Kim Ondaatje (née Betty Jane Kimbark, October 2, 1928) is a Canadian painter, photographer, and documentary filmmaker. Born in Toronto, Ontario, Ondaatje studied at the Ontario College of Art and McGill University. She completed a M.A. in Canadian Literature at Queen's University, while on a teaching fellowship. Until 1964, Ondaatje served as a part-time lecturer at Wilfred Laurier University and Sherbrooke University. In the early 1960s she returned to the visual arts again and by 1965 was painting full time. In 1967, with fellow Canadian artists Jack Chambers and Tony Urquhart, she founded Canadian Artists Representation (CAR), which today is the Canadian Artists Representation/Frontes des Artistes Canadiens (CARFAC). CAR was the first artist organization in the world to establish a fee structure for museum and gallery exhibitions of contemporary artists. Primarily a visual artist, Ondaatje later directed short documentary films and published books of photography. In her paintings she pursued a variety of interests. Along with abstract and impressionistic landscapes she composed three paintings series: a landscape group entitled the Hill Series; an interior-based group of paintings titled The House on Piccadilly Street; and a final group of large industrial landscapes entitled the Factory Series, completed in the mid-1970s. Ondaatje's research on traditional Ontario quilt-making and design led to a large national touring exhibition of patchwork quilts (1974-76), and a documentary film. During the course of her career, she worked for the London Public Gallery, the Agnes Etherington, the Art Gallery of Ontario, and the Emily Carr College's Outreach as a travelling artist with her work from 1969 to 1981. Her paintings and films are part of various collections in galleries across Canada including: the National Gallery of Canada, the Art Gallery of Ontario, the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, the Doris McCarthy Gallery at the University of Toronto,the MacIntosh Gallery, University of Western Ontario, London, the Windsor Public Gallery, Simon Fraser University, B.C., and the Confederation Centre Art Gallery, in Prince Edward Island. She was married to the Canadian poet D.G. Jones, and later was married to the poet and novelist Michael Ondaatje. She has six children.
Short Films
- Black Creek, 1972, (16mm, colour)
- Factories, 1973, (16mm, colour)
- Patchwork Quilts, 1974, (11 min., 16mm, colour)
- Old Houses, 1977 (27 min., 16mm, colour)
- Where Bitter Sweet Grows, 1978, (16mm, colour)
Books
- Old Ontario Houses, 1977
- Small Churches of Canada, 1982
- Toronto, My City, 1993
