Laurie Steen - The Space of Nothing and Everything

Laurie Steen is a Canadian artist who specialises in drawing. Laurie has a Bachelors Degree in Design from the University of Manitoba and has been exhibiting her work for over 20 years.

‘My relationship with the landscape is very sensory, leading me to approach drawings as I would a portrait, where time and space enter the work in the form of many layers. And in beginning, there must be silence and light; then I quietly immerse myself into a drawing.

I tend to work seasonally, in the winter months I am drawn to working with dark graphite and oils working within the structure of nature in a horizontal bare landscape, or the portrait. There is a concentration on the vertical and the horizontal elements pulling and rooting me to a place. The construction lines centre me and help me focus on the essence of the piece and of the place.

In the warmer months, when light and colour flood the studio, I am often working outside on large drawings on mylar or observation drawings on paper following in between fleeting moments, or stills in the landscape. I realise more and more how profoundly my studio, my personal environment, and the seasons affect not just my subject, but my working methods too.

A few things have remained constant, the importance of my encounter with the natural environment and the need to make drawings.’

Laurie continues to exhibit in Canada, Switzerland and England. In the UK she continues
to exhibit at the RWA, including all of the DRAWN bi annuals and received the prize for drawing in 2010. She was elected a Royal West of England Academician in 2015.