Edie Marshall is a Saskatchewan painter who is interested in the environment, the history and culture of the land. Most of her work is about the prairies where she finds an unlimited and often overlooked source of colours and shapes, ideas and images. Edie paints large energetic canvases and small intimate ones as a way to describe the vastness and energy of the land with its diverse and unique ecosystems. 

Edie received her Bachelor of Fine Arts from the University of Saskatchewan in 2004 with Great Distinction. She has work in public collections at the University of Saskatchewan and St. Thomas More Gallery in Saskatoon. Her work has been exhibited internationally and can be found in private collections in Canada, the United States, Mexico, Europe and Australia.  

Edie  worked as the Program Coordinator at the Art Gallery of Regina and at CARFAC SASK. She is an advocate for visual arts and artists and has served on the CARFAC Saskatchewan and National Boards, the board of directors for the Art Gallery of Regina and the Saskatchewan Arts Board. She taught painting at the Neil Balkwill Civic Art Centre for three years and continues to teach workshops in Regina and Moose Jaw.   Edie currently lives in Riverhurst, Saskatchewan where she has her studio practice.

Moving Landscapes

The idea started as a series of layered abstract landscape paintings beginning with a red underpainting and drawings copied from my sketch book, drawings that were executed while walking on land that was once covered with wild strawberries and was my home for much of my life.  At the time I was reminded of John Lennon’s “Strawberry Fields Forever”, a song about place and memory.

I broadened this idea by  using other coloured grounds and drawings that were executed while moving through the landscape, either by walking or riding in a vehicle.  The coloured grounds provided me with a strategy to move away from local and illustrative landscape colours to that of vibrant, saturated, hues.  The source drawings that I used are  layered with gestural marks and overlapped images, becoming abstract very quickly, loosening an adherence to faithful representation.  The marks and the vibrant coloured grounds stimulated my imagination and memory towards paintings that are sensorially rich.