Maria's Story
Maria Janicki is a photographer and educator born in Montreal. She developed an interest in photography and nature at a young age, partly inspired by summers spent in the Eastern Townships of Quebec.
In education, Maria focused on scientific pursuits, getting a BSc in biology and psychology. Graduate school at SFU led her to beautiful BC. She has taught psychology at a local college for over 20 years.
During this time period, her love of photography turned digital. She took classes at Port Moody Arts Centre, joined the Pacific Digital Photography Club, and learned post-processing skills to help realize her artistic vision.
Through photography, Maria seeks the beauty in many subjects: flowers, trees, landscapes, and architecture. Her photographic work has been in many art exhibitions, several audio-visual presentations, and her photographs have been published in international newspapers, magazines, websites, and books.
In addition to being a science-minded academic and educator, I need to express my artistic side. My main creative passion is photography. I love being able to capture and preserve the beautiful, interesting, and memorable moments of everyday life.
I see the visual artist as directing the eye of the viewer to see things they hadn’t noticed, to make connections, to feel, to question, to wonder, and to appreciate. That is the goal of this collection called “The Trees of Burnaby”. People form lasting connections with trees, and trees are part of our community. Through trees people mark the passage of time. We welcome Spring blooms and are dazzled by Autumn colours. Winter trees are silhouettes in the cold landscape and decorated to light the darkness. Each photograph in this collection features trees located in public spaces. If you haven’t noticed them before, I hope you’ll take a closer look.