CHANDRA BARNETT
Chandra Barnett is a multidisciplinary artist, creative consultant, and community arts facilitator based in Sault Ste. Marie, Ontario. Raised in Thunder Bay and Montreal, she has long drawn inspiration from her surroundings and emotional landscape, using art as both an expressive outlet and a grounding force.
Since moving to the Algoma region in 2007, Chandra has become a mother, earned her Digital Imaging and Photography diploma with honours from Sault College (2013), and developed an award-winning photographic practice. Her work has appeared in Applied Arts Magazine and been featured in community-based projects including Thinking Rock Community Arts and Youth Social Infrastructure (YSI) Collaborative. As a founding contributor to the ArtSpeaks Project, she has helped design and lead non-clinical, trauma-informed art programming since 2017.
Chandra’s current practice returns to her earliest creative love: collage and assemblage. A lifelong collector of magazine clippings, textiles, and imagery, she uses these materials to explore themes of emotional recovery, identity, and transformation. Her work incorporates layered, handmade imagery influenced by music, storytelling, and lived experience.
Whether through photography, sewn forms, or floating paper compositions, her work invites intimacy, accessibility, and healing. Chandra continues to share and support creative expression through inclusive, community-rooted practices—always seeking to elevate resilience, beauty, and story through art.
