Critical Distance DIRECTORY Renée Anne Bouffard-McManus

Renée Anne Bouffard-McManus is an artist, curator, art worker, and researcher who is currently based in Toronto. Her research connects care to the art of noticing within curation, art communities, and art organizations. She explores care theory and Disability Arts frameworks to inform this work. Since 2008, as a self-taught artist, she became interested in rural and online art/design communities and economies. In 2025, she graduated with an MFA in Criticism and Curatorial Practice from OCAD University. While at OCAD she did placements with Workman Arts and Arts Etobicoke.

As an artist, she paints moody landscapes and whimsical illustrations, working in watercolour, gouache, collage, and digital printing on paper and silk. Presently, her art practice reflects on bridging the knowledge gained through her MFA to make artwork about her and her family of origins’ lived experience with caregiving both as a mother and inside the Huntington Disease community.

After graduating, she curated exhibitions of student’s work at OCAD and has also lectured there as a sessional instructor. She is a member of the Creative Research Inclusive Practices (CRIP) Lab at OCAD University. In the colder months, she leads a weekly community art table in Etobicoke for those with experiences of home and food insecurity.