Thaddeus Holownia, is a visual artist, teacher, letterpress printer and publisher. Holownia was born in England in 1949 and immigrated to Canada in 1954. He grew up in a Polish home blessed with original art and a modest library of art books. His mother was a weaver, and his father an engineer who made photographs and painted. Family trips to galleries and museums across Canada and the US imbued Holownia with an early appreciation of art, architecture and the natural world. He completed a B.A. in Communication and Fine Arts at University of Windsor in 1972. Currently he is a professor and head of the Fine Arts Department at Mount Allison University in Sackville, New Brunswick.
A catalyst moment was a gift of a 35mm rangefinder camera from his uncle Joe Skarzenski in 1968. Encounters in Toronto in 1970s with Canadian designer Allan Fleming, Stan Bevington at the Coach House Press, A Space Gallery and association with the Toronto artist collective “the Order of the Broom” contributed to formative years in the development of his artistic interests.
Holownia’s work has been the subject of numerous exhibitions, including Thaddeus Holownia: the Terra Nova Suite, a twenty-five year survey of his work in Newfoundland & Labrador at the Provincial Gallery (The Rooms) in St. John’s Newfoundland. His 1998 a mid career retrospective exhibition, Extended Vision: Photographs by Thaddeus Holownia 1978 -1997, organized by the Canadian Museum of Contemporary Photography, traveled across Canada and to the Centro de la Imagen in Mexico City. His photographs have been included in numerous group exhibitions, including Monet’s Legacy: Series, Order and Obsession at the Hamburger Kunsthalle, Hamburg, Germany and Car Culture at the Heckscher Museum in Huntington NY.
Holownia is a Fulbright Fellow, and elected member of the RCA. He has twice received the Paul Paré Medal from Mount Allison University in recognition of excellence in teaching, creative activity, research, and community service. Recent awards include the Lieutenant Governor’s Award for High Achievement in the Visual Arts from artsNB and the Order of New Brunswick.