OCAD U Alum Meryl McMaster to represent Canada in major exhibition

Meryl McMaster, Lead Me to Places I Could Never Find on My Own I, 2019

Known for her dreamlike photographic self-portraiture, Ottawa-based artist and OCAD U alum Meryl McMaster will represent Canada in the major exhibition, New Worlds: Women to Watch 2024 at the National Museum of Women in the Arts (NMWA) in Washington, D.C. (April 14 to August 4, 2024).

Selected by the curatorial team of the NMWA to participate in the exhibition, McMaster is the second Canadian artist whose work will be included in the NMWA’s Women to Watch tri-annual exhibition. 

Women to Watch is a dynamic collaboration between the museum and its national and international network of outreach committees. The committees work with curators in their regions to create shortlists of artists and from this list, NMWA curators select the artists and works to exhibit at the museum. 

Works by the 28 artists featured in New Worlds: Women to Watch 2024 will explore how our world has been transformed by a global pandemic, advocacy for social reform, and political division, from perspectives that shift across geographies, cultural viewpoints, and time.

McMaster, who is of nêhiyaw (Plains Cree), Métis, British and Dutch ancestry, is known for her exploration of the self, in relation to land, lineage, history culture and the more-than-human world. 

Her lens-based practice incorporates the production of hand-crafted materials and performance forming a synergy that transports the viewer out of the ordinary and into a space of contemplation and introspection. 

The recipient of several prestigious awards, including the Scotiabank New Generation Photography Award, the REVEAL Indigenous Art Award and the Charles Pachter Prize for Emerging Artists, McMaster’s work has been acquired by significant public collections within Canada and the United States, including the National Gallery of Canada, the Art Gallery of Ontario, The Boston Museum of Fine Arts and the National Museum of the American Indian. 

Source: 

Canada Committee of the National Museum of Women in the Arts