Marie Becker-Pos Vancouver BC Oil and Acrylic Artist Home

BIO

Currently I live in Vancouver BC in the Pacific Northwest. I was born on Long Island, New York, moving upstate to attend university.

I have lived in Berkeley, San Francisco, studied drawing and painting in Rome, the Loire Valley and Toronto, but still treasure memories of Long Island, my Czech mother's medicinal gardens, the sand dunes, salt marshes with their wildlife and the soft grey light of winter days.

STATEMENT

Social Comment and Portraits: Combining my academic background in social-psychology with the hands-on, practical experience of art education provides me with a unique "eye" to interpret life in the global "village." Using oil or acrylic paints I produce paintings that reflect my dualistic background, with art that is often simultaneously soothing and unsettling, whimsical and menacing, humorous and cryptic.

Sometimes I pose a social issue, leaving the choice of solution to the viewer.

Botanicals and Abstract Art: I don't want to leave my alter ego out of the scene; for a change of subject matter I paint the fruits, flowers and vegetables growing in my gardens.

In the abstract arena I take the opportunity to avoid specific subjects and let paint, color and forms interplay.

During this process, rhythms and forms begin to emerge which remind me of my natural environment.

The element of esthetic personal choice enters into play for the final idealization of the piece.

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EDUCATION

M.A. (Education) Syracuse University
M.Ed. (Counseling Psychology) University of BC
Diploma of Fine Arts, Langara College, Vancouver BC

INDEPENDENT STUDIES

1986-1992
~ Leslie Poole, Vancouver BC
~ Michael Britton, Head of Vancouver Academy of Art BC
1992
~ Ted Jacobs, Ateliers d'Art Internationaux, Les Cerqueux Sous Passavant, France
1999-2002
~ John Viljoen, Avenue Road Arts School, Toronto ON

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EXHIBITIONS

2008
~ Vizivarosi Gallery, Budapest Hungary, HMC Group Show in July
~ Artists In Our Midst, preview show and open studio Vancouver BC
~ Silk Purse Gallery, on going West Vancouver. Community Center Arts Council BC
~ Visual Arts Exchange, on going Raleigh NC USA
2007
~ Vizivarosi Gallery, Budapest Hungary, Group Show in August
~ Visual Art Exchange Gallery, Raleigh North Carolina, featured artist for August
~ University Women's Club, Hycroft Gallery, summer show
~ Silk Purse Gallery, Duo show, West Vancouver Community Arts Council BC
~ Nador Gallery, Group show, Budapest Hungary
~ Deer Lake Gallery, Group show, Burnaby Arts Council BC
2006
~ University Women's Club of Vancouver Summer Show
~ 13th Hungarian Multicultural Centre, Artists Residency Program in May
~ Balontonfured Congress Center Art Show, Hungary in August
~ Euphorbia, Rotary Art Show, juried in White Rock BC
~ Vancouver in Bloom, Van Dusen Botanical Gardens
~ Visual Art Exchange Gallery, Raleigh NC, Ongoing
2005
~ Visual Art Exchange Show, Raleigh NC
~ East End Arts Council, Group Show, Long Island NY
~ Greenpeace 3rd Annual Show, Toronto ON
~ Secret Garden Tea Co, Solo Show, Vancouver BC
2004
~ Toronto Heliconian Group Exhibition
~ Collage Art Show & Sale, Toronto ON
~ Darlings Open Studio, Toronto ON
~ Broken Fence Society, Juried Art Exhibition, Toronto ON
~ Le Gallery, Group Show, Toronto ON
2003
~ Propeller Centre-Visual Arts, Juried Show, Toronto ON
~ ArtiVizier, Solo exhibition, Hoog Soeren Netherlands
~ Broken Fence Society; Juried Art Exhibition, Toronto ON (honourable mention)
~ Darlings Studio Visit, Toronto ON
2002
~ Toronto Heliconian Life Drawing Group Exhibition
~ Juried Environmental Art Exhibition, Toronto ON
~ National Ballet of Canada Art Show, Hummingbird Centre, Toronto ON
~ The Red Head Gallery, Group exhibition Toronto ON
~ Mystery Art, Famous & the Not-So-Famous, OCAD, Toronto ON
2001
~ Woolfitt's Gallery, Annual Art Exhibition, Toronto ON
~ Toronto Heliconian Club, Small Works Exhibition, Toronto ON
~ Rotunda Exhibition at City Hall, Toronto ON
~ The Red Head Gallery, Group Exhibition, Toronto ON
~ The Avenue Road Arts School, Annual Adult Art Show, Toronto ON
~ National Ballet of Canada Art Show, Hummingbird Centre, Toronto ON
2000
~ Toronto Heliconian Club, Small Works Exhibition, Toronto ON
~ National Ballet of Canada Art Show, Hummingbird Centre, Toronto ON
1999-1998
~ Deborah Worsfold Gallery, Vancouver BC
1998-1996
~ Open Art Gallery, Vancouver BC
1997
~ Solo show, Basic Inquiry, Vancouver BC
1996
~ Group show, Basic Inquiry, Vancouver BC
~ Community Arts Council of Vancouver Juried Exhibition
1995
~ Gallery of BC Ceramics, Metamorphosis, Sculpture of the Autumnal Equinox, Vancouver BC
~ Sidney & Gertrude Zack Gallery, Jewish Beaux Arts Vancouver BC
~ Basic Inquiry, Group Show, Vancouver BC
1992
~ Ateliers d'Art Internationaux, Les Cerqueux Sous Passavant, Group exhibition, France
~ Vancouver Life Drawing Society, Annual Members' Exhibition
1991
~ Baya Salon, Solo Exhibition, Vancouver BC
~ Community Arts Council of Vancouver, Juried Exhibition, (honourable mention)

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SELECTED DONATIONS

2005
~ Sierra Legal Defense Fund, Exhibition & Auction, Vancouver BC
~ Women's University Club, Christmas at Hycroft Benefit, Vancouver BC
2004
~ Sunnybrook & Women's Foundation, Art Auction Benefit Toronto ON

PRIVATE COLLECTIONS

Canada, US, Japan, Netherlands

PUBLICATIONS

Hungarian Multicultural Center 10 Years Anniversary Catalogue (2006) published by the Balontonfured Congress Center Art Show featuring Marie's work.

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RECOMMENDED LINKS

www.ernestbecker.org
The mission of the Ernest Becker Foundation is to bring advances in social scientific theory to the public in efforts to reduce human violence.

We are devoted to multidisciplinary inquiries into human behavior, with a particular focus on our brutality toward one another. Drawing on Becker's writings, especially the last three: Birth and Death of Meaning (1971), his Pulitzer Prize-winning Denial of Death and its companion Escape From Evil, and now on the Becker Reader, the EBF supports research and application at the interfaces of science, the humanities, social action and religion.
www.robertpos.info
People take it for granted that their lives divide into three time zones: past, present and future. Some people live predominantly in their private past; others in their future time zone. Then there are those who, as the Latin saying "carpe diem" goes, seize the day. It is the general consensus among psychiatrists, psychologists, and social scientists that a person's time perspective is acquired and variable in nature. Robert Pos, however, came to a different point of view based on his clinical experience with and research on 405 consecutive office patients (1987-1991). He concluded that people's time perspectives can be reduced to two mutually exclusive, universally occurring and therefore genetically determined personality types: those he termed alphas who predominantly relate emotionally to their here-and-now, but have difficulty in relating emotionally to their past and future (the future is "not yet the present," the past "no longer the present"); and those he called betas, who have no problem relating emotionally to their future and past, but find it hard to focus primarily on their here-and-now. Pos came to the conclusion that this genetically determined duality in time perspectives is due to two different ways of autobiographic memory recording from which one's life story derives and which begins around age 5-6.
www.crystalpainter.com
Crystal Deshaies lives in False Creek, Vancouver BC and is active in the community with a number of arts groups and donates her talents to various community and non-profit organizations. She has won several arts awards, including a Senior BC Cultural Fund Award, and a Canada Council Touring Award. Her work has been widely exhibited in Vancouver, and Crystal now devotes herself to creating "Home and Garden Portraits", as well as personalized "Winsome Portraits" for her clients, and their loved ones.