Rosalie Favell, I awoke to find my spirit had returned, 2018. Oil on linen, Overall: 121.9 × 121.9 cm. Art Gallery of Ontario. Purchase, with funds from the Indigenous and Canadian Committee, 2023. Courtesy of the artist. © Rosalie Favell.
Located on Level 2, Gallery 230 & 231.
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For more than four decades, the photo-based artist Rosalie Favell has explored questions of Mètis identity, Indigenous futures and same-sex desire. Working in series, Favell’s unique visual language blends family photos, print material, oil painting, elements of collage and pop culture. In mining her complex personal history, she has created space for new Indigenous identities, unbound by authenticity debates or stereotypes.
Showcasing 22 photographs and three oil paintings, Portraits of Desire is Favell’s first solo exhibition at the AGO and is curated by Wanda Nanibush, the AGO’s Curator of Indigenous Art.
Contemporary programming at the AGO generously supported by
Rosalie Favell is a photo-based artist, born in Winnipeg, Manitoba and now based in Ottawa. To date Rosalie’s work has explored the relation of photography to issues of identity. Over the course of her long career, Favell’s work has appeared in exhibitions in Canada, the US, Edinburgh, Scotland, Paris, France, Taipei, Taiwan and Melbourne, Australia. Numerous institutions have acquired her artwork including: National Gallery of Canada (Ottawa), Canadian Museum of Contemporary Photography (Ottawa), Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian (Washington, D.C.), and Global Affairs, Canada. A graduate of Toronto Metropolitan University, Rosalie holds a Master of Fine Arts degree from the University of New Mexico and a PhD (ABD) from Carleton University in Cultural Mediations. In Ottawa Rosalie has taught at Carleton University, the University of Ottawa and Discovery University.
