About the Art
Sensual-expressive qualities of colour, paint, and movement mingle with a vibrant imagination to infuse Strayer's paintings with an intelligent animism. "I seek lyrical or dramatic moments of contact between reality and imagination -- the surprises of being human and alive to inner and outer worlds." Strayer's art celebrates the vital variety of actual and imagined realities,. It engages us to discover the worlds within and around us,, seeking diverse beauty, meaning, and delight-- wherever they may be found. Both abstract styles and imaginative representations are used to express moments of insight and change. Her paintings invite viewer participation and dynamic connections that resonate beyond initial views. Her works have won awards, had positive press reviews, been featured in books, media, and both public and private collections. They have been the focus of solo shows, as well as in many juried exhibitions (click for CV).
As well as Artist-Direct sale of specific works,, Strayer's art is represented by organizations listed below For enquiries, please use the contact form on this page or email info@janetstrayer.com.
About the Artist
Born in Europe, educated in the US and Canada, Janet Strayer has had a life-long commitment to human development. Loving and collecting art from an early age, it was not her full-time career until 2002, with her first solo exhibition. She graduated from Barnard College, Columbia University in New York, was an international Fulbright Scholar, and pursued a rewarding academic-research career as a published professor of psychology in Canada. She has lived, worked, and travelled in many regions of the world, experiences that, along with her personal and professional background, find their way into her art. Her working studio is on Saturna Island, B.C. She has also been a featured writer for Arts Avenue magazine and maintains an online blog about art, travel, and creative living. Click here for Janet Strayer's Art CV.
To visit her studio on Saturna Island, please contact Janet using the form on this page or email
Current Clients/Representation:
VGH-UBC Art Foundation
Saatchi Online Recognized Artist
Federation of Canadian Artists
NVanArts Rental Programme
Singulart
Recent Solo Exhibitions: 2019-2020 (prior ones on CV):
Zack Gallery, Vancouver:Wings of Imagination
Centennial Theatre, N.Vancouver: Being There
Place des Arts, Vancouver: Flow
Recent International Juried Shows 2020-2021
Painting on the Edge, Federation Gallery, Vancouver,, in both 2021 and 2020 exhibits
Annual International Representational Exhibit, Federation Gallery, Vancouver, 2020
Press Reviews
"A leap of passion .... The pieces in this exhibit are themed around a fascination with flight, discovery and freedom, expressed through vivid colours and playful imagery" (Kristy Dockstader review, The Source, Vol.20:10, 2020)
"Janet Strayer's art illuminates the subtlety of emotion"
(Olga Livshin, newspaper review of Child Out of Time, 2010 ).
"In her paintings you can find more than beautiful and harmoniously overlapping colors. The paintings provide a distinct/different reality...There is movement and dialogue. They are not paintings to pass by but invite a critical look and thoughts of dreams and adventures.(Tatiana Oseguera, The Art of Making Art, Sin Fronteras, newspaper review, Nov., 2014 )
"The logic of dreams is endemic in her work. One could say of these paintings—and of her entire oeuvre—that they re-enchant." ( Jean-François Renaud, curator, Of Fables and Myths, 2015)
"Janet Strayer’s brushwork is animated and free, gesturing with a dynamism... paint is close to living matter. Actualized here is the vital impulse subtending the entirety of Nature and conjuring life forces—a “plane of immanence,” to quote from Gilles Deleuze...Existential vitality is explicitly addressed in a play of pure and multiple affects arising from our experience of these works."(J-F. Renaud, curator, Esprit, 2017)
2018:Janet Strayer: Flow Exhibition | Daily Hive Vancouver: link
2019: Close Up on Art: Janet Strayer | Tri-City News: link