Biography
Joyce Wieland, O Canada,  1970, National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa.
Sara Angel, Founder and Executive Director of the Art Canada Institute.
Sara Angel, Founder and Executive Director of the Art Canada Institute.
Sara Angel giving a tour of Canadian art highlights at Art Toronto in 2019.
Sara Angel giving a highlights tour at Art Toronto, in 2019.

 

Sara Angel

Sara Angel is the Founder and Executive Director of the Art Canada Institute/Institut de l’art canadien, a research organization based at Massey College at the University of Toronto, dedicated to the education and promotion of Canadian art history.

Angel holds a PhD from the University of Toronto, where she wrote her dissertation on the Montreal art dealer Max Stern and the restitution of his Nazi-looted art. For her doctoral work, Angel received a Trudeau Scholarship, the most prestigious award of its kind in Canada, given “for innovative ideas that will help solve issues of critical importance to Canadians.” Angel has been a guest lecturer at Harvard University, the University of Toronto, Ryerson University, the Royal Ontario Museum, the Art Gallery of Ontario, the National Gallery of Canada, and the Israel Museum of Art.

Angel writes on contemporary visual culture for publications such as Maclean’s, Canadian Art, The Walrus, and The Globe and Mail to make the world of art accessible to a broad audience. Her academic writing has appeared in the Journal for Canadian Art History, Leonardo: The Journal of the International Society for the Arts, Sciences and Technology.

Angel has had an extensive career in arts journalism and publishing, including being a commentator for CBC television’s On the Arts, an editor for Saturday Night, and a columnist for The National Post. In 2006 she was named editor-in-chief of Chatelaine. She is the director of Angel Editions and Otherwise Editions, both companies she founded after working with the renowned graphic designer Bruce Mau. Books commissioned by Angel and created under her editorial and art direction, including The Museum Called Canada, Canada’s House: Rideau Hall and the Invention of a Canadian Home, and Fights of Our Lives: Elections, Leadership and the Making of Canada have been recognized as pioneering works on Canadian history that combine excellence in prose and visual presentation. In 2011, Fights of Our Lives was named one of the best Canadian political books of the last 25 years by Samara, in association with the Writers’ Trust of Canada.

An active volunteer, Angel devotes a portion of her day to doing work for not-for profit organizations. She is a Director of Canadian Stage and has served as a Director of both PEN Canada and Dancing With Parkinson’s. She is a SickKids Leader for the Hospital for Sick Children, and she does volunteer work for Re-think Breast Cancer, Canadian Doctors for Refugee Care, and The Stop Community Centre.

For more information on Angel’s work with the Trudeau Foundation click here.

© SARA ANGEL 2024