Michael Belmore
Michael Belmore (Anishinaabe), a member of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts, was born in 1971 north of Thunder Bay, Ontario. He holds an associated diploma (1994) in sculpture/installation from the Ontario College of Art and Design in Toronto, Ontario, and currently lives in Ottawa, Ontario. Belmore works in a variety of media including plastics, metal, wood, and stone. These materials are important to understanding his work, bringing into account how we view nature as a commodity. Belmore’s work has warranted numerous awards from the Ontario Arts Council, Canada Council and Canadian Native Arts Foundation.
The North American landscape, especially its watersheds, continues to be shaped by our divergent tendencies to that of nature. Rivers have been dammed, streams redirected and wetlands drained all in order to better satisfy the demands of western society. Over the past few years my practice has focused primarily on stone carving and the traditional metal smithing technique of chasing and repoussé. Through the arduous process of hammering copper, I have continued to map out waterways through calculated and miscalculated blows.
