Museum

 Earlier in the month I made a return visit to the Canadian War Museum. Its present headquarters has been here on Lebreton Flats since 2005, after outgrowing its previous location. Its architecture feels like a bunker, entirely appropriate to its theme.

The John McCrae Gallery hosts temporary exhibits. On now into early January is the exhibit Outside the Lines: Women Artists and War.

The exhibit starts with two paintings, decades apart but with commonalities- the presence of women in military duties. This is Gas Drill by Molly Lamb Bobak, done in 1944.

Gertrude Kearns painted Stack in 2004, at a time when women had long since been part of front line operations.

The exhibit looks into women depicting military life in the 19th century from the outside, where they were witnesses to it.

This is the sketchbook of Elizabeth Hale, the wife of an officer, depicting Block House, Cove Fields, part of the defensive structure of Quebec City.

Millicent Mary Chaplin painted Monument To Wolfe and Montcalm, Quebec between 1838-42. The monument pays tribute to the British and French generals who led their forces at the decisive Battle of the Plains of Abraham during the French and Indian War, and who both died in the wake of that battle.

Eveline Alexander, the wife of an officer, etched this- Grand Military Steeplechase at London, Canada West 9th May 1843 in 1845.

Katherine Jane Ellice did this watercolour, View From The Battery At Quebec in 1838.

Two world wars would have a huge effect on society as a whole, especially for women. We'll pick up here tomorrow.