Bonnie Devine
Serpent River First Nation, Canadian
Installation artist, performance artist, sculptor, writer
Eiteljorg Fellowship (2011)
Background[edit]
Bonnie Devine was born in Toronto and is a status member of the Serpent River First Nation.[1] In 1997 Devine graduated from the Ontario College of Art and Design, with degrees in sculpture and installation,[3] and she earned her Master of Fine Arts degree at York University in 1999.[4] She has taught studio and liberal arts at York University, Queen's University, and the Centre for Indigenous Theatre. She joined OCAD University as a full-time instructor in 2008[2] and was a founding chair of the university's Indigenous Visual Culture program.[5]
Artwork[edit]
As a conceptual artist, Devine works with a variety of media, often combining traditional and unconventional materials. At a 2007 solo exhibition, Medicine River, at the Axéneo 7 art space in Quebec, she created eight-foot long knitting needles and knitted 250 feet of copper cable to bring attention to the contamination of the Kashechewan water system.[6] She has fashioned full-sized canoes from paper and works with natural materials such as reeds in her 2009 piece, New Earth Braid. She also created land-based installations.[7]
Devine's work is also primarily influenced by "the stories, technologies, and arts of the Ojibwa people."[8]
Exhibitions[edit]
Devine's work has been exhibited in solo and group exhibitions in Canada, the U.S., South America, Russia and Europe.[8] Her 2010 solo exhibition, Writing Home, curated by Faye Heavyshield, was reviewed in Border Crossings.[9] A solo exhibition of Devine's work, Bonnie Devine: The Tecumseh Papers was held at the Art Gallery of Windsor from September 27, 2013, to January 5, 2014.[10] Her work is featured in the Art Gallery of Ontario's exhibition Before and after the Horizon: Anishinaabe Artists of the Great Lakes.[11]
Awards and recognition[edit]
Devine has received numerous awards, including 2002 Best Experimental Video at the imagineNATIVE Film + Media Arts Festival, the Toronto Arts Awards Visual Arts Protégé Award in 2001, the Curry Award from the Ontario Society of Artists in 1999, a variety of awards from the Ontario College of Art and Design, as well as many grants and scholarships.[4] She has been chosen for the 2011 Eiteljorg Museum fellowship.[12] She received a Governor General's Award in Visual and Media Arts in 2021.[13]