Canadian art at the Art Gallery of OntarioCarlo Catenazzi
A survey of the visual arts in Canada is presented in these pages by 20 art historians and curators, one chapter each, that covers the late 19th century to the present.
The opening chapter introduces the founding art galleries, art societies and artist-run centres in Canada's major cities that established the country's visual arts culture. Both the National Gallery of Canada and Royal Canadian Academy were founded in 1880, followed by the establishment in the 1920s and 1930s of city art galleries in Montreal, Toronto, Winnipeg, Edmonton and Vancouver. The exhibition and collecting policies of these institutions, together with artist-run centres, art magazines and cultural policy, have played a central role in "defining and re-defining what can be described as 'Canadian art,'" writes editor/contributor Anne Whitelaw.
A useful beginning. While space does not permit discussion of all 20 chapters, ranging from early traditional painting to today's interdisciplinary video, performance, conceptual and installation art forms, here are some high points - admittedly, subjectively mine.
The period 1890 to 1914 relates to the Barbizon and Hague Schools of painting, with some Impressionist elements of the new-century artists William Brymner, Horatio Walker, Helen McNicoll, Homer Watson, Maurice Cullen and William Henry Clapp. The work is luscious, although covered by only nine reproductions. Mural painting was introduced during this time in public buildings in Quebec's cathedrals and in provincial legislature buildings across the country by painters Frederick Challener, George Reid, E. Wyley Grier and Charles Huot.
Tom Thomson and the Group of Seven chapter deals with material that is well known and still well loved. The Emily Carr chapter is beautiful. Contributing writer Gerta Moray, professor emerita at the University of Guelph, ranks Carr's reputation to important female artists Georgia O'Keeffe and Frida Kahlo. "Her stylistic experimentation, romance vision, and writings established her for Canadians as the prototype of the isolated visionary modern artist," Moray writes. Of great interest is Moray's account of Carr's influence on Canada's west coast ethno-cultural art history.
Joyce Zemans details the period of abstract and non-objective art from 1915 to 1961, beginning with the earliest of painters working in abstraction in the 1920s. She pays due attention to pioneers of the movement, among them Bertram Brooker, Fritz Brandtner, Lionel LeMoine FitzGerald, J.W.G. (Jock) Macdonald, Lawren Harris, Kathleen Munn, Edna Tacon and Marian Scott. The foregoing three women, Zemans claims, "were among the most interesting pioneers of abstraction in Canada." She handles the postwar art of Painters Eleven, the Regina Five and Vancouver's West Coast style of abstraction with appropriate excitement and style.
The chapter Paul-Émile Borduas and the Automatistes, by François-Marc Gagnon, who describes Borduas as "the most important figure in the history of modern Quebec art," presents a well-researched account of Quebec's art and its social history. The Automatistes manifesto Refus global, authored primarily by Borduas, a sweeping denunciation of the power wielded by the church and government over art, is accompanied by other less known dissident artists' manifestos. Among the ones Gagnon cites are Prism d'yeux, written by Jacques de Tonnancour, "which defended diverse approaches to artmaking, gave more urgency to the Automatistes' own project." according to Gagnon.
Quebec Plasticens artists are well represented in the chapter Geometric Abstraction after 1950, and chapters on Inuit and native art provide valuable information on the co-operatives run largely by native artist activists and government initiatives that together have elevated early touristy native crafts to fine art. Pop Art, postmodernism, photography, furniture design and experimental video art are included as worthy elements in Canada's visual art culture.
Nonetheless, it is disappointing that scant attention is paid to this country's art dealers, who championed pioneering artists. Similarly, patrons whose gifts of art grace virtually every art gallery in this country are scarcely acknowledged. Disappointing also is the lack of attention paid to the graphic arts, from Canada's esteemed early pioneers Tom Thomson, JE.H. MacDonald and C.W. Jefferys to modernists Jack Bush, William Winter, Oscar Cahén, Harold Town and James Hill. Much the same can be said for the omission beyond mere name mention, if that, of postwar contemporary sculptors Sorel Etrog, Kosso Eloul, Armand Vaillincourt and Walter Yarwood.
While many of the 20 chapters in this book are authoritative and well written, apart from some wooden academic writing, overall the book suffers from its 20 separate voices. They create a sense of clutter, a lack of continuity. Moreover, an art history spanning a century of Canada's art that is represented by a mere 185 illustrations is a terrible disappointment.
This book should motivate publishers to exert pressure on all levels of government to provide funding for more books that celebrate Canada's world-renowned artists and its many forms of magnificent art.
Iris Nowell's book Painters Eleven: The Wild Ones of Canadian Art, will be released in September.