Horror Vacui II, Black Doodle (2021) Painting by Tina Mc Callan (Marie Julou)

Born in Guernsey, Channel Islands in 1964, she left the island at 18 to study at Art School where she explored mostly painting as her medium. This lead to an M.A. in Painting from the Royal Academy of Arts in London (1990-1993) where she was the recipient of several prizes and then she was awarded a DAAD scholarship to study with Gunter Uecker at the Art Academy Dusseldorf (1994-96). At the time she was interested in abstract art and spirituality, in Germany, her art practice broadened to include installation, performance and film. She had several group shows, “The Holy” in Recklinghausen in a church where she made an installation in the bell tower and several solo shows “Do you know what your wish is” at Galerie Laden 33 and in London at Curtain Road Arts, Shoreditch “I spun a web”.

Wanting to include other people in her work, in 1999 she made her first “Recreation” project: a collaborative painting project based on an Old Master workshop where the audience of the museum is invited to paint their own masterpiece. Commissioned by the National Gallery in London she produced “Piero di Cosimo” in 2002, a Recreation project with 100 people. This she considers her “public” extroverted practice. Subsequent commissions and exhibitions have included: The United Nations Lebanon, The Museum of London, 24 hours in Neukoln, Berlin, The Canakkale Bienalle, Turkey, Glastonbury Festival and more recently the Museo de Belles Artes, Valencia.

Parallel to producing these “Recreations” she continues to produce abstract paintings in a more “Private” introverted practice. Travel has played a huge role in her art, living in cities as diverse as Istanbul, Dusseldorf, London and Paris as well as small towns such as Fethiye in Turkey. She has undertaken several residencies, the most remarkable being six weeks in Mauritius where she travelled with the Uecker class to stage an exhibition. McCallan opted to live with a Tamil family and take part in the religious ceremony Cavadee. For her, religion, ritual, art and performance are all inextricably linked and she views painting as a kind of performance. She currently paints in her studio in Russafa, Valencia under the name of Marie Julou, a painting pseudonym which she invented when she lived in Paris in 2002 (McCallan’s middle name and mother’s maiden name). She has since exhibited in several group shows under this name “Horror Vacui” L’Escuela, Ruzafa with photographer, Steve Jones and curated an exhibition “Dirty Pink” of 13 international Female artists which was shown at Sporting Club Russafa, Valencia, Spain.

• Nationality: UNITED KINGDOM
• Date of birth : unknown date
• Artistic domains: Works by professional artists, Represented by a Gallery,
• Groups: Professional Artist Contemporary British Artists Artists presented by a gallery