Marshall McLuhan

Marshall McLuhan was a Canadian professor of English literature who burst into world prominence as a media guru in the 1960s. Working with the ideas of Harold Innis, another Canadian communications expert, McLuhan popularized the idea that our technologies have a profound effect upon our lives, culture, and history.

Countering the commonly accepted attitude that the content of a message is more important than its form, McLuhan pointed out that the means of communication itself creates an impact, regardless of what is being said. He claimed, for example, that a story has different meanings depending upon whether it is related orally, written in a book, acted out on the stage, heard on radio, presented on film, viewed on television, or depicted in a comic book. Each of these media has its own inherent bias and language, or, to put that principle into its now popular form: "the medium is the message."

About the artist

Shelley Adler studied fine art at York University, the Edinburgh College of Art, and Boston University, where she obtained a Masters Degree. Her work has appeared at the Nicholas Metivier Gallery in Toronto and the Andrea Meislin Gallery in New York, where in May 2008 Adler will exhibit her new paintings. In the Fall 2007 issue of Canadian Art magazine, Adler was profiled by Gillian MacKay, who praised her skill in portraiture: "Adler handles paint like a living force. In her works, marks, shapes, and passages have an abstract expressive power that is independent of their representational function." Shelley Adler lives and works in Toronto.

Click here to read the Marshall McLuhan Press Release.