of Victoria
Video and photography
Laura Dutton (she/her) is a photo/video-based artist working and living in Victoria BC on the unceded territory of the lək̓ʷəŋən peoples. She received an MFA from the University of Victoria in 2011 and a BFA (Hons.) from Concordia University, Montréal in 2006.
Dutton works with photography and video installation to unravel the materiality of lens-based images and disrupt our ability to look straight through to the referent described. By obscuring, degrading, or removing the subject matter altogether, her images reveal their own process and become distilled suggestions of what once stood before the lens, offering an epistemological space for the viewer to meditate on the act of seeing and knowing.
Solo exhibitions of her work have been held at Deluge Contemporary (Victoria), The Alternator Centre for Contemporary Art (Kelowna), Esker Foundation Project Space (Calgary), PAVED Arts (Saskatoon), and VU Photo (Québec City). She’s taken part in recent group exhibitions at the Saskatoon Nuit Blanche, The Legacy Art Gallery (Victoria), The Victoria Arts Council, The Vancouver Art Gallery, Franc Gallery (Vancouver), Gallery Jones (Vancouver), Chernoff Fine Art (Vancouver), and Open Space (Victoria).
Dutton’s work was included in the opening exhibition for the inaugural year of the Capture Photography Festival in Vancouver, and she was the Québec winner of the 2006 BMO First Art competition. She has received project grants from both the Canada Council for the Arts and the BC Arts Council. Her work is included in collections of the Vancouver Art Gallery, the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, the Bank of Montreal, and the University of the Fraser Valley.