For the FINAL post in our Artist You Need To Know series, we’re honouring William (Bill) Kirby.
Kirby is an appropriate person to end this series with as he has been an advocate for Canadian art and artists for decades, and his work with the Centre for Contemporary Canadian Art inspired our Artists You Need To Know series.
In 1997, Kirby co – founded – and became the executive director of – the Centre for Contemporary Canadian Art, ‘where he developed the Canadian Art Database, an innovative and extensive resource made freely accessible online for artists, educators, researchers and the general public. His dedicated archival work has broadened awareness of contemporary Canadian art and artists at home and abroad.’ (from here)
This project grew naturally from Kirby’s tenure as the head of the the Canada Council Art Bank.
Speaking in 2008, Kirby asserted that “What makes it unique is that the artists’ history is online. I think the artists feel quite strongly about the thorough context in which they are represented,” Kirby says. “It is the most in-depth look at the Canadian art scene that’s out there.”
Kirby was Director of the Edmonton Art Gallery from 1967 to1971, Curator of Contemporary Art at the Winnipeg Art Gallery from 1974 to 1978 and a Visual Arts Officer for the Canada Council (1978 to 1981). He was also Head of the Canada Council Art Bank for 14 years, and was responsible for the Council’s Program of Assistance to Art Galleries and Artist-Run Spaces for several years.
As well, Kirby was a Professor of contemporary Canadian art at the School of Art at the University of Manitoba (1973 to 1978) and has been a lecturer and visiting Assistant Professor in the Department of Visual Art at York University in Toronto. He’s been on a number of boards and advisory committees over his extensive career, including the Canadian Conference of the Arts, the Canadian Art Museum Directors Organization, the Canadian Museums Association, the Western Canada Art Association, the Ontario Association of Art Galleries, The Artists Foundation, and the OnDisc Alliance. Kirby has also been a member of the Acquisition Committee of the Portrait Gallery of Canada.
He earned his Masters Degree in Contemporary Canadian Art from the University of British Columbia in 1973 after receiving a BA from the same institution in 1966.
Kirby was honoured with the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts medal in 2005 for his distinguished contributions to the visual arts in Canada.
From here : “Since 2013, it has been permanently housed at Concordia University in Montreal, under the auspices of the Gail and Stephen A. Jarislowsky Institute for Studies in Canadian Art, a Research Centre within the Faculty of Fine Arts.
The underlying objective of the CCCA Canadian Art Database has been to broaden public awareness of contemporary Canadian Art in Canada and abroad by documenting the careers of some of Canada’s leading professional artists, designers, art writers and curators, as well as some important Canadian art institutions and organizations that have helped shape the Canadian art scene since the 1960s.”
Like any online project that is, by its nature, the efforts of many that have been shepherded by Kirby, it evolved and expanded, becoming a significant resource for many exploring both contemporary Canadian art but also the rich history of the same.
In 2024, Bill Kirby was recognized as a Member of the Order of Canada for his extensive career and dedicated work in not just promoting Canadian art and artists, but being instrumental in ensuring that the history of Canadian art (both in terms of individual artists, but also in preserving the history of many organizations and events that have helped define Canadian art history) is accessible and available to future generations.
The CCC Canadian Art Database is available here, and we encourage you to spend significant time with it, exploring both the artists originally included by Kirby but also the many others that have been added to the ever growing collection.
Featuring Bill Kirby as the last person of importance in our Artists You Need To Know series is also a nod of not just inspiration but appreciation and admiration for his work as a proponent of Canadian Art.
As 2025 comes to a close, and we end this project, we’d also like to remind you that the Artists You Need To Know series will be online indefinitely, and encourage you to continue to explore it. We also want to thank all of our readers for their enthusiasm, interest and support of this series.