Stephen “Steve” Snake, Ojibwe painter, blends Woodland art and landscapes, honoring Indigenous heritage with powerful portraits and spiritual scenes.
STEVEN SNAKE
Biography
For Steven Snake, painting was never a career he simply chose. It was something that was always there.
Born June 14, 1966, on the Rama Reserve in Ontario, Stephen “Steven” Snake is a self-taught Algonquin Canadian artist. He began drawing as a child, recording the people and places around him with pencils and crayons that he later described as his “camera.”
Art was also part of his family. His mother was artistic, and her first cousin was celebrated painter Arthur Shilling. Steven grew up surrounded by Shilling’s work, and Arthur recognized something in the young artist early. He took Steven under his wing and taught him one of the lessons that would remain with him: painting was not simply about reproducing what the eye could see; it was about finding something deeper and making it your own.
Steven found inspiration in remarkably
different artists: Arthur Shilling, Norval Morrisseau, Vincent van Gogh and Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec. He was offered a scholarship to the Emily Carr College of Art, but chose another path. He wanted the freedom to paint. His education would come from life, experience, other artists, and countless hours in front of a canvas.
Along that journey came meaningful artistic relationships. He spent time with renowned Inuit artist Floyd Kuptana at Rama First Nation and was a good Friend of Indigenous artist Brian Marion-Passageeshic.
Steven’s documented exhibition history began in 1989 at the Woodland Cultural Centre in Brantford and continued through galleries and exhibitions in Canada and the United States.
But perhaps nowhere affected him as deeply as Bear Island and Lake Temagami. surrounded by water, rock, forest and ancient red-ochre paintings, Steven experienced something beyond scenery: a sense of belonging.
He described it simply as having “come home.” That feeling lives within his paintings.
Whether a landscape, a portrait or Indigenous imagery, Steven’s work is ultimately connected by something deeply personal: people, memory, land and spirit.
Nearly four decades after his first documented exhibition, Steven Snake is still following the path he chose for himself long ago.
An oil on board artwork depicting a landscape scene of Bear Island under a sky with cloud shapes, created by Steve Snake in 2017. The piece measures 11.5×11.5 inches and is an original work.
A painting titled “The Messenger” by Steve Snake, created in 2022 using oil on canvas. The artwork measures 14 by 18.5 inches and is an original piece.
A painting titled ‘Algonquin Shawman’ by Steve Snake, created in 2022. The medium is oil on canvas, and it measures 9×12 inches. The artwork is an original piece, signed on the front.
A painting titled “Peeking out to L. Temagami” by artist Steve Snake, created in Summer 2014. Medium is oil on board, measuring 11×14 inches, and it is an original artwork. The signature is located on the front.
