Elizabeth Zvonar (born 1972) is a Canadian

contemporary art Contemporary art is a term used to describe the art of today, generally referring to art produced from the 1970s onwards. Contemporary artists work in a globally influenced, culturally diverse, and technologically advancing world. Their art is a ...

ist who works primarily with mixed-media

collage Collage (, from the , "to glue" or "to stick together") is a technique of art creation, primarily used in the visual arts, but in music too, by which art results from an assembly of different forms, thus creating a new whole. (Compare with pasti ...

and

sculpture Sculpture is the branch of the visual arts that operates in three dimensions. Sculpture is the three-dimensional art work which is physically presented in the dimensions of height, width and depth. It is one of the plastic arts. Durable sc ...

based in

Vancouver Vancouver is a major city in Western Canada, located in the Lower Mainland region of British Columbia. As the List of cities in British Columbia, most populous city in the province, the 2021 Canadian census recorded 662,248 people in the cit ...

, British Columbia, Canada. She is currently represented by Daniel Faria Gallery,

Toronto, Ontario, Canada Toronto ( , locally pronounced or ) is the most populous city in Canada. It is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the fourth-most populous city in North America. The city ...

Life and education

Zvonar was born in

Thunder Bay Thunder Bay is a city in and the seat of Thunder Bay District, Ontario, Canada. It is the most populous municipality in Northwestern Ontario and the second most populous (after Greater Sudbury) municipality in Northern Ontario. Its population i ...

Ontario Ontario is the southernmost Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Canada. Located in Central Canada, Ontario is the Population of Canada by province and territory, country's most populous province. As of the 2021 Canadian census, it ...

. She has attended

Aichi Gakusen University is a private university with campuses in Okazaki, Aichi and Toyota, Aichi, Japan Japan is an island country in East Asia. Located in the Pacific Ocean off the northeast coast of the Asia, Asian mainland, it is bordered on the west by the ...

Toyota City, Japan , formerly known as Koromo, is a city in Aichi Prefecture, Japan. , the city had an estimated population of 426,162 and a population density of 464 people per km2. The total area was . It is located about 50 minutes from Nagoya by way of the Mei ...

(1994),

Capilano College Capilano University (CapU) is a teaching-focused public university based in North Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, located on the slopes of the North Shore Mountains, with programming that also serves the Sea-to-Sky Corridor and the Sunshi ...

in North Vancouver, Canada (1995), and Hokkaido University of Art & Design in

Sapporo, Japan is a designated city in Hokkaido, Japan. Located in the southwest of Hokkaido, it lies within the alluvial fan of the Toyohira River, a tributary of the Ishikari River. Sapporo is the capital of Hokkaido Prefecture and Ishikari Subprefecture ...

(1996). She ultimately received a BFA at Emily Carr Institute of Art and Design in Vancouver, Canada in 2002, the same institution that would later reward her with the Emily Award for Outstanding Achievement by an Emily Carr Alumna in 2011.

Work

Working extensively with collage materials, Zvonar’s practice works towards presenting a new history by collecting images from a variety of sources (advertisements, lifestyle, and art history) and reinterpreting them through juxtaposition. By working with images of the female body, Zvonar’s work reinterprets the use of female representation through a reductive and additive process that investigates the nuances and disparities of printed material in relation to

identity formation Identity formation, also called identity development or identity construction, is a complex process in which humans develop a clear and unique view of themselves and of their identity. Self-concept, personality development, and values are all cl ...

Solo exhibitions

Zvonar has exhibited at the

Contemporary Art Gallery A contemporary art gallery is normally a commercial art gallery operated by an art dealer which specializes in displaying for sale contemporary art, usually new works of art by living artists. This approach has been called the "Castelli Method ...

, Daniel Faria Gallery, Artspeak, and the Vancouver Art Gallery Offsite. In 2017, Zvonar participated in a residency at the Burrard Arts Foundation, where she exhibited her solo show ''To You it Was Fast.'' Her work ''THE CHALLENGE OF ABSTRACTION was exhibited at the Daniel Faria Gallery, Toronto from May 2 to June 6, 2015.'' Zvonar exhibited collages, sculptures, and casts. One of her featured works, ''IT’S THE GAPS THAT CHANGE THE SEQUENCE'', "presents two different images of open legs arranged in a mesmerizing spiral." In 2018 her show ''Banal Baroque'' was presented at Daniel Faria Gallery, which explored themes of "bodily and sexual excess" by "recontextualizing mass-produced objects, mass media objects, magazines, and mannequin parts to animate the uncanny treatment of the human figure that lies dormant in this source material." Her work is noted to evoke

Surrealist Surrealism is an art movement, art and cultural movement that developed in Europe in the aftermath of World War I in which artists aimed to allow the unconscious mind to express itself, often resulting in the depiction of illogical or dreamlike s ...

and

Dada Dada () or Dadaism was an anti-establishment art movement that developed in 1915 in the context of the Great War and the earlier anti-art movement. Early centers for dadaism included Zürich and Berlin. Within a few years, the movement had s ...

ist collage, particularly those of

Hannah Höch Hannah Höch (; 1 November 1889 – 31 May 1978) was a German Dada artist. She is best known for her work of the Weimar Republic, Weimar period, when she was one of the originators of photomontage. Photomontage, or fotomontage, is a type of collag ...

. Among the exhibited works were ''Marcel Meets Judy'' (2013), which featured a "mass-produced pink seashell candy dish." This object was rendered obsolete from its function and references

Marcel Duchamp Henri-Robert-Marcel Duchamp (, ; ; 28 July 1887 – 2 October 1968) was a French painter, sculptor, chess player, and writer whose work is associated with Cubism, Dada, Futurism and conceptual art. He is commonly regarded, along with Pablo Pica ...

’s readymades and

Judy Chicago Judy Chicago (born Judith Sylvia Cohen; July 20, 1939) is an American feminist artist, art educator, and writer known for her large collaborative art installation pieces about birth and creation images, which examine the role of women in history ...

’s porcelain vagina-flowers in ''

The Dinner Party ''The Dinner Party'' is an installation artwork by American feminist artist Judy Chicago. There are 39 elaborate place settings on a triangular table for 39 mythical and historical famous women. Sacajawea, Sojourner Truth, Eleanor of Aquitaine, ...

'', 1974–1979.

Artworks in collections

Elizabeth Zvonar's artworks can be found in the following collections: * Burnaby Art Gallery *

Neuberger Berman Neuberger Berman Group LLC is an American private, independent, employee-owned investment management firm. The firm manages equities, fixed income, private equity and hedge fund portfolios for global institutional investors, advisors and high-ne ...

Toronto-Dominion Bank Toronto-Dominion Bank (), doing business as TD Bank Group (), is a Canadian multinational banking and financial services corporation headquartered in Toronto, Ontario. The bank was created on February 1, 1955, through the merger of the Bank of ...

Vancouver Art Gallery The Vancouver Art Gallery (VAG) is an art museum in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. The museum occupies a adjacent to Robson Square in downtown Vancouver, making it the largest art museum in Western Canada by building size. Designed by Fr ...

Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery The Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery is a contemporary art gallery in Vancouver, British Columbia, on the campus of the University of British Columbia. The gallery is housed in a building designed by architect Peter Cardew which opened in 1995 ...

Solo exhibitions

Zvonar has exhibited both group and solo exhibitions across Canada, Australia, Belgium, Japan and in New York. *''Cut & Paste''. 2020. Vancouver: Capture Photography Festival. *''I Spy''. 2020. North Vancouver: Polygon Gallery. *''Milky Way''. 2019. Toronto: .Contact Photography Festival. *''Ageless Ambiguity.'' 2018. Toronto: Daniel Faria Gallery. *''The Future Is Coming Everyday''. 2017. Coquitlam: Evergreen Cultural Centre. * ''To you it was fast''. 2017. Vancouver: Burrard Arts Foundation. * ''The Experience''. 2015. Vancouver: Vancouver Art Gallery Offsite. * ''THE CHALLENGE OF ABSTRACTION''. 2015. Toronto: Daniel Faria Gallery. * ''I Really Do Believe The Best Thing A Person Can Do With Themselves Is To Expand Their Minds''. 2014. Vancouver: Gallery 295. * ''Banal Baroque''. 2013. Toronto: Daniel Faria Gallery. * ''On Time''. 2009. Vancouver: Contemporary Art Gallery. * ''There Are No Rules''. 2009. Vancouver: The Western Front. * ''Super Human Be In''. 2008. Vancouver: Malaspina Printmakers. * ''Parallel Dimension'': 2007. Vancouver: Artspeak Gallery.

Awards

* 2016 AIMIA , AGO Photography Prize (Shortlisted) * 2015 VIVA AWARD, The Jack and Doris Shadbolt Foundation for The Visual Arts * 2012–15 City of Vancouver Artist in Residence Award * 2011 Emily Award, Outstanding achievement by an Emily Carr Alumna, Emily Carr University * 2009 City of Vancouver Mayor’s Award, Emerging Visual Artist * 2007 VADA (Vancouver Art Development Award)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Zvonar, Elizabeth Canadian contemporary artists Living people Canadian women artists Canadian collage artists Canadian women collage artists Artists from Ontario People from Thunder Bay 1972 births Emily Carr University of Art and Design alumni Members of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts