Kim Ondaatje

b.1928

Kim Ondaatje is a Canadian painter, photographer, printmaker, and documentary filmmaker. She was born in Toronto and studied at the Ontario College of Art (now OCAD) and later at McGill University. Ondaatje then continued her studies at Queen’s University, earning her MA in Canadian literature. Ondaatje went on to lecture at Wilfred Laurier University and Sherbrooke University. In the 1960s, Ondaatje began focusing on her art full-time. In 1967, with fellow Canadian artists Jack Chambers and Tony Urquhart, she founded Canadian Artists' Representation, which today is the Canadian Artists Representation/Frontes des Artistes Canadiens (CARFAC). In 2008, the University of Toronto held a retrospective exhibition of Ondaatje’s paintings between 1950-1975. During her career, Ondaatje worked for a number of arts institutions and museums, including the Museum London, the Agnes Etherington Art Centre, the Art Gallery of Ontario, and the Emily Carr University of Art and Design. Ondaatje married the poet and novelist Michael Ondaatje. In March 2009, Ondaatje and Urquhart were announced as joint winners of a Governor General's Award in Visual and Media Arts, Outstanding Contribution for their role in founding Canadian Artists' Representation (CARFAC), the Canadian Artists’ Representation/Le Front des artistes Canadiens. Ondaatje’s work is held within the collections of the National Gallery of Canada, the Art Gallery of Ontario, the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, the Robert McLaughlin Gallery, the Art Gallery of Windsor, and elsewhere.