
Claudia Miatello
Claudia earned a B.A. in English literature and studied accounting and finance at the Rotman School of Management at the University of Toronto. She was the Chief Financial Officer (CFO) of the University of Toronto Schools and the Assistant Director of Risk Management for Ernst & Young Canada (EY). In 2020, she graduated from the University of Toronto with a Master of Theological Studies degree, before returning to her true passion: art.
Claudia's animated shorts have screened at festivals around the world – from off-Broadway in New York City, to a children’s television network in the Czech Republic. Her most recent animated short, titled “Buon Ferragosto”, was screened at Academy Award-qualifying film festivals in North Carolina and Illinois in the USA. She has won awards for her animation, most recently in Milan, New Jersey, New York and South Carolina.
In July 2023, Claudia’s artworks were exhibited at an art show titled “Buongiorno, Buonanotte" at Galleria360 Arte Contemporanea in Florence, Italy. The art catalogue from this solo exhibition was later accepted into the book collection at the Eberhard Zeidler Library of Art & Architecture at the University of Toronto’s Daniels Faculty of Architecture.
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Claudia’s artwork often depicts scenes of Italy – the very place of her family’s history. In 1966, her father, Egidio Marchese, was a young civil lawyer who had recently graduated from Law at the University of Florence. That same year, her mother, Irene Jagusiak, traveled from Canada to Italy to study Italian history in Florence for one year as part of the MA program at Middlebury College in Vermont. They were destined to meet! Eleven months later, Irene and Egidio were married at Palazzo Vecchio, and celebrated their reception on the rooftop patio of her father's family home in Florence.
Throughout her youth, they traveled to Italy, spending holidays and summers in Florence visiting relatives and going to the sea. The inspiration for her artwork comes from these memories of the daily rhythm of her life in Florence during this time. Claudia has traveled to Italy many times as an adult and she always returns to Canada with beautiful memories and inspiration for her artwork.
Visiting Italy and creating art there not only helps to connect Claudia to her Florentine roots but also allows her to honour all those people in Florence, in the past and present, who have shaped both her and her work.

