Rosalie Favell RCA (born 1958)[1] is a Métis (Cree/British) artist from Winnipeg, Manitoba currently based in Ottawa, Ontario, working with photography and digital collage techniques.
[5][6] Receiving her first camera at age ten,[5] Favell first formally explored her artistic impulse a number of years later at a night photography course which inspired her to continue learning the medium.
[13] Favell was an early member of the NIIPA (Native Indian/Inuit Photographers’ Association) in Hamilton, the first artist-run centre specializing in photo-based artwork by Indigenous artists in Canada.
[19][20] The active poses that Favell captures in Facing the Camera lend agency to the sitters and call into question stereotypes created in part by a history of portraiture of Indigenous people from a colonial perspective.
[2] An exhibition at the Canadian Museum of Contemporary Photography (National Gallery of Canada) called Steeling the Gaze: Portraits by Aboriginal Artists that challenged stereotypical portrayals of Indigenous people through portraiture featured Favell's work.
[25] Her portraits appeared alongside the work of other Indigenous artists such as KC Adams, Carl Beam, Dana Claxton, Thirza Cuthand, Kent Monkman, David Neel, Shelley Niro, Greg Staats, Jeff Thomas, and Bear Witness.