Ysabelle Vautour

2022 Winner

“Wow, thank you to the jury; this is amazing. I feel so thankful to be selected. It is validating to be acknowledged for my work, and I feel more at home in the art scene. This honour means a lot. I am excited to be able to deepen my art practice with this award.” Ysabelle

Ysabelle Vautour started out working in the mental health and disability support sector. In 2019 she decided to paint and create art every day for a year. A few months into her 365 art everyday challenge, she was featured by CBC, invited to speak at ArtsLink NB’s Short and Sweet Speaker Series, and participated in a few live painting competitions. Ysabelle’s work was also selected for a juried exhibition at the Nails on the Wall Gallery in Metuchen, New Jersey.

Ysabelle’s artwork tends to be close-up, bringing a sense of intimacy to the viewer and is a better view for the legally blind painter. She shielded away from painting, thinking it was not for her as she only sees in black and white and wouldn’t be able to tell if the colors looked muddy. It wasn’t until she tried art as therapy that she could focus on how it feels making the art as opposed to how it will look in the end.

In 2020 Ysabelle became a board member at Connexion Artist Run Center. She was featured in the Shediac Artist Village, Ami Ami-télé, and Created Here Magazine. She was recruited to give a public talk to NBCCD Craft College art students and was the artist in residence at the Fredericton Arts Alliance. Ysabelle received a micro-grant for her self-directed Alone Together residency from NBCCD Craft Library.

Ysabelle had two solo exhibitions in 2021, the first at the Penny Gallery in Fredericton and the second at Corid’art Gallery in Shediac. In addition, she was awarded two grants from artsnb for her project “Bodies in Motion,” which she will present at Leon Leger Gallery in September of 2022.

In 2021 she was featured as a live painter on the national stage at the Disability Without Poverty August Roundup event. A graduate of Artslink’s Catapult arts and business accelerator program. Later that year, she worked on Atlantic Canada’s first Disability Art Conference. The project was in collaboration with Theatre New Brunswick and the JRG Society for the Arts.

This year the artist was selected for Sync Canada leadership training. No stranger to trying new things, Ysabelle created and co-curated the NB Disability Artist Showcase at Fredericton Playhouse, Struts Gallery, and the National Access Art Center in Alberta. Look out for well as in a new television documentary on Ami-télé called 100% Passion, Third Shift, Sappy Fest, Nocturn, Bluenose Festival, Steps Public Art Roundtable, and the ZYP gallery in Alberta.

Lately, Ysabelle has been doing an artist residency at the NB Coalition for persons with disabilities and is currently undertaking the Inspire Festival Mural Training.

Check out Ysabelle’s art and updates at:

Youtube, Twitter, TikTok: @creatingaccess

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/creatingaccess

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/creatingaccess/