b. 1936, Negootkook, New Brunswick
First Nations Affiliation: Wabnaqii

Dedicated feminist, activist, and artist, Shirley Bear is a painter trained at Whistler House Gallery and the Boston Museum. Her work draws upon Maliseet myths, legends, and petroglyph images to counter post-contact, patriarchal attitudes and systems. With this goal foremost, she has worked extensively as a lecturer, performer, political lobbyist (along with other Native women she was at the forefront of the struggle to reinstate those women who had lost their Indian status through marriage to non-Native men), and curator (Changers: A Spiritual Renaissance, and Decelebration). A recipient of the prestigious Ford and Lansdowne Fellowships (1969, 1997), Bear has also earned grants from the Canada Council and residencies at the Banff Centre for the Arts, the Women's Art Resource Centre, the St. Michael's Print Shop in Newfoundland, and Altos de Chavon in the Dominican Republic. A First Nations Education Advisor at Emily Carr Institute of Art & Design, she is a resident elder and specialist in traditional botanical science.

R E C E N T   E X H I B I T I O N S

S E L E C T E D    C O L L E C T I O N S

Canadian Museum of Civilization, Hull, Québec
National Arts Centre, Ottawa, Ontario

S E L E C T E D   B I B L I O G R A P H Y

"Ancient Aboriginal images." ARTSatlantic 9, no. 1 (Winter 1989): 4-5. [Review: Gallery Connexion, Fredericton, New Brunswick]

Dornan, Linda Rae. The Vocation of Storytelling: Rooted in Community - Shirley Bear, Marlene Creates, Yvon Gallant, Janice Leonard, Carol Taylor. Sackville, New Brunswick: Struts Centre, 1994.

"Footprints." Calgary Herald, 26 September 1991, p. C1,C2. [Review: The New Gallery]

Gray, Viviane, and Moira Dianne O'Neill. Pe'l A'tukwey: Let Me . . . Tell a Story: Recent Work by Mi'kmaq and Maliseet Artists. Halifax, Nova Scotia: Art Gallery of Nova Scotia, 1993.

Murray, Carla and Mary Anne Barkhouse. "Focus on WARC." Matriart: A Canadian Feminist Art Journal 2, no. 1 (1991) : 34-39.

Nowlan, Alden. Nine Micmac Legends. Illustrated by Shirley Bear. Hantsport, Nova Scotia: Lancelot Press, 1983.

Richler, Nancy. "Different struggles, different rights (Interview with Bet-te Paul and Shirley Bear)." Broadside A Feminist Review 9, no. 4 (February 1988): 4.

Silman, Janet. Enough is Enough: Aboriginal Women Speak Out. Toronto, Ontario: The Women's Press, 1987.

Vernon, Terri R. "Shirley Bear's ancient images." ARTSatlantic 10, no. 3 (Winter 1991): 16. [Review: Mount Saint Vincent University Art Gallery, Halifax, Nova Scotia]