Dianne Bailey Allen Exhibition

Born and raised in northern Ontario, Dianne now lives in Callander,Ontario.

Determined to do something art related after high school, Dianne decided to study fine art over interior design because the four year program in interior design at Ryerson did not offer a degree. (It is degree granting now and her youngest daughter is a graduate of the program.)

Achieving her BA in Fine Art from the University of Guelph, she excelled in drawing under instructor John Filion. She then attended the University of Toronto where she earned her BEd in Visual Arts with Intermediate and Senior qualifications.

Accepting a job in her hometown, she ended up back at her old high school: teaching art. Hired at the age of twenty-one, and looking younger, it was many years before she could be “spotted” as the teacher in the classroom.

While teaching full time, coaching, getting married and raising three daughters, Dianne had little time for her own art but managed to take courses every summer from talented artists such as Greg Curnoe (ink drawing), Ken Danby (drawing and painting), Dizintar Mezulis (hand building in clay), Christopher Rees (clay portrait sculpture), Bruce St.Clair (watercolour and oil painting) and Jack Reid (watercolour).

Once her children were older, Dianne shared a studio space with two other artists at the Capitol Centre in North Bay, where she worked on her art most Saturdays and holidays, primarily using acrylics and watercolours. Some of her art can be seen on the North Bay Heritage Carousels, where she painted three scenery panels, two horses, a chipmunk and two of her paintings are reproduced.

In the fall of 2012 she retired from teaching, acquired her own studio space and began painting full time. A trip to Scotland in 2014 and a course at The Academy for Realist Art in Toronto inspired her to return to painting in oil. Her subject matter remains the same: people and places that are familiar to her, but she feels that her best work happens when she is working from life.

More of her art can be viewed on her website: dianneallenart.com