Laurie Mackie is a multidisciplinary artist who lives in Victoria Canada.
Over the past 20 years her work has been selected for international and regional juried shows. She has received government and private commissions.
Her most recent projects (2019) were presented in three solo shows: Xchanges Gallery and arc-hive Gallery, Victoria, and the Burnaby Art Gallery satellite gallery in Burnaby BC.
Sewing Lessons at Xchanges Gallery is a rich multi-layered story that talks about the global economy, divisions of labour, and manufacturing. It included 28 works in installation, printmaking, painting, and sculpture.
Burnaby Art Gallery’s satellite gallery in the Bob Prittie Library showcased 25 prints related to Sewing Lessons. This exhibit ran concurrently with the Xchanges Gallery show.
Unknown Limits at arc-hive Gallery engaged a diverse sense of place, from the intimacy of the body to a planetary scale, and navigated issues related to our human desires to label, explore, map and extract resources. There were 33 works in photography, painting, sculpture, and an artist book.
A notable aspect of her practise is the use of diverse organic and industrial materials. Her printmaking incorporates traditional and hybrid techniques, including laser cut forms, laser etching, and computer numeric control machined plates.
Deconstruction and craftsmanship are characteristics of her projects. Recent themes connect personal identity with consumption, manufacturing, and the environment. Her projects bridge ideas that initially seem irreconcilable. They are a marriage of unrelated spaces, personal and universal.
Laurie Mackie’s work is a complex call to consider the material world: who makes it and how it functions in modern life.
Comments from viewers at her recent shows:
“Very strong powerful work – an important show”.
“Powerful and vaguely foreboding but enticing at the same time.”
“I love the connections to the mapping elements of Meta Incognita.”
“A very thoughtful exhibition. Great to see contemporary art in Victoria that pushes ideas and norms.”
CV available on request.