Barbara Cole Archives - Toronto Guardian https://torontoguardian.com/tag/barbara-cole/ Toronto Guardian - Toronto News, Events, Arts & Culture. Wed, 07 Jan 2026 14:54:58 +0000 en-CA hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.9.4 https://torontoguardian.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/cropped-TorontoGuardian_FaviconLogo512_C1V1-32x32.jpg Barbara Cole Archives - Toronto Guardian https://torontoguardian.com/tag/barbara-cole/ 32 32 “A Day in the Life” with: Toronto Photographer Barbara Cole https://torontoguardian.com/2026/01/toronto-artist-barbara-cole/ Wed, 14 Jan 2026 08:33:06 +0000 https://torontoguardian.com/?p=118727 Barbara Cole is a Toronto-born fine art photographer celebrated for her dreamlike imagery and inventive use of photographic techniques, including [...]

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]]> Barbara Cole is a Toronto-born fine art photographer celebrated for her dreamlike imagery and inventive use of photographic techniques, including underwater photography and modernized wet collodion. Her work explores themes of transformation, weightlessness, and self-discovery, capturing figures in states of transition and reflection.

Throughout her career, Cole has worked internationally on commercial projects and has created several large-scale commissions, including an installation for the atrium at the M. Lau Breast Cancer Centre in Toronto’s Princess Margaret Hospital. Her series Underworld was exhibited at the Canadian Embassies in Tokyo and Washington, D.C.

Cole has won prestigious awards, including the Grand Prize at the Festival International de la Photographie de Mode in Cannes and third prize at the International Photography Awards in New York. In 2012, the acclaimed documentary series Snapshot: The Art of Photography II featured an episode devoted exclusively to Cole’s photographic practice, and her most recent book, Between Worlds, was published by teNeues in 2023.

Barbara Cole
Working with talented designer Steven Lejambe to create the costumes for a new series, Rendezvous.
Barbara Cole
Revealing the framed black and white Impermanence images at Total Image Works, where I print and frame.
Pool shooting, with model Alyx from Niwa Models, sometimes means “in the rain”.
The Impermanence show was shot old style with a Rolleiflex twin lens reflex camera and black and white film.
Working in my underwater studio for the past 25 plus years.
Working in my “dry” studio with model/actress Leah Kirkup from Niwa and hairstylist Ryan Greenwood, agency director of 21 Management, for my Whispers series.
Barbara Cole
Working on my next series, Whispers, which is in studio and digital.
Barbara Cole
My good friend and assistant for many years, Mark Kneeshaw.

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Which ’hood are you in?

Spadina Village

What do you do?

I’m a fine art photographer working both underwater and above since 1982

What are you currently working on?

Multiple projects, both in water and the studio

Where can we find your work?

Bau-Xi Gallery, both Toronto and Vancouver, Galerie de Bellefeuille in Montreal, Holden Luntz Gallery in Palm Beach and Art Angels in Los Angeles.

 

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