Since graduating from Emily Carr in 2008, Melanie has been especially productive. From ceiling-high collages to LP and magazine art, Melanie has worked on all sorts of projects, and has stuck to a certain principle while doing so. “I try to push myself and try something new,” she says. That includes something new for the viewer, too.

Full Article in Beatroute Magazine

VANCOUVER — It got people talking during the Stanley Cup Playoff: a big, hand-painted sign at the corner of Main Street and 26th Avenue, proposing marriage to "Daniel (or Henrik) Sedin."

Under the proposal, in big block letters painted in red, the seemingly crazy Canucks fan signed her name — Melanie Coles — along with a cellphone number.

It turns out Coles is an artist, and the sign part of a public artwork installation for a show on fandom, called Total Devotion: A Shrine to the Manic Compulsion of Fans.

Coles, an Emily Carr graduate whose work typically engages the public, said she knew she had to incorporate Canuck fever into her piece at the show, which opened June 4th at Little Mountain Gallery.

Full Article from the Vancouver Sun

In the last few weeks, we've all discovered -- the hard way -- just how crazy fans of the Vancouver Canucks can be. But that fanaticism doesn't just involve looting and jumping over burning cars. It can also be terribly romantic.

Consider a giant sign that appeared in the city during the finals. Attached to the side of a building, it asked, in big red letters: "Daniel (or Henrik) Sedin, will you marry me?" Underneath the immodest proposal was a name -- Melanie Coles -- and a phone number.
Sweet, yes. It's charming to think that the captain of the Vancouver Canucks -- or his twin brother -- might be so swayed to swoon by a simple billboard.

But it's also art. Ms. Coles, an installation artist, painted the sign, and she rented the phone just to record what the Sedins -- or anybody else -- might say on her voicemail.

And now she's posted recordings of some of those calls. So, for the record, here are the voices of some people who may, or may not be, who they claim to be.

CBC Radio - As It Happens - June 28th, 2011

Melanie Coles is one of the Cheaper Show’s four featured artists and is no stranger to the Vancouver art community. Her most notable pieces include “Where on Earth is Waldo?”—a painted rooftop Waldo to be found on Google Earth—and the recent “Sedin Proposal” in which she left her telephone number and proposed to the twins on a billboard.

Coles will be showing both a large scale art installation and three new collages at the Cheaper Show.“Instead of having a piece for sale for $200, [featured artists] were given the money to spend on supplies. I created a 3D installation in one of the big windows, so you can see it from both the street and the gallery. It’s a large scale 3D collage, so it’s essentially two different pieces from the inside and the outside,” explained Coles.

Full Article from Ubyssey

Melanie Coles painted this message up the street from my apartment. For all those who don’t follow hockey, the Sedins are twin brothers who play for our hockey team, the Vancouver Canucks. This work was created for “Total Devotion” which opened at Little Mountain Gallery last week.

Full Article from Booooooom

It's a bold statement, i know this, but i am going to say it anyway: this is my favorite layout that i have seen in all of 2011. BOOM! B-lines from vancouver used the work of local collage artist Melanie Coles to put together a perfect looking record. every single panel of this layout could stand alone as its own xerox collage masterpiece, yet they are still able to come together and create a body of images that maintain a cohesive look. on the front cover, a really strong black and white photocopy collage that hits you with a nice pop of red. i love the way she mixes hand drawn elements in with the photographs...

Full Article on Art 4 Punks

Andree Lachapelle (Broken Pencil Issue 30)

"With Love, From Me to You!" is a precious little zine, a collection of letters and postcards, envelopes and postal stamps and all things original and creative, and mail-related. It is colourful and vibrant and charming and loving and worth picking up and enjoying time and time again-every page holds so much detail as to occupy one's mind for a lifetime! Do not be selfish, however-share this zine with your friends. It's easy: take it, seal it in a Ziplock bag, add a name, an address, stamp it-or not-and send Melanie Coles' art to another part of the planet. It would be wrong to keep it to yourself.

Taylor Ball (The Drama Magazine Issue 8)

With Love From Me To You! is a beautiful collection of some of Melanie’s favorite pieces of mail art, both sent and received. It is by gazing at the pages of interesting images, and reading the small blocks of typewriter-text stories that accompany them that one is engaged in the excitement of mail art, inevitably wishing to have received or sent any of the packages which these images adorned.With Love From Me To You! Is the perfect zine for a relatively short and simple introduction to and sampling of mail art, all the while remaining exciting enough to provoke you to participate.