Catriona Jeffries

Liz Magor

Liz Magor (b. 1948, Winnipeg; lives/works: Vancouver) is an artist whose practice has centred primarily on sculpture for over four decades. Using traditional mould-making techniques, Magor replicates everyday objects either as discrete, uncanny forms, or spliced together with an unrelated quotidian object of her environment. In Hollow (1998–1999), Magor hollow-cast a section at the base of a tree trunk, leaving a wall just a few inches thick, which she lined inside with soft foam. The resulting cavity is large enough to crawl into and the artist underscored that invitation by placing a blue sleeping bag inside. More recent work includes a recurring motif of cardboard boxes cast in polymerized gypsum and covered in a trompe l’oeil patina and paired with found objects like stuffed animals or clothing. In McKee and Cook (2017), one such slim “box” stands on the floor as a stuffed animal draped over top looks like it is about to drop a vintage garment that it is dangling on a hanger. Consistent throughout Magor’s practice is an experimentation with traditional sculptural elements such as mass, volume, and weight, mixed with a slightly sardonic humor. In even the most unassuming items, like a plastic bag, her approach draws out the non-utilitarian functions of objects and our human attachments to them, such as needs for comfort and affirmation.

Magor studied at the Vancouver School of Art and at Parsons School of Design in New York City. In 2021, France awarded Liz Magor as a recipient of the Chevalier dans l'Ordre des Arts et des Lettres. In 2015, she was the recipient of the Gershon Iskowitz Prize, and in 2001, she was recipient of the Governor General’s award. In 1987, she exhibited at documenta 8 in Kassel, Germany, and in 1984, she represented Canada at the Venice Biennale.