Jim Reid
About the Artist
Jim Reid’s landscape paintings highlight the complex relationship between culture and nature. His work is plein air, experiential and immersed in process. He has stated: “My work embodies a spirituality that I feel is inherent in Nature. The fragility and resilience of Nature, its exquisite order and chaotic unruliness fascinate me. I feel uneasy with the exploitative attitude toward Nature, yet as a member of a technological society I participate in exploitation. This contradiction is reflected in my work.”
Paintings from the 1980’s explored the borderlands between urban, agricultural and natural areas. Through the 1990’s the work became more sculptural, with the series Terraforms. These massive assemblages combined man-made materials such as acrylic paint, metal mesh and fiberglass castings with collaged natural material from the site.
Reid’s Ferals series (2003-2013) was a typology of individual wild apple trees growing in the forests near his studio. Descended from cultivated trees, these feral apple trees escaped that control and became integrated into the local ecosystem.
Peel Plain (2014-2020) moves to the open spaces and distant horizons of the historic farmlands below Peel’s section of the Niagara Escarpment. At first glance serene, yet energetic and chaotic, they reflect conflicting forces in a changing landscape. In the ongoing series
Forgotten Places (1983-present), repeated forms and obsessively layered surfaces reveal the terrain as ancient, complex and constantly transforming.
Terraforms toured Ontario public galleries as a solo exhibition. Collections include Canada Council Art Bank, Art Gallery of Hamilton, Peel Art Gallery, Art Gallery of Peterborough, MacLaren Art Centre, Art Gallery of Guelph, Kitchener-Waterloo Art Gallery, Whyte Museum, Art Gallery of Mississauga.
Forgotten Places
Jim Reid
Tangle
2022
acrylic on canvas
30 x 30 inches
Jim Reid
28-6-20
2020
acrylic on paper
36 x 36 inches (framed)
Jim Reid
Exquisite Entropy, 14-10-10
2010
acrylic on canvas
82 x 108 inches
Jim Reid
Forest 1-9-10
2010
acrylic on canvas
36 x 48 inches
Jim Reid
Feral 15-10-07
2007
acrylic on canvas
84 x 72 inches
(Private Collection)
The Peel Plain
Jim Reid
Peel Plain
2020
watercolour & pastel on paper
framed behind museum glass
19 x 45 inches (framed)
Jim Reid
Sydenham Lake 1
2018
watercolour & pastel on paper
framed behind museum glass
42 x 62 inches (framed)
Jim Reid
Peel Plain 9-1-18
2018
watercolour & pastel on paper
framed behind museum glass
42 x 62 inches (framed)
Jim Reid
Peel Plain 29-11-17,
W from Mississauga Rd, S of King St
2017
watercolour and pastel on paper
13 x 39 inches
Jim Reid
Peel Plain 7-6-16
#1 SE from Torbram, N. of Old School Rd.
2016
acrylic and pastel on Arches paper
31.5 x 41.5 inches (framed)
Jim Reid
Peel Plain 30-3-16-1
2016
acrylic, pastel and graphite on paper
25 x 35 inches
(Collection of Peel Art Gallery)
Terraforms
Jim Reid
Terraform study
2000
acrylic and collage on plywood
30 x 30 inches
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