Yangyang Pan, born in 1976, studied at the Sichuan Fine Art Institute where she received her Bachelor of Arts with Honors in 1998 followed by her Master of Fine Art in 2002. She remained as an instructor until 2006 when she relocated to Canada. The artist is widely recognized for her gestural abstract paintings primarily focused on the contrasts found in nature. Her expressive visual language takes inspiration from nature, fusing it with spirit and spontaneity sourced from emotions within. Pan has recently collaborated on projects for Apple, Holt Renfrew, Anthropologie, Amour Vert. She has exhibited internationally since 2006, including Canada, US, Italy and China.
A series of abstract landscape paintings that selected in this exhibition reflect her engagement as a newcomer to the land around her. As a visual artist in the north country close to the city Toronto, she marries her immediate perceptions of the Canadian landscape with an appreciation that springs from an outside perspective. Memories of past landscapes meld into the vision of the present, resulting in a somewhat hybrid canvas. It is both a very individual experience and also one that is universal, for we all bring our own stories to the way we see the world. Through a faintly eastern interpretation of a western landscape she can offer these viewers a glimpse into what it is like to either appreciate Canada from a lens other than their own or reflect to fellow newcomers a distillation of a new world that we reach out for together.
“New Abstract Landscape” can be found in The Fix (Lower level across from Whole Foods) for the month of December, and all pieces will be available for purchase.
