Calgary-based artist Marigold Santos creates startlingly beautiful works that explore identity, transformation, heritage and the fragmented nature of cultural diaspora. This past fall, Santos unveiled a new exhibition, Efflorescence/The Way We Wake, in Lyon, France, at Musée d’art contemporain de Lyon, which also features works by fellow Canadian artist Rajni Perera. Santos’s work was inspired by a deeply personal homecoming.
“I went back to the Philippines for the first time in 11 years,” says Santos. “It was a very important return — not just for me as an artist, but as a mother.” Travelling with her husband and young son, Santos’s visit to her native home sparked a creative renewal. “I was experiencing my culture in a very different way — through my child’s eyes and as a working artist. It felt grounding and uplifting at the same time.”
Santos’s upcoming show, opening in January 2026, featuring her new body of work at Patel Brown in Montreal, reflects that experience via lush multimedia works that knit together memory, mythology, the natural world and ancestry. “I’m thinking about heritage not only in terms of lineage, but community and the natural world,” says Santos.
Though Santos’s paintings, drawings and mixed-media installations have been shown to international audiences (rumours that she is also a tattoo artist are true, but she inks only a handful of chosen clients each year), she is proud to call Calgary home. “I was pretty nervous about coming back here after living in Montreal, but it’s been an amazing place to raise a family and grow as an artist. I feel supported here.”
