Bio

I am constantly reminded that our landscape and the communities that we live in are so closely tied to one another in a fragile relationship. Through our favorite past time of accumulating "stuff", our Canadian landscape is greatly compromised and changed. Where a field in my neighbourhood once stood still with deer grazing upon it, it now supports a row of houses that barely differ from one another. It seems that the more we acquire, the better off we think we'll be. My artwork attempts to herald the opposite with a twist of visual comic relief attached to it. I choose to paint scenes that I am familiar with — scenes from my neighbourhood. These illustrate the tension between the accumulation of what we desire, and the result of that on our landscape, all the while using a lighthearted visual style of painting that is both easy to look at through simplification and arresting colour.

Karin Rabuka has been making artwork all of her life. While spending most of her growing up years in Nova Scotia, Canada, much of her interest in art was started by drawing with rocks in the sand at her seaside cottage.

She later attended the University of Waterloo, Waterloo, Ontario and earned an Honours Bachelor of Arts in Fine Art Studio Specialization. Since then she has practiced art as a full-time business and now has a studio in Ottawa, Ontario.

Karin has been awarded several awards for her work, including First Prize Best of Show at UxShow in Uxbridge (one out of over 600 applicants), Ontario Arts Council Exhibition Assistance Grants, the Leading Edge Award, Kitchener, Ontario, and the Waterloo Regional Arts Foundation Exhibition Assistance Grant.

Karin's work has been in exhibitions at the Toronto Outdoor Art Exhibition, Grimsby Public Art Gallery, Dale Smith Gallery, Ottawa, and the Robert Langen Gallery at Wilfred Laurier University, Waterloo, Ontario.

Karin's work is part of many private collections in Canada including British Columbia, Toronto, Windsor, Kitchener and Ottawa.

Karin is now represented by the Dale Smith Gallery in Ottawa, Ontario.