Tim Merrett takes possession of art history as his creative birthright, unabashedly appropriating images from past masters and bringing them into tension with contemporary experience. Past and present ebb and flow on his canvases, taking arts historical images, by Fantin Latour, for example, and inserting them as “resting places” within areas of bold color or salvaged objects. The appropriated image is thus squeezed between contemporary bookending realities represented by fields of paint and found materials. The resulting totality challenges our perception of time, beauty and mortality where “then” and “now” are locked into a relationship we ourselves, as viewers, must balance. Tim Merrett's work can be found in private collections throughout North America and Europe and in corporate collections like Kinross Gold Corporation (Toronto), Zest/She Magazine (London UK), Museum of Biblical Arts, (Dallas, CO), Royal Bank of Canada, and Toronto's Badminton and Racquetball Club