Myfanwy Spencer Pavelic (RCA)
MYFANWY PAVELIC was born and raised on Vancouver
Island. She had little formal art training, but at the age of 15
an exhibition was arranged for her by Canada's foremost West Coast
painter, Emily Carr. Pavelic's love of music and talent as a musician
attracted her to the career of a concert pianist but when a problem
with her wrists barred further development in this field, she turned
her creativity to drawing and painting.
For several years she spent part of each year
in New York. Here she observed the changing climate of the international
art world. She experimented with abstract expressionism, but finally
reaffirmed her commitment to her own evolving figurative style.
She has worked in oil, acrylic, and has successfully experimented
with tissue collage. Charcoal, one of her favourite media, has been
used for both prepatory sketches and finished drawings.
For most of her career Pavelic has focused on
the human figure and is renowned for her portrait paintings. Local
and international personalities have come to her Saanich studio
for sittings, from Maxwell Bates and her fellow artists of the Victoria
"Limners" group to former Canadian Prime Minister, Pierre
Elliott Trudeau.
However, the music world has remained a constant
interest. Its creative personalities have provided her with much
subject matter for her paintings and sketches. These include Mstislav
Rostropovich, Paul Badura-Skoda, Glenn Gould, Jan Cherniavsky, Zara
Nelsova, Ravi Shankar - and her close friend, the actress, Katharine
Hepburn. Pavelic's now well-known portrait of Yehudi Menuhin was
commissioned by Lord Thompson for Fleet for Britain's National Portrait
Gallery in 1984.
Pavelic has been awarded the Order of Canada,
is a member of the Royal Canadian Academy and holds an Honorary
Doctorate of Fine Arts from the University of Victoria.
For more information, visit:
www.maltwood.uvic.ca/pavelic
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