Meet our MFA faculty members
During this program, you’ll have the opportunity to engage with some of our Studio Art and MFA faculty members
- Monica Tap
- John Kissick
- Martin Pearce
- Kristie MacDonald
Monica Tap
Toronto, Ontario
Professor, University of Guelph
Monica Tap is interested in how location or landscape can trigger memory; akin to how painting readily conjures its own past. This history reveals how aesthetics, among other factors, have operated to tame nature into landscape, and the artifice and assumptions underlying this.
Over the past fifteen years her canvases have been exhibited across Canada, in London, England, and in New York City. Currently, Tap’s work is represented in private, corporate and public collections in Canada and the U.S. She is also the recipient of many grants and awards, including:
- Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada grant for her project, Translation as a Strategy of Renewal in Painting
Education
- 1990, BFA – Nova Scotia College of Art and Design
- 1996, MFA – Nova Scotia College of Art and Design
oil on canvas, 78×78 in
oil on canvas 51 x 67 in
oil on canvas, 80 x 90 in
oil on canvas, 49×65 in
John Kissick
Guelph, Ontario
Professor, University of Guelph
John Kissick is a contemporary artist and writer. As an artist, Kissick is best known for his abstract paintings, which feature a hybrid pictorial space and balance historical references and pop culture.
Throughout his career, Kissick has had over 30 solo exhibitions in Canada, the U.S., and Germany, including two national touring shows and has been included in a number of survey exhibitions.
He has published numerous essays on contemporary art for national periodicals.
Education
- BFA – Queen’s University, Ontario
- MFA – Cornell University, Ithaca, New York.
- Management Development – Harvard University, Massachusetts
60″x 48″
66″ x 72″
No 7, 2014
59.5″ x 54″
Martin Pearce
Guelph, Ontario
Director, School of Fine Art & Music
Professor, University of Guelph
As Gary Michael Dault has written about his recent work, “painting is also applying pigment and removing it again, digging, chipping, sanding, maybe tearing at it with your fingernails. Pearce operates as if he were a surrogate for erosion, for the wearing away of the landscape by force and time.”
Pearce is the Director of the School of Fine Art and Music at the University of Guelph. He has exhibited paintings and drawings both nationally and internationally for almost 30 years. His work is included in public and private collections across Canada, the US, and Britain.
Education
- 1981, BFA – Newcastle Polytechnic, England
- 1985, MA, Painting – Royal College of Art, London, England
Kristie MacDonald
Toronto, Ontario
Assistant Professor, University of Guelph
In her art practice, MacDonald engages notions of the archive and the collection, as well as their roles in the evolving meanings and contextual histories of images and artifacts.
MacDonald recently completed her PhD in the Department of Visual Art at York University in Toronto. She is Coordinator of Printmaking at the University of Guelph.
Education
- 2008, BFA, Visual Arts – York University, Toronto, ON
- 2011, MIS, Archival Studies – University of Toronto, ON
- 2016, MFA, Visual Arts – York University, Toronto, ON
- 2022, PhD Candidate, Visual Arts – York University, Toronto ON
