Marcia Harris & Mark Holliday

“Entropic Landscapes”

September 13 - October 2, 2025

OPENING RECEPTION on Saturday September 13, 2025

2-6PM

Both ARTISTs WILL BE IN ATTENDANCE

Mark Holliday

Born in Calgary in 1956, Holliday's family moved to England when he was five years old. Most of his youth was spent in the English Lake District, which is famous for its profound beauty. Although after leaving school he maintained a career as a welder/metal fabricator Holliday often acknowledged his artistic urges by periodically sketching and painting landscapes.

In 1984, taking advantage of his Canadian citizenship and looking for a challenging experience, he returned to Calgary. Working as an Industrial pipe fitter for the next few years Holliday began to ponder an odd career change. By 1990 he had quit his job and was enrolled in a fine arts course at the Alberta College of Art. Graduating with honors in 1994, Holliday was also one of the founding members of Untitled Art Society.

In recent years he has become recognized as an accomplished painter, his work offering an unusual approach to traditional landscape painting. The vital essence of his work owes its strength to simply asking the question: what can beeswax medium actually do? The final painting should set about supplying an unrepentant answer related to the encaustic wax process itself. This age-old encaustic method meaning "to burn in" needs to be applied with some swiftness. The beeswax is heated in garage-sale electric frying pans made molten hot and it is liable to cool on the brush if not handled with some speed. The result is that you see Mark, in the act of painting, the work a permanent present participle of creativity. The modish word to describe such action is "marks," but that implies discrete traces of remote activity. In his case, the more you look, the more you see the paint, the pigment, and the beeswax in a state of turbulent self-animation

Marcia Harris

Marcia Harris was born in Gaspé, Quebec. An interest in art began during Harris's formative years when she entered many contests, including a national one in 1992 where she met her Majesty the Queen at Canada's 125 birthday celebration in Ottawa. Harris completed a Bachelor of Fine Arts program at the University of British Columbia Okanagan and graduated with distinction in 2004. Since then, she has shown in numerous galleries across western Canada, and has been involved in various public art shows.

Though her subject matter is diverse, Harris is best known for her nostalgic depictions of familiar buildings in urban landscapes. Her choice of subject is largely motivated by colour, light, and shadow. Through a distinct use of these elements and a painterly approach, Harris's expressive vitality provokes an alternative perception of familiar urban spaces. She revels in the unpredictability of colour interactions and embraces the beauty of unresolved moments. Her methodical application of colour balances theory and practice while emphasizing the potent impact of layering light and shadow.

Marcia Harris's work is in the collection of the Alberta Foundation for the Arts and in several corporate collections in Calgary.

to see more works from Marcia Harris or Mark Holliday, please visit the links below