Cliff Eyland (November 7, 1954 – May 16, 2020) was a Canadian painter, writer and curator.

Career

Born in Halifax and raised in Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, Eyland studied art at

Holland College Holland College is the provincial community college for the Canadian province of Prince Edward Island (PEI). It is named after the British Army engineer and surveyor Captain Samuel Holland. History It was formed by the Government of Prince ...

Mount Allison University Mount Allison University (also Mount A or MtA) is a Canadian primarily undergraduate liberal arts university located in Sackville, New Brunswick, founded in 1839. Like other liberal arts colleges in North America, Mount Allison does not par ...

, and the

Nova Scotia College of Art and Design NSCAD University, also known as the Nova Scotia College of Art and Design or NSCAD, is a public art university in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. The university is a co-educational institution that offers bachelor's and master's degrees. The univ ...

. While in school, he was influenced by artists Robert Morris,

On Kawara was a Japanese conceptual artist who lived in New York City from 1965. He took part in many solo and group exhibitions, including the Venice Biennale in 1976. Early life Kawara was born in Kariya, Japan on December 24, 1932. After graduating fr ...

and

Daniel Buren Daniel Buren (born 25 March 1938, in Boulogne-Billancourt) is a French conceptual artist, painter, and sculptor. He has won numerous awards including the Golden Lion for best pavilion at the Venice Biennale (1986), the International Award for ...

. Eyland was best known for his work that transformed public spaces and his drawings and paintings done on the small 3 x 5 index card format. In 2005 his installation ''Untitled'', consisting of over 1000 paintings, opened at the Winnipeg's Millennium Library. In 2014, he installed at the

Halifax Central Library The Halifax Central Library is a public library in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. It is located on the corner of Spring Garden Road and Queen Street in Downtown Halifax. It serves as the flagship library of the Halifax Public Libraries, repla ...

where''Library Cards'' is behind the front desk and ''Book Shelf Paintings'' is on the fifth floor.David Diviney (February 18, 2015). "Cliff Eyland Returns to the Library in Halifax Project", ''Canadian Art.'' https://canadianart.ca/reviews/cliff-eyland-returns-library-halifax-project/ He also has a smaller

public art Public art is art in any media whose form, function and meaning are created for the general public through a public process. It is a specific art genre with its own professional and critical discourse. Public art is visually and physically acce ...

commission of 600 painting titled ''Sculptures in Landscapes'' at the Meadows branch of the

Edmonton Public Library The Edmonton Public Library (EPL) is a publicly funded library system in the city of Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, available for use by any member of the public. Library cards are free to all Edmontonians; as part of its centennial in 2013, the E ...

. Eyland also hid card drawings in books and card catalogues at the

Art Gallery of Ontario The Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO; french: Musée des beaux-arts de l'Ontario) is an art museum in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The museum is located in the Grange Park neighbourhood of downtown Toronto, on Dundas Street West between McCaul and Be ...

in Toronto, the Library and Archives in Ottawa and the Muttart Library in Calgary. During his 2012 residency and solo exhibition at the

National Gallery of Canada The National Gallery of Canada (french: Musée des beaux-arts du Canada), located in the capital city of Ottawa, Ontario, is Canada's national art museum. The museum's building takes up , with of space used for exhibiting art. It is one of the ...

, he showed painting in the vitrine, published an artist book and placed 1000 file card drawings into books in the Library. Halifax Central Library art

Eyland was a curator and writer as an extension of his artistic practice. Between 1998–2010, he was an associate professor of painting at the University of Manitoba School of Art and director of Gallery One One One. Eyland's archives are held at the

University of Manitoba Archives & Special Collections The University of Manitoba Archives & Special Collections is a department of the University of Manitoba Libraries which holds historical records related to and created by the University of Manitoba. It is also a collector of private records of indiv ...

. In 2020, his alma mater

set up the Cliff Eyland Memorial Scholarship for painting students and endowed by his family.

Exhibitions

Exhibition highlights include solo exhibitions at the

New School University The New School is a private research university in New York City. It was founded in 1919 as The New School for Social Research with an original mission dedicated to academic freedom and intellectual inquiry and a home for progressive thinkers. ...

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the U ...

, the

Winnipeg Art Gallery The Winnipeg Art Gallery (WAG) is an art museum in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. Its permanent collection includes over 24,000 works from Canadian, Indigenous Canadian, and international artists. The museum also holds the world's largest collec ...

, Struts Gallery and Gallery Connexion (both in New Brunswick), the Muttart (now the

Art Gallery of Calgary Calgary ( ) is the largest city in the western Canadian province of Alberta and the largest metro area of the three Prairie Provinces. As of 2021, the city proper had a population of 1,306,784 and a metropolitan population of 1,481,806, making ...

), the

Art Gallery of Southwestern Manitoba The Art Gallery of Southwestern Manitoba (AGSM) is a contemporary art museum in Brandon, Manitoba. Founded in 1907 as the Brandon Art Club, the AGSM is the oldest centre for visual art in Manitoba and one of the first in Canada. As a not-for-p ...

, and at the

Art Gallery of Nova Scotia The Art Gallery of Nova Scotia (AGNS) is a public provincial art museum based in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada. The art museum's primary building complex is located in downtown Halifax and takes up approximately of space. The museum complex compr ...

, the Eyelevel Gallery, Saint Mary's University Art Gallery and

Dalhousie University Dalhousie University (commonly known as Dal) is a large public research university in Nova Scotia, Canada, with three campuses in Halifax, a fourth in Bible Hill, and a second medical school campus in Saint John, New Brunswick. Dalhousie offer ...

Art Gallery. Group exhibitions include shows in Paris at the Maison Rouge museum, in

Florence Florence ( ; it, Firenze ) is a city in Central Italy and the capital city of the Tuscany region. It is the most populated city in Tuscany, with 383,083 inhabitants in 2016, and over 1,520,000 in its metropolitan area.Bilancio demografico ...

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...

Manchester Manchester () is a city in Greater Manchester, England. It had a population of 552,000 in 2021. It is bordered by the Cheshire Plain to the south, the Pennines to the north and east, and the neighbouring city of City of Salford, Salford to ...

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe ...

, and

Lublin Lublin is the ninth-largest city in Poland and the second-largest city of historical Lesser Poland. It is the capital and the center of Lublin Voivodeship with a population of 336,339 (December 2021). Lublin is the largest Polish city east of ...

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, , is a country in Central Europe. Poland is divided into Voivodeships of Poland, sixteen voivodeships and is the fifth most populous member state of the European Union (EU), with over 38 mill ...

, among others. Eyland regularly updated his ongoing installation ''File Card Works Hidden in Books'' at the Raymond Fogelman Library at the

in New York City between 1997 until 2005.

References

External links

Official website

Gurevich Fine Art

University of Manitoba MSS 402 - Cliff Eyland fonds
{{DEFAULTSORT:Eyland, Cliff 1954 births 2020 deaths 20th-century Canadian painters Canadian male painters 21st-century Canadian painters Canadian art curators NSCAD University alumni 21st-century Canadian non-fiction writers Canadian male non-fiction writers 20th-century Canadian male artists 21st-century Canadian male artists