Nicole Young is a visual artist based on the traditional, unceded and occupied territories of the Musqueam, Squamish and Tsleil-Wautuh First Nations in Vancouver, Canada. Working at the junction of environmentalism, material exploration, and storytelling, Nicole’s works are as much experiments with materiality as they are conversations on ways to approach climate justice. She combines repurposed painted canvas with thrifted and hand dyed textiles, often sourcing natural materials to create pigments and dyes. Moving seamlessly between large scale textile installations, sewn works on canvas, and drawings, Nicole’s works blend traditional approaches to textile art with gestural, painterly characteristics.
Throughout the creation process, Nicole approaches her work with the mentality that nothing will be wasted, and this idea affects the way she creates everything from paper studies to large scale installations. Any leftover textiles, papers and canvas are always used in future paintings, and the gathering of materials and production of pigments is of equal importance to the creation of the final work itself. She uses painting as a way to deepen her connection with the natural world, and to create a dialogue about waste-free practices.
Nicole has always been interested in the connection between textiles and memory. Seeing specific fabrics brings to mind someone we have known, or a place we have visited, and Nicole is intrigued by the idea that a particular pattern or textile will always evoke different memories from herself to the viewer. By bringing these seemingly disparate pieces of textiles and painted canvas together, she is documenting the connections between memory, imagination, and reality, and how these are often fragmented yet dependent on one another.
Born in Ontario, Nicole attended the University of British Columbia Okanagan where she received a BFA in Visual Arts and Art History, and studied studio arts and art history at the University of California Los Angeles. She works out of her studio in Mount Pleasant as well as her home in North Vancouver. Her work has been exhibited in Canada and abroad since 2010, and her paintings are in private and corporate collections throughout the globe.
