Meet Marica Villeneuve

We’re excited to introduce you to the always interesting and insightful Marica Villeneuve. We hope you’ll enjoy our conversation with Marica below.

Marica, so good to have you with us today. We’ve always been impressed with folks who have a very clear sense of purpose and so maybe we can jump right in and talk about how you found your purpose?

Art has been a lifelong passion (or obsession) of mine. I was the kid that would sit quietly at the table for hours, creating. Like most artists though, life tried to beat it out of me a little bit — things like always getting in trouble for doodling in class and people repeatedly telling me about the “starving artist” trope. For that reason, I tried to do something more “practical” with my life, but found it impossible to ignore my love for art. So, I went to York University to study fine art and minored in psychology, with the hope of becoming an art therapist. I applied to study at an art therapy institute at the end of my degree and through a strange sequence of events, I was rejected, and surprisingly felt a sense of relief. Shortly afterward, they changed their minds and accepted me, which left me feeling utterly conflicted and surprisingly upset. I eventually listened to my heart and took my emotions as a sign; I had always wanted to help people, but as a deeply empathetic person, being a therapist didn’t seem like the healthy way for me to do that. Also, around this time, I won an art award at school, which came with the opportunity for a solo art exhibition. During my show, I received so many comments about how seeing my artwork felt like an escape, brightened peoples’ days, and uplifted emotions. This made me realize that creating art could maybe be my small way of helping others. As I tried to regain my footing in life after deciding not to pursue what I had spent years working towards, I worked as a custom art framer in Toronto, which ignited a big passion for that, then as an art and framing consultant at a large gallery. During the years that I worked as a consultant however, I neglected my art. I was so busy that I didn’t have any time or energy left for it. Then the pandemic hit, I was temporarily let go, and I began to work on my art like it was my 9-5 job, showing me that I could buckle down and dedicate myself to making art full time when given the chance. Also, as someone born with asthma, being at a higher risk of dying during the pandemic scared me into seeing that life is so short and maybe it was finally time to start following my dreams. I went back to work for a year or so while figuring out my next move in life, but by the end of that period, due to so many factors and changes at that workplace, I was beyond burnt out and feeling depressed. All of that, the revelations that I had during the first lockdown, and the planning I had done led to the decision to leave my job and finally pursue art full time. I was able to do just that for over 2 years, which was the most wonderful, fulfilling, and terrifying experience. The life of a full-time artist is not an easy one, but nothing has felt more right for me. I recently experienced more big life changes by moving away from the Toronto art community that I love to live in London, Ontario, so that my partner could get his PhD. The move was difficult for me and my business, but it eventually brought about some opportunities that satisfy my other passions, like working as a custom framer again (which I had really missed doing) and as a gallery assistant at the loveliest local art gallery. I’m still working as an artist too, and I’ll never stray far from this path again, no matter where the rollercoaster of life takes me. I have clearly never been able to fully ignore what feels like my “purpose” because my heart has consistently reminded me of it and guided me toward it throughout my life. I don’t really know whether I found my purpose, or it found me and completely latched on.

Great, so let’s take a few minutes and cover your story. What should folks know about you and what you do?

I consider myself a surreal nature artist with a passion for framing. I often like to include unique framing designs with my artwork and sometimes I work backwards, where a frame actually inspires my art. I like to let each art idea guide me toward what feels like the best medium to use to express it, but acrylic paint is what I use the most. My ideas come from my dreams and daydreams, and nature is my main inspiration. Our planet is the most wonderful, mysterious, and beautiful place! I have always loved learning about and discovering new plants and animals, and whenever I do, my imagination runs wild. When I paint, I want to make the impossible look possible by combining realism and surrealism, to immerse the viewer in a fantastical scene that subtly encourages deeper thoughts about our relationship with nature. A lot of my recent paintings are made with the intention of showcasing nature’s beauty, in the hopes of creating a better appreciation for it. Colour plays a big part in how I like to emphasize its beauty, as well as shape and texture, and how different elements in nature can relate to each other. I recently created a painting with goldfish swimming among flames from a fire, for example. Their colouring, movements, and flowing fins remind me of licks of flames. This painting actually won a major award recently, which made me feel so honoured that this wild kind of idea resonated with people so much!
Having spent a lot of my life travelling back and forth between Northern and Southern Ontario, living in both Toronto and North Bay at different points in my life, I have been able to experience urban and rural living. Because of this, a big portion of my work also combines animals and nature with man-made settings or objects, to bridge that gap. We tend to feel that we’re separate from nature, but I want to emphasize that we are actually very much a part of it. I hope that this encourages more people to take care of our planet — by doing so, we preserve all living things, us included. In keeping with these values, I don’t want my business to contribute to the destruction of our environment, so I only use recycled, re-used, and biodegradable packaging for my art and prints. I’d much rather have a beautiful planet over beautiful packaging.
I have started to share more information about the plants and animals that I include in my art when I share it, which I’ve really enjoyed because I can be a bit of a biology nerd, especially when it comes to marine biology. By doing this and through sharing and selling my art, I’m so happy to have witnessed people get more excited about nature! I’m looking forward to sharing some new surreal nature paintings at Artist Project 2025 in Toronto and at a couple of other gallery shows in London and Toronto. A big dream of mine is to one day get involved with an environmental organization and use my art to make a bigger impact on our beautiful planet.

If you had to pick three qualities that are most important to develop, which three would you say matter most?

Being authentic with my art has probably been most impactful in my journey as an artist. Not everyone is going to like what you create, but if you create what feels authentic to you and what inspires you the most, you will be the most fulfilled, and eventually your audience will find you. There have been (and still are) so many people that want me to just stick with painting landscapes or portraits because I have some of the technical skills to do those, but while I’ve enjoyed practicing those skills, it’s not the kind of art that sets my soul on fire. Not everyone has liked it, but once I started painting what I was really excited about — things that were surreal, unique, maybe even a little bit weird — I felt the most satisfied with my work, and I even started to get recognized for it. It can be scary to put your “weird” ideas out there, but being authentic is what will make you stand out in the art world! So don’t do what everyone else is doing, and don’t let people tell you what to create.
Developing a thick skin when it comes to rejection is also important. I get more rejections than acceptances, and this is the case for most artists that you will ever come across. As a deep-feeling person, I understand how truly awful it feels to be rejected, but I learned an important lesson when I was in university that impacted my attitude toward it ever since. I had applied to an annual group art show that I was so excited about and was rejected. I didn’t have a lot of experience with rejection at the time, so it hurt— a lot. But, I applied again the following year and 3 of my drawings got in! I had forgotten what I applied with the first time, but later discovered that one of the accepted drawings was the exact same one that had been rejected the year before. This showed me that rejections don’t have to mean that your art is “bad”. Most of the time it’s simply about who’s in the jury that year, the type of show, the theme, the venue, etc — there are seriously so many factors involved that we can’t possibly leap to a rejection meaning that we’re bad artists! So don’t stop applying to things. A rejection just means that the opportunity isn’t the right fit for you this time around. Maybe it will be next time, or the next time after that, or you’ll get accepted into something else that’s even better for you. Do your research to avoid unnecessary rejections (for example, don’t apply to a gallery that just shows landscape paintings if you’re an abstract artist) but don’t let rejections stop you from putting your art out there.
The third most impactful quality in my journey has been openness to exploring new things. When I was 13, my mom signed me up for art classes with a wonderful local art teacher. She encouraged me to try painting and I was so resistant because I had gotten comfortable with drawing at that point and didn’t care to try anything else. I tried it though, fell completely in love with it, and to this day it’s the main method by which I create art. I’m so grateful to that art teacher for her encouragement and guidance, and now I try new mediums whenever I can! The same thing happened when I was encouraged by colleagues at an art store to try working as a custom framer. I used to think that frames were the most boring part of a displayed work of art, but I tried framing, fell totally in love with it, and my new appreciation for frames greatly impacted the trajectory of my art practice. I think that being open to exploring new things can make you a stronger, more versatile artist, and you seriously never know when you might come across a new art form that you will love.

What is your biggest challenge right now

Right now, my biggest challenge is finding a good balance between my other jobs and my work as a professional artist. 2024 was a difficult art-selling year for a lot of artists, myself included. For that reason, and because I moved away from the art community that I had started to carve a little place into, I decided to look for work outside of my art business this summer. Within a few weeks of each other, two great opportunities presented themselves. I now work part time as a custom framer and as a gallery assistant, but taking on these roles has greatly impacted my time to work in the studio. Sometimes I wish that I could split myself into 3 so that I can do everything to the fullest extent! But I understand that I’m just one person and can only do so much, so I’m trying to work out a better balance to allow me to keep pushing my art business forward while still being able to do these other things that I enjoy. I’m still very much in the process of figuring it out, but I’m hopeful that I’ll be able to find a good balance that keeps me on the path toward my bigger goals.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://www.artbymarica.com
• Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/art.by.marica
• Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/maricavilleneuveart