Maria Kelebe
ev is a Moscow born Toronto-based artist and a community art facilitator. Maria creates landscapes, still lives, and portraiture in a loose contemporary impressionistic style. She is very passionate about the benefit of art creation and consumption on mental health and takes every available opportunity to bring art closer to the community.
“From a young age, art has been my meditation and my means of centering. In my adulthood, I have begun turning to art to help myself navigate life by using my work as a processing tool. I focused on the impressionistic style to express my feelings, and future plans. I view art creation and consumption as something very personal to all parties involved and as a major mental health component.”
Maria’s art education began at the Claude Watson School of the Arts in Toronto for both elementary and high school programs. She continued her education at the Aegean Canter for the Fine Art in Italy and Greece, and with further training received at the Academy of Realist Art in Toronto. Maria also attended the Lauder Business School in Vienna, Austria where she continued her art practice while organizing public art workshops and exhibits.
Maria explores themes of storytelling, memory, and expressing her mood through art. Her work represents an illustration of a daydream filled with beautiful places, eating and drinking luxurious treats, and having life-changing and soul-touching connections and experiences. She calls her style “a stylized painterly journalism” used to capture past and future memories in a soulful way.
As a marketing manager in an IT firm, Maria organized and led company wide art workshops and exhibits. Maria also organized and participated in a serious called ArtHaus live providing the audience with music and art. Maria’s works can be found in private collections in North America and Europe. She has been exhibiting her works in Canada as well as in Greece and Austria.