Barbara Steinman

Steinman was born in Montreal, Quebec in 1950.[1] She began her career as a pioneering videotape artist in Vancouver in the late seventies and evolved into creating elaborate video and multimedia installations.[2] After returning to Montreal in 1980, her video sculptures and installations received international recognition and were included in major exhibitions and biennials. As in Vancouver, Steinman was involved with Montreal's video and alternate art production: she was co-director of Vidéo Véhicule, the centre for independent media arts production, and also a director of the artist-run La Centrale / Powerhouse Gallery.[3][2]

A common theme in Steinman's work is the fate of the disenfranchised and the dispossessed. In 2019, Whitehot Magazine of Contemporary Art wrote that she "effectively memorialises subjects denied a common name, a concrete identity, a reasonable life."[4] She works in multiple media, including video, photography, neon, and installation art.

Steinman’s artworks have been shown in exhibitions in Canada and internationally, including the biennials of Seoul, Sydney, Sao Paulo and Aperto in Venice, as well as exhibitions at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York, the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam, the Tate Liverpool in England, the Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO) in Toronto and the National Gallery of Canada.[2] Her public art projects have received widespread recognition, including the award for Design Excellence for an outdoor public artwork in Vancouver (1998), a commissioned work for Canada House (Berlin) (2005), and the design of a featured artwork for the Canadian Embassy in Moscow (2010).[2]

Her work is included in the collections of the Musée d'art contemporain de Montréal[5] and the National Gallery of Canada.[1] Steinman received the Governor General’s Award in Visual and Media Arts (2002) and was awarded an honorary doctorate from Concordia University in Montreal (2015).[2]

• Greenberg, Reesa. "Barbara Steinman: Beauty, magic and points of view". www.yorku.ca. Canadian Art, Winter 2003, vol. 20, no. 4, pp 76-81. Retrieved 2020-07-16.