Artist, educator. Iain was born in Middlesbrough, England in 1946. Baxter& received a Bachelor of Science in Zoology (1959) and a Master of Education (1962) from the University of Idaho, and a Master of Fine Arts in Painting (1964) from Washington State University; he also studied in the Department of Fine Arts at Kyoto University (1961) and Emily Carr University of Art + Design (1984-1988). Baxter& has held teaching appointments at Washington State University (1962-1964), the University of British Columbia (1964-1966), Simon Fraser University (1966-1971), York University (1972, 1974-1976), Emily Carr University of Art + Design (1978-1979), Alberta College of Art + Design (1981-1982, 1985-1988), and the University of Windsor (1988-present). Baxter& is the recipient of numerous awards, including a Governor General’s Award in Visual and Media Arts (2004) and he was named an Officer of the Order of Canada (2003).
A practicing artist since 1956, Baxter& formed the N.E. Thing Company Limited or NETCO with then-wife Ingrid in 1966. Officially incorporated in 1969, the prolific and influential NETCO humorously appropriated and subverted the corporate paradigm in a variety of projects that comment on art and art making and its socio-historical context. The first Canadian artists to be featured on the cover of Art in America (May-June 1969), NETCO dissolved in 1978. Baxter&’s artistic production since the dissolution of NETCO includes neon signs, ‘animal preserves’, a grocery cart of genetically modified organisms, and installations using obsolete technology. His work has been featured in solo and group exhibitions at institutions such as the Morris and Helen Belkin Art Gallery, Sonnabend Gallery, the Vancouver Art Gallery, the National Gallery of Canada, the Museum of Contemporary Art (Los Angeles), the Guggenheim Museum, the Museum of Contemporary Art (Chicago), and the Museum of Modern Art. Baxter& lives and works in Windsor, Ontario.
Additional information and materials about NETCO are available on request in Art, Architecture and Planning at the University of British Columbia Library. http://www.library.ubc.ca/finearts/
Discrete project sites documenting the work of specific artists and collectives in detail.
Essays and conversation providing a context for exploring the Project Sites and Archives.
Video interviews conducted between December 2008 and May 2009 reflecting on Vancouver’s art scene in the sixties.