Vancouver artists Roger Lee and Carole Itter win Governor General's Awards for visual and media arts
The art historian and interdisciplinary artist join eight laureates recognized nationally for reshaping Canada's cultural landscape.
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The Canada Council for the Arts has named two Vancouver-based artists among 2026 winners of the Governor General's Awards in Visual and Media Arts: art historian and philanthropist Roger Lee, who received the Outstanding Contribution Award, and interdisciplinary artist and filmmaker Carole Itter, honoured with an Artistic Achievement Award.
Lee, born and raised in Vancouver, studied art in the city, Mexico, and France before becoming Canada's first Chinese Canadian art history professor. He taught at the University of Regina for more than three decades, establishing the institution's Department of Visual Arts Gallery in the early 1970s and later helping bring the student-run Fifth Parallel Gallery to its current home in 1997. In 2023, he funded the gallery's renovation. His philanthropy extends to the Vancouver Art Gallery's Centre for Global Asias fund and the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, which houses the Roger Lee Gallery of Asian Art. Lee is also a devoted collector, with a particularly notable Yixing teapot collection.
"Across decades, Roger Lee has helped reshape the cultural landscape of Canada," said Dr. Melissa Karmen Lee, CEO of the Chinese Canadian Museum, in the awards announcement. "Through his work with museums, galleries and universities, he has championed acquisitions and exhibitions that bring diasporic, cross-cultural and historically marginalized perspectives into the centre of institutional narratives."
Itter, born and raised in Vancouver, studied at UBC, the Vancouver School of Art, and Accademia di Belle Arti in Rome. Her practice spans sculptures, installations, performances, and film. A landmark work, "Where the Streets are Paved with Gold: A Tribute to a Canadian Neighbourhood" (1991), is a 29-foot-long floor installation built from cast-off objects Itter collected, painted, and gilded in her own Strathcona neighbourhood, honouring elderly immigrants and their belief in Canada as a place of opportunity. She collaborated extensively with artist Al Neil from the 1970s, working out of The Blue Cabin, which now operates as a floating artist residency. This fall, her work appears in "Here to Play: Variation for Sixteen Hands," a group exhibition at the Gibson Art Museum at SFU Burnaby exploring play as a lens for understanding material value and established systems.
The details
Who are the two Vancouver artists who won Governor General's Awards for visual and media arts in 2026?
Roger Lee, an art historian and philanthropist, won the Outstanding Contribution Award, and Carole Itter, an interdisciplinary artist and filmmaker, won the Artistic Achievement Award.
What is Roger Lee's background in art history?
Roger Lee was born and raised in Vancouver, studied art in the city, Mexico, and France, and became Canada's first Chinese Canadian art history professor. He taught at the University of Regina for more than three decades.
What is Carole Itter's landmark work?
'Where the Streets are Paved with Gold: A Tribute to a Canadian Neighbourhood' (1991) is a 29-foot-long floor installation Itter created from cast-off objects she collected, painted, and gilded in the Strathcona neighbourhood to honour elderly immigrants.
Where can you see Carole Itter's work this fall?
Her work appears in 'Here to Play: Variation for Sixteen Hands,' a group exhibition at the Gibson Art Museum at SFU Burnaby exploring play as a lens for understanding material value and established systems.
