Shana Patry

Shana Patry was born in a small town with a very catholic name, in a region famous for its blueberries and meat pies, in Québec, Canada. Raised with strong familial values and very close to nature, paints and craft papers were her favorite toys as a kid. Supportive, her family soon gifted her a proper easel and big tubs of gouache paint. The story goes that one day, at 8 years old, Shana independently went downstairs to the small wardrobe that served as a craft room and painted a portrait of a dog in a wheat field during a thunderstorm, completely from her mind.

Shana’s family saw her tremendous potential and enrolled her in traditional oil painting classes from the age of 8-12 years old. During this time, she created over 60 paintings of animals, ranging from giraffes and anteaters to skunks and turtles, refusing adamantly to paint people or other subject matters. After an uneventful high school education (where she picked all the art classes that she could), she started college in 2013 in Visual Arts at Cégep de Jonquière, and at the same time started selling her art online. Shana graduated college in January 2016 and, not feeling quite ready yet for university, became a full-time artist.
Following a depression in fall 2019, she decided to rebuild herself on stronger foundations by attending a year-long online mastery program with the Milan Art Institute. Now addicted to collecting knowledge and pursuing education, she will soon be starting a part-time Certificate of Visual Arts at the Université du Québec à Chicoutimi while still focusing on her personal art.

Now, Shana Patry is focusing on expanding her knowledge and collecting new experiences through experimentation and research. Her paintings can be described as expressive realism, with animals lost in their thoughts in a moment of wonder. They inspire a moment of pause and reflection within oneself, as well as a feeling of hope and power through bold brushstrokes and contrasting colors.