Katja Kessin, aka MacLeod

Canada / painting and mixed media installations

Artist Statement:
"I am a Canadian artist who grew up in Hamburg, Germany and emigrated to Montreal in the early Eighties. Permanent displacement made me acutely aware of the wide-ranging effects of loss of adequate textual language, or "mother tongue". In order to explore the communicative properties of images versus textual accounts, in January 2001 I embarked on a project entitled 2001 Earth Odyssey: a visual diary, comprised of an acrylic painting per week on stretched, 10" x 12" canvasses. When I viewed the completed series it became apparent that with a single glance I could instantly recall the events of an entire year. In contrast, when consulting a written diary, such a feat would be impossible, as it would take a considerable amount of time to read the sequence of events; thus the recollection would not be instantaneous. The idea was to directly paint onto the canvas without prior thumbnail sketches, in order to capture the previous week in a simple image, not in an illustrative but in an intuitive, symbolic fashion. For a painter of usually highly detailed, large-scale paintings, this allowed for a minimum of self-censorship, which in turn permitted a fresh, uninhibited approach to painting. 2001 Earth Odyssey is my attempt to visually capture the life of one human being on our planet - myself - over the course of the year 2001."
Katja Kessin

Art History Faculty: Concordia University, Montreal, QC 1999 - 2001
Studio Arts Faculty: Concordia University, Montreal, QC 2001 - date

Fine Art instructor:
Visual Arts Centre, Westmount, QC 1997-98
Auberge Transition (women's shelter) Montreal 1995-99
Hamburg, Germany 1998 (painting workshops: Awareness through Art, Seasons)
Oxford Street Studio, Montreal 1996-97 (painting workshops)

Education:
PhD in Humanities (in progress): Concordia University, Montreal 1998 - 2003
Master of Fine Arts, Painting: Concordia University, Montreal 1993
Independent Student: Concordia University, Montreal 1988, 1995 (Women's Studies and Art Therapy)
Guest Student, Fine Arts: Lerchenfeld, Hamburg, Germany 1992
Bachelor of Arts, Studio Art: Concordia University, Montreal 1988 (with distinction)
Diploma, Foreign Languages: Institute of Foreign Languages, Hamburg, Germany 1982
Abitur, Major in Fine Arts: International Baccalaureat, Hamburg, Germany 1979

Award: SWAAC National Award of Merit 2000

Fellowships:
SSHRC 1999-2002
FCAR 1999, 2000
Concordia University, McConnell Fellowship 1999-2000
Concordia Institute for Can. Jewish Studies 1999-2000
University External Grant Holder Doctoral Scholarship 1999-2001

Project Grants:
Rector's Cabinet Special Projects Grant Concordia University 2000
Conseil des arts et des lettres du Quebec (long term) 1998
Conseil des arts et des lettres du Quebec (short term) 1997
Conseil des arts et des lettres du Quebec (long term) 1994

Travel Grants:
Quebec Ministry of Education Mobility Bursary Germany 2002/03
Morrie and Diane Travel Award in Art History (Germany 2002)
Canada Council Germany 1992+1998

Research:
Teaching Assistantship: Dept. of Painting and Drawing, Concordia University (Ptg. 400/4 50 - 2001)
Research Assistantship: Dept. of Art History, Concordia University (Genocide and Holocaust Art 1998-2000)
Supervisor: Model Drawing Studio, Concordia University 1991-92
Assistant: Visiting Artists' Program, Concordia University 1990-91
2001 Earth Odyssey