Julie Liger-Belair

I love houses. The simple little image of a triangle on top of a square that all kids learn to draw early on and most every one around the world recognizes as a symbol for ‘dwelling’ and ‘home’ is so evocative and stimulates my imagination in so many ways. The house can symbolize the place where we are most comfortable, most ourselves, a place of warmth and protection. But it can just as easily symbolize a place where we feel trapped or where bad things can happen out of the public eye. The house can symbolize our inner world, the windows being our eyes that can look both in or out, that can divulge the inner turmoil or on the contrary keep it well hidden behind drawn curtains. For this reason I love drawing houses with no doors, forbidding entry or exit and only windows to see in or out of, a both comforting and scary notion.

 For this latest series I have chosen to paint on older paintings. I love the act of recycling older work, allowing some of the images to show through and so starting a conversation (if you will) between the new ideas and older ideas.

This is the latest ongoing series.

collage/paintings on birch cradle board

This series takes the themes of my last series (lost/perdu), which dealt with the private 'self' we keep secret, and 'exposes' these secret, fragile inner worlds for all to see. I am particularly interested in exploring women's issues through this series, looking at how these have evolved (or sometimes not) over the years. I tackle the struggles women face with motherhood and the simultaneous need to feel useful and fulfilled outside of the home, in our professional lives.

collages/paintings on wood cradle board

2017-2018

collages/assemblages in three dimensions

2016-2017