Christine Vaillancourt
Biography
Christine Vaillancourt earned a BA from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and a MA from the Rhode Island School of Design. She has exhibited widely in the United States as well as in Toronto, Canada and Taipei, Taiwan. Her work is included in several corporate collections including ITT, MCI, SAP America; Nordstrom in California, Texas, and Florida; Essex Investments in Boston; Hale and Dorr in New York City; and CSC Index in New York and Chicago. Most recently, she held a solo exhibition at the Boston Convention and Exhibition Center on view from November 2006 through June 2007.
Review of Artist’s Work from the 2004 “Techno-Retro” show at the Newport Art Museum
Vaillancourt’s paintings reverberate through time. Geometric abstractions, rooted in the early twentieth century work of the Constructivists, Concrete artists and Mondrian, Vaillancourt carries us forward to the 1950s, the decade of her childhood. Post-war enthusiasm for engineering and machine production manifested itself in design, in particular, textiles filled with abstract color blocks, circles and lines suggesting mathematical symbols. Fast forward fifty years to the present, in which Vaillancourt’s imagery connects us with the high tech world: digital info, bits and bytes, molecules, genes, quarks, the building blocks of matter providing us with glimpses of our attempts to understand the possibilities of nanotechnology.
She further engages us with illusory techniques, making acrylic look like encaustic, fooling the eye with depth perception, and creating playful yet provocative motifs. Calculated and precise multi-colored shapes - circles, ovals, squares, rectangles and dots - levitate in space in Vaillancourt’s paintings. She achieves this effect by layering her forms beneath heavily applied translucent acrylic medium. Vaillancourt invites the viewer to enter her world of contained but free moving objects. She writes, “My work is a study of geometry, color, line, space, movement, and the natural historical human connection of elemental geometry as metaphor.”
-Nancy Whipple Grinnell, Curator of the Newport Art Museum
Awards and Exhibitions
Museum Exhibitions
2007
Boston Convention Center, Boston, MA
Three Columns Gallery, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA
2004
Newport Art Museum, Newport, RI, one-person exhibition
2004
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, MA. Juried benefit auction
2002-2004
“Great River Arts Institute” Traveling museum exhibition:
Brattleboro Museum, VT
Wood, Gallery and Art Center, Montpelier, VT
Griswold Museum, Lyme, CT
1999
Ninth Triennial at the Fuller Museum, Brockton, MA
1988
Bristol Art Museum, Bristol, RI
Solo Exhibitions
2007
Boston Convention and Exhibition Center
2004
Nikola Rukaj Gallery, Toronto, Canada
Newport Art Museum, Newport, RI
2002
Andrea Schwartz Gallery, San Francisco, California
1999
Creiger-Dane Gallery, Boston, MA
1996
Creiger-Dane Gallery, Boston, MA
1992
Arnold Gallery, Newport, RI
1991
Bromfield Gallery, Boston, MA
1989
Paul Sorota Fine Arts Gallery, Boston, MA
1986
Arnold Gallery, Newport, RI
Two-Person Exhibitions
2000
Gallery Five North, Boston , MA
1997
Lenore Gray Gallery, Providence, RI
Group Exhibitions
2004
Toronto International Art Fair 2004, Nikola Rukaj Gallery
2003
Nikola Rukaj Gallery, Toronto, Canada
Trinity Gallery, Atlanta, GA
Gallery Materia, Scottsdale, AZ
2002
Pentimenti Gallery, Philadelphia, PA
Bickett Gallery, Raleigh, NC
2001
Andrea Schwartz Gallery, San Franciso, CA
Gallery 10, Hilton Head, SC
1999
Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, RI, Alumni Exhibition
Gallery Five North, Boston, MA, RISD Alumni Exhibition
1996
Tichnor Gallery, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA
Boston Corporate Art, Boston, MA. “Bouncing Off the Walls”
1995
Mario Diacono, Boston, MA. “Rites of Paint”
Federal Reserve Bank Gallery, Boston, MA
Institute of Contemporary Art Studio Tour, Boston, MA
River Contemporary Art, Housatonic, MA
Boston Center for the Arts, Boston, MA
Lenore Gray Gallery, Providence, RI
1994
Grossman Gallery, School of MFA, Boston, MA
Contemporary Artists Center, Beaver Mill, North Adams, MA
1993
American Art Festival ‘93 Invitational. Taipei, Taiwan
Boston Center for the Arts, Boston, MA
Federal Reserve Bank Gallery, Boston, MA
The Brickbottom Gallery, Somerville, MA
1992
Lydon Fine Art, Chicago, IL. Three-Person Exhibition
Boston Center for the Arts, Boston, MA
Mu Gallery, Boston, MA
Federal Reserve Bank Gallery, Boston, MA. “Distinct Voices”
1991
Mills Gallery, Boston Center for the Arts, Boston, MA
1990
Boston Visual Artists Union Gallery, Boston, MA
Mills Gallery, Boston Center for the Arts, Boston, MA
Federal Reserve Bank Gallery, Boston, MA
1989
Mills Gallery, Boston Center for the Arts, Boston, MA
The Annex Gallery, San Diego, CA
1980
Rudolph Steifel Art Center, Wheeling, WV
Kent State University Art Gallery, Kent, OH
1976
Newport Art Association, Newport, RI
Woods-Gerry Gallery, Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, RI
Corporate Collections
Radius Financial Group, Massachusetts, New Hampshire
Nordstrom, California, Oregon, Texas, Florida
Excel, Bermuda
Hale & Dorr, New York City, NY
Centre Solutions Bermuda Ltd., Bermuda
CSC/Index, Chicago, IL
SAP America, Boston, MA
Essex Investments, Boston, MA
CSC/Index, New York, NY
MCI, Arlington, VA
ITT, Stamford, CT
Xerox Corporation, Los Angeles, CA
Bloomingdales, New York, NY
DeCordova Museum, Lincoln, MA. Corporate Loan Program
Copley Plaza Hotel, Boston, MA
Back Bay Hilton, Boston, MA
Spaulding Investments, Burlington, MA
Berthold and Associates, Charleston, WV
Very Fine Products Inc., Westford, MA
Rex Hagon and Associates, Toronto, Canada
Stone, Fox and Ladd, LTD., Boston, MA
Venture Sales, Framingham, MA
McDuffee Insurance, Merrimack, NH
Automated Medical Systems, Brookline, MA
Milgrim, Thomajan and Lee P.C., Boston, MA
M.A.C. Make-up, owner Frank Toscan, Toronto Canada (private collection)
44 North, owner Chef Mark McEwan, Toronto,Canada (private collection)
Press
Art New England, “Spotlight for RI,” Susan Boulanger, August/Sept,2004
Boston Sunday Globe, “Critics’ Pick,” Christine Temin, May 9, 2004
Providence Journal, “Art Scene,” Bill Van Siclen, January 30, 2003
Newport Daily News, “Art”, February 14,2003
Daily Local News, Philadelphia, PA. “Pentimenti shows Ideal Abstraction,” R.B. Strauss, October 5, 2002
New American Painting Magazine, Fifth New England Competition, Number 26, 2000
The Boston Globe, “Dot-Dash,” Cate McQuaid, September 9, 1999
New American Painting Magazine, Second New England Competition, Number VII, 1996
Artsmedia, “Excavations: New Paintings,” Jeff Perrott, September 1996
Artsmedia, cover, summer issue 1996
The Newton Tab, Kristen Lombardi, October 29, 1996
Boston Sunday Herald, , “Women’s Painting have ‘rite’ stuff,” Mario Diacono Gallery exhibition, Mary Sherman , June 25, 1995
Bay Windows, Shawn Hill, July7, 1994
The Boston Globe, Christine Temin, October 13, 1993
Art New England, Paul Parcellin, August 1993
The Boston Globe, Lynda Morgenworth, February 18, 1993
New American Painting Magazine, competition. 1993
Newport This Week, John Pantalone, August 6, 1992
The Newport Daily News, Rob Reimer, July 30, 1992
The Boston Globe, Nancy Stapen, October 17, 1991
South End News, Elizabeth Fearnley, September 26, 1991
Honors and Awards
2003 First Place, Newport Art Museum
1999 Four month residency as an Exchange Teacher in Beijing, China, awarded by Newton Public Schools and the Freeman Foundation
1991 Greek Studies Fellowship, Newton Public School and AHEPA
1991 Vermont Studio Colony Fellowship
1974 Rhode Island School of Design Fellowship
Source: Diamond-Newman Fine Arts LLC has sourced this information from the artist. This information is solely for historical perspective and we can not guarantee the comprehensivenessor complete accuracy of this information since we did not directly comprise the historical log of the artist's shows ourselves. Exhibition information should not be a basis for purchasing artwork.
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