The Rise Of The Group Of Seven

 We begin today with a parka, dating around 1916, by an unknown Inuit artist.

Lawren Harris was another member of the Group of Seven. This is his 1912 painting The Drive.

Maurice Cullen painted Winter Evening, Quebec around 1905. This looks across the St. Lawrence River to Quebec City, which occupies the high ground.

Two paintings are exhibited beside each other. This first one is Waiting, by Kathleen Moir Morris.

Its counterpart is A Laurentian Homestead, circa 1919, by Clarence Gagnon.

Mary Wrinch painted Snow Magic in 1918.

Here is another work by Kathleen Moir Morris. Byward Market, Ottawa was painted around 1927.

March Evening, Northland is a 1914 painting by J.E.H. Macdonald, yet another member of the Group of Seven.

The Group of Seven exhibited formally together from 1920-33. The membership changed through those years, but they started out as friends years beforehand. One member of that friendship died before they became a group, but is considered as one of them. Here we have two works. A.Y. Jackson painted Cacouna in 1921. Snow And Rocks, at bottom, is by Tom Thomson, a 1916. It was Thomson who died before the Group formalized itself, but who was a huge influence on the others in terms of the source of their inspiration- the Canadian outdoors.

Lawren Harris painted Winter Morning in 1914.

At top, we have In The Woods, an undated work by Thomson. Below it is Study For Sumacs, by Franklin Carmichael, yet another member of the Group of Seven.

Canadian Artists Out In The World

 I start things off with a display case in the foreground of the next gallery, with items by Indigenous artists inside.

This area concerns itself with Canadian artists painting abroad. Here we have The Beach, St. Kitts, a 1913 painting by Franklin Brownell.

Henry Sandham painted St. Mark's, Venice in 1901.

Here we have Grand Canal, Venice, by A.Y. Jackson. He was one of the members of The Group of Seven, a group of Canadian artists who were hugely influential on the country as a whole. The painting pre-dates their time exhibiting together, done in 1912.

Emily Coonan painted Ponte Vecchio, Florence around 1921.

Summer Landscape, Saint Sulphice is a 1914 painting by W.H. Clapp, dating to 1914. Below it is Bathing Woman, Capri, dating to 1890, by W. Blair Bruce.

Here we have another work by Jackson, dating to 1912. This is Studio At Etaples.

A Wreath Of Flowers is an 1884 oil painting by William Brymner. 

Head Of A Woman dates circa 1923-28, by Alfred Laliberte.

The Confessions Of An Irish Patriot

 We begin today with The Self Made Man, a 1926 sculpture by Alfred Laliberte.

This is Dollard des Ormeaux, a 1916 sculpture by Louis-Philippe Hebert.

Here we have Dancing On The Moon II, a 2016 sculpture by indigenous artist David Ruben Piqtoukun.

The Smiths is an 1894 oil painting by W. Blair Bruce, in the Impressionist style.

Three sculptures by the same artist are displayed here, dating to the first quarter of the 20th century, by Marc-Aurele De Foy Suzor-Cote. Kahnawake Women is in the foreground. The bust Maria Chapdelaine is in the middle. And in the background is The Old Canadian Pioneer.

Here we see Bonsecours Market, Montreal, an 1880 canvas by William Raphael.

Homer Watson painted The Flood Gate around 1900-01.

The Croppy Boy (The Confession Of An Irish Patriot) is a dramatic 1879 painting by Charlotte Scheiber.

And today I finish with A Meeting Of The School Trustees, an 1885 oil painting by Robert Harris.

City Daily Photo Theme Day: Stripes

 The first day of each month is a theme day for members of City Daily Photo. For April, that theme is Stripes. Check out how others are interpreting this theme right here.

I start in an office building downtown. I was passing through one day, and noticed the pattern on these columns with LED screens on the ground floor.

At Lansdowne one day, I attended a PWHL game. An oversized hockey helmet had been created out of hockey sticks- and the stripe pattern caught my eye.

Stripes of another kind. These icicles hung down, side by side, from the roof of the Aberdeen Pavilion.

After finishing a night walk on the Rideau Canal in February, I came closer to the Ottawa Convention Centre. The pattern of steel framing the glass reminded me of stripes. As did the wood panel inside- horizontal stripe after stripe.

Nearby, stripes on the overhead entranceway of a hotel also qualified.

This one is from the archives, taken in 2017, but thoroughly appropriate. Morning Star by Alex Janvier is a large mural on the ceiling in the Canadian Museum of History.  Its third segment consists of stripes of multiple colours pointing inwards to the central segment.

Passing by a shop in February, I noticed a group of stuffed Garfields in the window- cartoon stripes and all.

I took these in early March. The south stands of the stadium at Lansdowne Park includes an exterior screen of wooden beams climbing up and becoming a shell of sorts, with a pathway between the screen and the stadium itself. The parallel beams have the effect of stripes to the eye.

And finally, from the series I'm currently doing here on a recent visit to the National Gallery of Canada, this is Voice of Fire, a 1967 painting by Barnett Newman. It attracted much controversy when it was added to the collection in the 80s because of the price, and has skyrocketed in value for some inexplicable reason. 

This isn't art. 

This is three big stripes on a big canvas. 

I could paint that.