RBC names distinguished panel for Eleventh Annual Canadian Painting Competition

Nine curators, artists, and gallery directors from across Canada will award a total of $55,000 to winners

TORONTO — RBC, with the support of the Canadian Art Foundation, today announced the jury panel for the 2009 RBC Canadian Painting Competition.

“The RBC Canadian Painting Competition supports and nurtures emerging Canadian artists by providing them a forum to display their artistic talent to the country and hopefully open doors to future opportunities,” said Gay Mitchell, deputy chairman, RBC Wealth Management. “The competition gives these artists the opportunity to showcase their work to some of the most respected members of the Canadian visual arts community.”

The 2009 jury panel is made up of nine distinguished members of the visual arts community, including curators, gallery directors and artists, representing every region of Canada. The 2009 RBC Canadian Painting Competition jury panel consists of:

* Nathalie de Blois, Curator of Contemporary Art, Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec
* Victoria Page, Owner, Gallery Page and Strange, Halifax
* Etienne Zack, Artist, Montreal
* Benjamin Diaz, Director, Diaz Contemporary, Toronto
* John Kissick, Artist & Director, School of Fine Art and Music, University of Guelph
* Josée Drouin-Brisebois, Curator, Contemporary Art, National Gallery of Canada
* Ken Lum, Artist, Vancouver
* Nancy Tousley, Senior Art Writer, Calgary Herald
* Kathleen Ritter, Assistant Curator, Vancouver Art Gallery

“RBC and the Canadian Art Foundation work closely to deliver a top quality competition and a big part of that is the selection of top quality judges,” said Ann Webb, executive director, Canadian Art Foundation. “The members of this jury panel were selected because each has unique expertise to offer. We feel their diverse backgrounds and experiences will serve the competition and the entrants well.”

Entries are now being accepted for the 2009 RBC Canadian Painting Competition and must be submitted by May 3, 2009.

Details and rules of the competition may be found at www.rbc.com/paintingcompetition. The submitted works will be short-listed to 15 semi-finalists by independent panels of regional judges. All regional jurors come together in May in Toronto to determine one national winner and two honourable mentions.

The 2009 winner will be announced October 7 and all 15 paintings will be on exhibit at the Musée d’art contemporain in Montreal. The three winning paintings will then travel to Toronto where they will be displayed at the Toronto International Art Fair October 22 - 26 followed by an exhibition of all 15 paintings at the Power Plant in Toronto from November 21 -29.

All finalists will be featured in Canadian Art magazine and on the web at www.rbc.com/paintingcompetition and www.canadianart.ca.

About the RBC Canadian Painting Competition
Established in 1999, the RBC Canadian Painting Competition is a tribute to Canada’s artistic talent. The goal of the competition is to support and nurture Canadian visual artists early in their career by providing them with a forum to display their artistic talent to the country and hopefully open doors to future opportunity. An investment in Canadian culture and the visual arts community, the competition will award one national prize of $25,000 and two honourable mentions will receive $15,000 each. Along with past winners, the winning paintings of 2009 will become part of RBC’s Canadian art collection comprised of more than 4,000 works of distinguished art collected over the past hundred years. Various paintings from the RBC collection have been exhibited in museums, enabling more Canadians to enjoy these wonderful works.