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Ilyana Martinez - Images of stones, seeds, plants and buildings scatter in abstract space. Nature refuses to die and the man-made world comes alive
Ilyana Martinez was born in Toronto to a Mexican father and Canadian mother, and was raised in Mexico and the United States. Ilyana studied Communication Design in Nova Scotia (NSCAD) before she went to the Ontario College of Art & Design and graduated with honours majoring in drawing and painting (2002). She has received an award for watercolour from the Toronto Outdoor Art Exhibition, and in 2006, she received an Ontario Arts Council project grant which took her to Mexico.
Currently Ilyana Martinez lives and works in Toronto. Her recent series of work is on amate, a bark paper handmade by the Otomi. In an intuitive working process, forms and colours emerge on the soft textured surface. Images of stones, seeds, plants and buildings scatter in abstract space. Nature refuses to die and the man-made world comes alive, as one fuses with the other. The drawings are remnants of a dialogue with her surroundings.
