the Poverty project (1980–82/84), the nine-panel Clayoquot Protest (August 9, 1993) (1993–95), and Abstract Paintings I–XII (The Financial District) (2010), which he donated to the National Gallery of Canada; the last was presented by the NGC in 2015–16. These series foreground his method: pairing urban or social subjects with fields of colour to test the boundaries between documentary image and abstract form. Wallace’s honours include the Governor General’s Award in Visual and Media Arts (2004), the Canada Council Molson Prize (2009), appointment as Officer of the Order of Canada (2012), the Queen Elizabeth II Diamond Jubilee Medal (2013), Chevalier de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres (2014), induction into the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts (2016), and the $100,000 Audain Prize for the Visual Arts (2022). His work is held in public collections including the National Gallery of Canada and the Centre Pompidou, among others.