Faces of the Centre: Jill McRae

Jill McRae is the Confederation Centre Art Gallery’s Conservation and Display Technician and has been a dedicated team member for over 16 years.

Her favourite memories of working at the Centre include sitting inside Tom Benner’s giant copper moon, creating an advice booth and hiring her mom to work in it, shooting arrows across the gallery and into a painting for Michael Fernandez (the polar opposite of art conservation), and gluing together the broken pieces of David Thauberger’s Fish Burger. Although some elements may seem dull (like all the math she must do as part of her job), moments like these strange and wonderful ones, make her love her job.

Her favourite spot at the Centre is Memorial Hall when it is raining, the sound is lovely.

A fun fact about the Gallery team is that they keep tabs on Ada’s featured donut flavours. They have been known to take 11 a.m. donut breaks so they do not lose the best options to the lunch rush.

When she was young, her parents took her and her brother to see Reveen the Impossibilist at the Centre. She laughed, she was amazed, and it scared her a little; she left feeling like he was some kind of wizard. She especially remembers the feeling of being in that big space with the giant hanging sound baffles, it felt like a special night out.

For her, her job is a perfect mix of routine and expecting the unexpected. The Centre is so grateful for Jill’s tremendous work with the Centre and The Gallery over the years and couldn’t imagine the space without her.