Gideon Tomaschoff was born in Israel and traveled extensively through Mexico, Cuba and Brazil before settling in Toronto. Educated in Beersheba as a mechanical engineer, he returned to school in Toronto to study painting at the Ontario College of Art in 1993.

In his travels through Central and South America, Gideon saw buildings that had been battered and stained by the elements, and by human use over time. The stone and adobe walls of the colonial town of Oaxana, Mexico, for instance, are painted with different colours layer upon layer. As time wears away the surface of a particular area, bright colours become muted, blue reveals a patch of ochre, or red paint reveals the soft bricky pink beneath its surface. Inadvertant collages bloom on every street.

It is in these rugged surfaces with their unintentional beauty, that Gideon finds the subject matter for his paintings. Rather than depicting a particular ancient facade with the specificity of a portrait, Gideon uses the wall as a metaphor, and one that has a breadth of subtlety and variation. He treats his canvases roughly, as the elements will beat against an old wall. Using unconventional materials, such as a builder’s knife and spatulas, Tomaschoff pushes his surfaces “to express something in every square inch”. He sees the walls he paints as witnesses to their external surroundings, acquiring the marks of time and experience. (excerpts from “Traceless” by Kate Regan)

Awards
1998 Ontario Arts Council grant for emerging artists
1997 1st Annual Indoor Artists Show, Best oil painting
1996 OCAD, Drawing and Painting, honourable mention

Selected Solo Exhibitions
2012  “Colourfall”, Odon Wagner Contemporary, Toronto
2011  Zwischenraume, Art Society of Monchengladbach, Germany
2010  Banias, Julie M Gallery, Tel Aviv
2009  Towards an Archaeology of Colour, Odon Wagner Contemporary
2008  New Paintings, Reece Galleries, NY
2007  New Paintings, Cohen Rese Gallery, San Francisco
2006  Passage of Time, Odon Wagner Contemporary

Selected Group Exhibitions
2005-10 Art Toronto (formerly TIAF), with Odon Wagner Contemporary, Toronto
2007 Canada in New York, Parca Biennale, 511 Gallery, NY
2006 Cohen Rese Gallery, San Francisco
2005 Odon Wagner Contemporary, Toronto
2004 Steam Whistle Brewery, Toronto
2002-04 Toronto International Art Fair (TIAF)
2002 Newzones Gallery, Calgary
2002 New Paintings, Edward Day Gallery, Toronto
2000 Newzones Gallery, Calgary

Collections
AltaLink, Calgary
Baycrest Hospital, Toronto
Beit Halochem, Tel Aviv, Israel
Charles Crug Winery, Napa Valley
Dynatec, Toronto
Elements, Toronto
Rothschild Canada Inc., Toronto
Rudson Valuation Group, Toronto
Sherbanuk Metals Marketing, Toronto
Simon, Turnbull & Martin, Washington
Sun Life Financial, Toronto
TD Canada Trust, Toronto

Education
1993-96 Drawing and Painting, Ontario College of Art and Design (OCAD), Toronto, with honours.
1978-1982 B.Sc. Mechanical Engineering, Ben-Gurion University, Israel.