MacDonald, Nancy

Nancy grew up in Nova Scotia and received her BFA in Fine Art from NSCAD University (1991). She began her career working as a photographer for a regional Nova Scotia newspaper and went on to become a digital artist in the computer game industry, working in San Francisco, Toronto and Ottawa. After moving to the South Shore of Nova Scotia, Nancy began to focus on more traditional drawing and painting. Nancy is currently represented by the Laurie Swim Gallery in Lunenburg NS and Argyle Fine Art, Halifax, NS and is a member of the Lunenburg Art Gallery Society and VANS.

Artist’s Statement

“Our teeth are reefs, our bones are stones.” - Robert Macfarlane

I've spent a lifetime trying to comprehend my deep connection to nature and my need to express it with my art. It's that unconscious, lung filling deep breath when you reach the ocean. Shoulders dropping. Hours that seem like minutes pass, lulled by the bubbly sounds of a brook bending around the trees. It's an irresistible urge to climb on the big rocks and to hold the little ones in your hands, keeping the special ones in your pockets. Sitting in the moss, questioning, how many colours of green can exist in the world? We often think of ourselves as separate from nature but we're a part of it, made of the same stuff. Connected. I often take photos for reference, but they never seem to capture all that I'm seeing or feeling. In my current work I've been experimenting with ways to translate what's in my mind's eye, my memories, into physical images. As a photographer and a painter, I have been integrating the two mediums since my art school days. My process involves manipulating and collaging the photos I create, for reference to enhance certain elements and abstract others as a stepping stone to create ideas and to inform the marks that I will make with my pencils and paints.