JEANIE RIDDLE:
THIS WORLD OF SHAPES
With contributions by jake moore, Arturo Abundes-Corona, Leela Riddle-Merritte, and David Ayala-Alfonso.
JEANIE RIDDLE:
THIS WORLD OF SHAPES
With contributions by jake moore, Arturo Abundes-Corona, Leela Riddle-Merritte, and David Ayala-Alfonso.
ISBN: 978-1-77835-716-9
Format: softcover
160 pages, 21.5 x 14 cm
Edition size: 250
Release date: October 24, 2026
Spanning multiple decades of practice, this book is a comprehensive presentation of Jeanie’s expansive artistic practice.
Alongside her vast installation and painting work, This World of Shapes presents the artist’s writings, moving between memoir, creative writing, and poetry, offering generous insight into her thought, methods, and experiences. The book is an invitation to wander from the quiet introspection of abstraction towards the pulsating rhythm of personal stories, hardship, transformation and poetic reckoning.
Amplifying the possibilities of an artistic monograph, This World of Shapes includes essays by curators, essayists, and neuroscientists, highlighting the connections between Jeanie’s thought and multiple spheres of human experience. It also features an introduction by Leela Riddle-Merritte, Jeanie’s daughter, a unique contribution that insightfully connects the artistic work with an intimate, emotional history.
This World of Shapes will be released at the finissage of Jeanie’s solo exhibition of the same name, presented at LIVART as part of the 3rd edition of Pictura, Montreal’s painting triennial. The book will be presented by the artist in conversation with the book’s editor, David Ayala-Alfonso.
This World of Shapes is published with the kind support of Canada Council for the Arts* and is distributed in Canada through Pictura MTL and internationally through Form and Color Only.
*The Canada Council for the Arts mandate is to foster and promote the study and enjoyment of, and the production of works in, the arts. Through its grants, services, prizes, initiatives, and payments, the Canada Council supports a dynamic and diverse arts and literary scene. These activities generate a meaningful cultural, social and economic impact for over 2,000 communities in all parts of the country and beyond. The investments and leadership of the Council help advance public engagement in the arts from coast to coast to coast while also contributing to the international recognition of artists and arts organizations from Canada.
Jeanie Riddle engages with painting as an expanded language that defines itself through color, shape, space, process, transformation, tender care, (her version of) feminist activity, and play. She wrestles with new meaning from the isolated practice of working in the studio where applied knowledge, use of materials, art history, social constructs and personal politics come together to make art as well as delving into the inner work of understanding personal narrative and origin stories to deliver scenarios. She takes risks with her engagement of working in arenas associated with the feminine – décor, arrangements, beauty – ways that allow a further depth to her inquiry while she stealthy slides her work into abstraction. These material manifestations and her considered upcycling of looked for objects, are acts of precise selection and siting as Content.
She holds a MFA from Concordia (2005) and has attended residencies at El Sur, Mexico City, Casa Lü, Mexico City, Bemis Center, Omaha NB, Cite des arts Internationale, Paris,Triangle Arts, Brooklyn NY, and the Vermont Studio Center. Her work has been shown across Canada as well as in Mexico City, Brussels, Berlin and Paris. Her projects have been repeatedly supported by Canada Council for the Arts and the conseil des arts et lettres du Quebec. A professional cultural worker, Riddle was the founding director of Parisian Laundry where she established numerous artist’s careers. She has worked as a consultant, juror, educator and writer and presently, dedicates her time to her own established mid career practice. She currently lives and works in Montreal and Mexico City.