The Most Famous
ARTISTS from Canada
This page contains a list of the greatest Canadian Artists. The pantheon dataset contains 125 Artists, 1 of which were born in Canada. This makes Canada the birth place of the 21st most number of Artists behind North Macedonia, and Georgia.
Top 3
The following people are considered by Pantheon to be the most legendary Canadian Artists of all time. This list of famous Canadian Artists is sorted by HPI (Historical Popularity Index), a metric that aggregates information on a biography’s online popularity.
1. John Howe (b. 1957)
With an HPI of 46.85, John Howe is the most famous Canadian Artist. His biography has been translated into 20 different languages on wikipedia.
John Howe (born August 21, 1957) is a Canadian book illustrator and concept designer, best-known for his artwork of J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth.
2. Bill Reid (1920 - 1998)
With an HPI of 40.98, Bill Reid is the 2nd most famous Canadian Artist. His biography has been translated into 15 different languages.
William "Bill" Ronald Reid Jr., also known as Iljuwas Bill Reid, (12 January 1920 – 13 March 1998) was a Haida artist whose works include jewelry, sculpture, screen-printing, and paintings. Producing over one thousand original works during his fifty-year career, Reid is regarded as one of the most significant Northwest Coast artists of the late twentieth century. The Bill Reid Gallery of Northwest Coast Art celebrates his legacy through the curation of contemporary Indigenous art. Reid was a matrilineal descendant of K'aadaas Gaa K'iigawaay, who belong to K_ayx_al, the Raven matrilineages of the Haida Nation. This matrilineage traces its origins to T'aanuu Llnagaay. His names are Iljuuwas (Princely One), Kihlguulins (One Who Speaks Well), and Yaahl SG_waansing (Solitary Raven). Some of his major works were featured on the Canadian $20 banknote of the Canadian Journey series (2004–2012).
3. Kenojuak Ashevak (1927 - 2013)
With an HPI of 38.61, Kenojuak Ashevak is the 3rd most famous Canadian Artist. Her biography has been translated into 16 different languages.
Kenojuak Ashevak, (Inuktitut: ᕿᓐᓄᐊᔪᐊᖅ ᐋᓯᕙᒃ, Qinnuajuaq Aasivak) was a Canadian Inuk artist. She was born on October 3, 1927 at Camp Kerrasak on southern Baffin Island, and died on January 8, 2013 in Cape Dorset, Nunavut. Known primarily for her drawings as a graphic artist, she also had a diverse artistic experience, making sculpture and engraving and working with textiles and also on stained glass. She is celebrated as a leading figure of modern Inuit art and one of Canada's preeminent artists and cultural icons. Part of a pioneering generation of Arctic creators, her career spanned more than five decades. She made graphic art, drawings and prints in stone cut, lithography and etching, beloved by the public, museums and collectors alike. Kenojuak has mainly painted animals in fantastical, brightly-colored aspects, but also landscapes and scenes of everyday life, in a desire to represent them in a unique aesthetic, making them beautiful by her own standards, and conveying a real spirit of happiness and positivity. She has an intuitive and sensitive way of working : she begins her works without having a clear idea of the final result, letting herself be guided by her intuition and her own perception of aestheticism through colors and shapes. She painted throughout her life, never ceasing to seek out new techniques to renew her artistic creation. At the beginning of her life, her fantastical, seemingly simple works became more complex over time, taking on a more technical aspect. At the end of her life, the artist returned to simpler, more singular forms and even brighter colors. Ashevak surmounted her circumstances to become an artist. Her range of mediums was exceptionally broad and included stained glass. Her achievements were honoured. She was the first Inuit artist inducted into Canada's Walk of Fame (2001), was made an Officer of the Order of Canada (1967) and promoted to Companion in 1982. She received the Governor General's Award in Visual and Media Arts (2008) and the Order of Nunavut (2012). Her work, with its superb design qualities, was used for Canadian stamps, coins and banknotes. Kenojuak's best-known work, making her one of the most famous Inuit artists, remains “The Enchanted Owl” dating from 1960. This major work by the artist was used on a stamp to commemorate the centenary of the Northwest Territories in the 1970s. Her artistic work is thus recognized as an integral part of Inuit culture, and more broadly of Canadian culture. In 2017, the Bank of Canada unveiled a commemorative $10 banknote in honour of Canada's 150th birthday featuring Ashevak's print Owl's Bouquet on the note. She received Honorary Doctorates from Queen's University (1991) and the University of Toronto (1992) and many films were made about her life.
People
Pantheon has 3 people classified as Canadian artists born between 1920 and 1957. Of these 3, 1 (33.33%) of them are still alive today. The most famous living Canadian artists include John Howe. The most famous deceased Canadian artists include Bill Reid, and Kenojuak Ashevak. As of April 2024, 2 new Canadian artists have been added to Pantheon including Bill Reid, and Kenojuak Ashevak.
