Canadian Painter

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Art Gallery, art., Halifax, life, Maud Lewis, Nova Scotia

We were in Halifax about 3 weeks ago, an easy drive of 3 hours from Charlottetown across the Sea Bridge down to Truro and a hop and a skip to Halifax. This time around I wanted to visit the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia to see the collection.

The Art gallery is housed in 2 buildings next to each other, one is an old government building facing the Legislature and the other is an Italianate style stone building called the Dominion building which has a statue of Britannia sitting on the roof.

The two building have an underground passageway connecting them. The collection of Canadian art is of good quality and interesting featuring many artists. The one in particular I wanted to see  was the works of Maud Lewis (1903-1970) born in Yarmouth and died in Digby, Nova Scotia. She married in 1938 Everett Lewis. Prior to being married Maud had a daughter out of wedlock named Catherine Dowley. Maud never acknowledged her daughter who moved to Ontario and had a family of her own.

I had heard much about Maud Lewis and she is one of those painters discovered late in life by the art world and the public and became a celebrity, though that did not enrich her at all. Today she is an icon in the Canadian art world for her simple ”naif” or folk art style of painting. Maud (Dowley) Lewis came from a simple background, her family were tradespeople, her father John was well known in Yarmouth for making good quality leather harness and other leather goods.  Maud was born suffering from juvenile rheumatoid arthritis and for the rest of her life suffered from this crippling disease. She was a very small women described as gnome like and her hands were severely deformed.

Her interest in art came from her mother Agnes who would paint Christmas cards and sell them to supplement the family’s income.  After her parents death Maud lived as a recluse and her only brother grew distant and rarely saw her.

At the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia a section of the museum is dedicated to her and her tiny little house in which she lived with her husband Everett Lewis, it has been transported from its original site and reconstructed for visitors to see.  It is as it was during her life, quite small, basically a one room house, with all the furniture, paint brushes and other items one finds in a house. What is so special about this little tiny house, is that Maud Lewis painted and decorated every inch of the place inside and out including the glass windows.

 

The house as it appears re-installed inside the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia today.

Her paintings are joyful and full of vibrant colours, showing life and scenes around her and what she saw.

Though I was not particularly interested in Maud Lewis as a painter despite having heard of her, coming to the gallery and seeing her tiny house and several of her paintings, I was enchanted by her work. It was I think the simple beauty of it all, childlike quality and the joy which radiated from her work. She has no agenda, no ideology, no philosophy or trying to pass a message. It is simply art for the beauty of it.

 

 

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203 miles or 3 hours and 28 min.

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art., cocktails, Food, Halifax, Nova Scotia, vacation

This is the distance between Charlottetown PEI and Halifax N.S. by car or 3 hours and 28 min. A lot of people will go to Halifax for the day.  Halifax is an old sea port on the Atlantic, population half a million people compared to the small town status of 36,000 for Charlottetown.

Travelling by road to Halifax is not that difficult and the road is quite nice. You get a very different vibe as you cross from one province to another, once over the sea bridge to New Brunswick and then down the Highway to Nova Scotia, you know you crossed a border, I don’t know how that is done but everything looks different in the scenery despite being still in the Maritimes.

Halifax with its famous Citadelle. 

We are going for a few days for a change of scenery and to see friends and try out new restaurants and old favourites, staying in the historical downtown. The weather looks like it will be warmer.

We hope to return to a favourite of ours Bar Kismet, barkismet.com   excellent cocktails and superb cuisine and also try new places, Ostrich Club https://theostrichclub.ca and Field Guide   https://fieldguidehfx.com.

There will be shopping and just plain fun. As I write this the Premier of PEI has just announced that the Provincial Election for the Legislature is now underway. He had been to see the Lieutenant Governor, H.H. Antoinette Perry today to ask for her to dissolve the Legislature so the election could take place. Saw the Premier a few days ago and he looked preoccupied and was not his usual talkative self. Everyone was expecting him to announce we would be going to the polls in April and yes we are on 23 April just after Easter weekend. The Green Party is very strong in the polls right now and the Liberals have been in Office for 12 years, many feel it is time for a change.

Looking forward to driving to Halifax, should be fun. The road will be Charlottetown to the bridge at Borden, then across the Strait 12Km, to Sackville, N.B. to Amherst, N.S. down to  Truro and straight to Halifax.

 

 

 

Museums Lisbon

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art., International, museum, Portugal, puppets, World

There are many wonderful sites to visit in Lisbon. We visited the Castle of Sao Jorge, the Mosteiro Dos Jeronimos, the Museo de la marioneta (Puppet Museum), the Calouste Gulbenkian Museum & Gardens, the archeological ruins of the Carmo, the museum of Royal Carriages (Dos Coches), the church of Sao Roque, the Tower of Belem and the monument to the Navigators.

Just to give you un aperçu as we say in French of what we saw, but that is not all.

One museum which might be dismissed as ”for children” is the beautiful and well curated puppet museum (Museo de la marioneta). It is housed in an old convent and on display are puppets from all continents of the world, from many cultures. Puppets after all are used in telling a story and as humans we need to tell others our stories. This museum brings this message of commonality amongst people, from Africa to Asia to Europe.

There are also many displays of Portuguese artist families who devoted their lives to developing this art form, many are very famous in Portugal like Maria Emilia Perestrelo. The last display is about puppets today in the age of technology, how camera are used to give them life. There is a special inter-active exhibit which you can use to make your own movie using puppets and sets.

It is a very interesting museum because it appeals to young and old and reminded me of my own childhood playing with puppets.

African Puppets

Some German puppets found on a German U-Boat, used to entertain the crew.

Puppets from Brazil

French Puppets

Portuguese Puppet theatre

here is the display exhibit with a computer who helps you create a moving scene and tell a story. Very laborious affair but fascinating for children and adults.

In the next post I will write about the other museums we visited.

 

Our trip to Portugal

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art., life, Politics, Portugal, Travel, vacation

Well this trip had been planned half way through my campaign for municipal Office and we had decided that whatever the outcome, we would be off on a vacation away from PEI afterwards and somewhere in Europe.

So we departed on 19 November on Rouge, a division of Air Canada. We flew business class of premium I think it is called and despite all the negative press, I found it to be quite nice a flight, regular airliner and all the usual trimmings, can’t see what all the naysaying is about.

We found an Air B&B in Mouraria, one of the oldest neighbourhoods of Lisbon just below the thousand year old castle fortress of San Jorge formerly a Moorish Palace and citadel.

Lisbon airport is very close to the city centre, we were only 15 minutes away from our apartment. The joke is that Lisbon comes as a free gym, there about 12 hills and the city is small but everything is up or down hill some of them at a 40 degree angle.

this photo was taken from the Castle looking down on Mouraria where we lived, our building is in the middle of the photo.

From inside the Castle, the flag of the City of Lisbon and the flag of Portugal.

looking up to the castle walls.

Again from the Castle parapet looking towards the parish of San Vincente O Fora with the beautiful maritime pines providing the greenery. This church is the Royal Mausoleum to the Kings of Portugal. The monarchy was abolished in 1910 in a coup and the royal family of Braganza, retired quietly.

Some dates about Portuguese history you will here a lot about if you visit. In Lisbon 1147 Martin Moniz and a group of knights from England, Spain, France and elsewhere capture the Citadel and Castle from the Moors and expel them. Today a metro station is named after Martin Moniz who apparently according to the story wedged himself in a door of the castle allowing his companions to enter, he died in the process. The age of the Portuguese Empire starts with Prince Henry the Navigator and in 1497 Vasco de Gama,Count of Vidigueira travels to India and then to various points in Africa establishing colonies along the way. The Portuguese Empire spanned the globe and led to a Papal bull dividing the world between the Spanish and Portuguese Empires.

In 1644 the sovereignty of Portugal was restored and the Spanish Hapsburgs were forced to give up their control of the country. The Braganza dynasty becomes the Royal house in Portugal until 1910. Another metro station is named after the Restauradores (restorer). Another important date is 1834 when all monasteries are closed and confiscated and religious orders are dissolved. This happened because of a movement to liberalize society and give it a parliamentary and constitutional monarchy, the church chose to be on the side of the ultra conservative and fought the movement. In 1908 the king and the crown Prince were assassinated while crossing the Plaza de Comercio upon their return to Lisbon. This assassination shocked Europe, led to political paralysis in Portugal and two years later finally a republic was proclaimed. What is not much mentioned nowadays is the almost 50 years of dictatorship from 1932 to 1968 by the Estado Novo party and its leader Antonio de Oliveira Salazar, he died in 1970 but his government kept going, finally on 25 April 1974 the army ousted the party from power in what is called the Carnation Revolution and Portugal returned to democracy.

Plaza de Comercio, rebuilt in 1755 after the great earthquake destroyed much of Lisbon. What we see today is the work of the Marquis of Pombal. In this square facing the river Tegus, the King and his son the heir to the throne were assassinated in 1908.

We walked all over Lisbon, there is so much to see and do, it can be exhausting. Also many wonderful restaurants, good wines and lots of Port.

In the fashionable Chiado neighbourhood with the new Christmas lights. Love the sidewalks in stone mosaic pattern all over the city.

 

168:01 Installation

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2003, art., Baghdad, books, Iraq, library, University, USA, Wafaa Bilal, war

I was at the Confederation Centre Art Gallery today to have a good look at the new Winter Show. Several artists are presenting their works. One artist is Wafaa Bilal  b. 1966 in Najaf, Iraq, he is an Iraqi American artist, a former professor at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and currently an associate professor at the Tisch School of the Arts at New York University.  Wafaa Bilal fled Iraq in 1991 and spent 2 years in a refugee camp in Saudi Arabia. Many members of his family where killed during this period.

The exhibit is entitled 168:01 

The title of the installation, 168:01, refers to the 13th-century destruction of the historic House of Wisdom library – then the largest in the world – at the hands of Mongol invaders. “Legend has it that they dumped its entire contents into the Tigris river to create a bridge to cross over, and that the pages bled for seven days – 168 hours,” Bilal said. “The extra 1 is that second when I imagine the books turned white and drained of knowledge.”

Aimed at restoring the roughly 70,000 books lost to looting and fire during the 2003 invasion of Iraq, Wafaa Bilal’s 168:01 mourns the loss of the College of Fine Arts Library at the University of Baghdad. The site-specific installation, organized and circulated by the Art Gallery of Windsor, positions viewers as potential participants who can choose to donate educational texts to the Fine Arts Library.

The installation becomes a system of exchange where art objects are traded for academic texts. Visitors are encouraged to donate books from the university’s wish list to help rebuild the library collection. Each participant who donates a book to the exhibition receives a white book in return — a symbol of the void that they have helped to fill and as a reminder of their contribution.

Wafaa Bilal’s powerful suite of photographs titled “The Ashes Series” brings the viewer closer to images of violence and war in the Middle East. In an effort to foster empathy and humanize the onslaught of violent images that inundate Western media during wartime, Bilal has reconstructed journalistic images of the destruction caused by the Iraq War. He writes, “Reconstructing the destructed spaces is a way to exist in them, to share them with an audience, and to provide a layer of distance, as the original photographs are too violent and run the risk of alienating the viewer. It represents an attempt to make sense of the destruction and to preserve the moment of serenity after the dust has settled, to give the ephemeral moment extended life in a mix of beauty and violence.” In the photograph “Al-Mutanabbi Street” from “The Ashes Series”, the viewer encounters dilapidated historic and modern buildings on a street covered with layers upon layers of rubble and fragments of torn books. Bilal’s images emanate a slowness that deepens engagement between the viewer and the image, thereby inviting them to share the burden of obliterated societies and reimagine a world built on the values of peace and hope.

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150, art., bears, butt plug, Canada., Confederation, Cree, daddies, First Nations, Indigenous, native, PEI, sex toy

For the last few years I have been working as a volunteer guide in our National Museums. This Summer despite my campaign for Public Office as City Councillor in Ward 1, Charlottetown I am back at the Art Gallery of the Confederation Centre. This Summer we have the exhibit of Canadian artist of the Cree First Nation, Kent Monkman.

Shame and Prejudice a play on the title of Jane Austen’s novel Pride and Prejudice. The exhibit which is over 3 rooms is large and complex and full of very controversial material some with explicit sexual content of a homoerotic nature and S&M depictions, none of it is gratuitous, all speaks directly to the experience of the indigenous population of Canada at the hands of white British colonial Officials and later the Federal Government of Canada and its policies of assimilation through incarceration, starvation, violence, residential schools, sexual abuse of children, murder and disappearance of native women, reservations, etc.

Needless to say some of our visitors to the Art Gallery have a difficult time of it and are offended that the memory of the 150th Anniversary of Confederation is not celebrated by the native population as a great project to civilize them into the mainstream. The comments are acid and mean, some deny anything wrong took place and place the blame on what they see as liberal thinkers and other miscreants who seek to destroy official history and attack Western culture. Some visitors find the art work inappropriate for families, we do have signs warning of the subject matter posted throughout. Others accuse Monkman of being a homosexual pervert pushing Indian propaganda for money.

One of the great difficulty for visitors who are non-native is to understand the culture and way of thinking of a First Nation person and how Native Culture and life is completely different in its terms of reference if seen from a White European perspective.

One early concept natives had to deal with was the idea that you could sell or buy land. Politicians promoted this idea as a way to solve claims to large portion of territory by simply offering token prices to native groups in return for their surrender of all the lands where they lived. Once dispossessed native groups could be easily exiled to remote reserves. The concept is completely foreign to native people, how can you sell or buy land, it is like saying you can sell or buy clouds or the air we breathe. The Government of Canada and the Prime Minister of the time did not even consider that native people might not be able to accept or understand such a concept. The policies of the government was to make of them little children in need of the civilizing influence of white people, in other words natives faced cultural genocide. As a French speaking Canadian, I can understand this type of discrimination and racist policy, though Canada has two Official languages, we were told to speak White (English) until 1968. The end of the Seven Year War in Europe in 1763 and the defeat of France was the reason for dominance and oppression in Canada.

Mass slaughter of animals for profit or fun was another concept natives could not understand. Natives living on the Prairies saw the building of the intercontinental railway across Canada which led to the mass slaughter of millions of bisons for fun by white men passengers on the train. In turn this led to mass starvation by First Nations who lost a primary source of food. The Government of Canada was happy to get rid of the ”Indian Problem” as it was dubbed by Ministers of the Government in Official memos.

Monkman also explores and presents with his alter-ego Miss Chief (pronounced Mischief) Eagle Testickle the unfolding history of natives in North America. In native culture gender and sexuality is redefined as Two Spirits, a concept not acceptable within Judeo-Christian morality, this is yet another point of friction between natives and europeans. Many visitors ask with some alarm if he is a man or a woman, is he showing off his erect penis (Freudian power symbol) to the daddies of Confederation, are the daddies (fathers) lusting after him. Yes is the answer but the lust is greed, dominance and power over the native population, the intent pure evil by these colonial politicians. This is very disturbing to many who confess that they never heard of Canada’s history told in this fashion. One man asked me why would the government allow such a show, it should be closed down, I asked if he was advocating censorship.

In the painting, Bears of Confederation, clearly shows a Confederation daddy with praying hands firmly inserted in his butt, while he is being whipped by Miss Chief Eagle Testickle with spirit Bears dancing and chasing in a playful manner other Confederation daddies naked and clad in leather gear.

Further along in the exhibit in the portion reserved to the residential schools which existed for 100 years where children where physically and sexually abused, Canada had a painful enquiry exposing the facts and this led to important financial settlements. The washable silicone hands reappear as a symbol of prayer like those of Albrecht Dürer and as a butt plug  a reference to the abuse that took place in those schools where tens of thousands of children died. In the words of Monkman, Christianity has fucked indigenous people over the centuries.

So you can see the challenge, many visitors accept what they see and others reject it, refusing to accept that anything negative took place. I enjoy presenting this exhibit because it attracts comments and reflection and is an opportunity to learn.

The exhibit continues until September 15, and will then travel to other parts of Canada.

 

 

My recent trip

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art., cuisine, Food, French, life, Travel

I travelled to Montreal my hometown for a week’s vacation away from PEI. Islanders will tell you that you need to get off the island especially between November and end April for mental health reasons. I did not listen to them and I should have, everyone I know goes away for a minimum of 2 full weeks in that time period.

I was born in Montreal and lived part of my childhood there from 1956 to 1960 and 1965 to 1974, only returning occasionally afterwards for family matters or to see friends.

I witnessed great changes in Montreal during the period of Mayor Jean Drapeau who had a grand vision for the Paris of the New World, Montreal is the second largest French speaking city in the World after Paris. It also was the metropolis of Canada until 1977 a title she lost to Toronto but regained as the other Metropolis after 2008.

The Metro system was opened in 1966, then we had the World Exposition in 1967, then the Olympics games in 1976. Montreal is also the seat of IATA and several international organizations, fine museums, art centres, great dining, etc.

It had been 4 years since my last visit when my father died and that visit was all about death and cleaning out my parents home, so not exactly a fun time.

I flew from Charlottetown on a regional jet (small plane) that is all that flies here to the island, the flight is 75 minutes so fairly quick. Montreal is a city of 4 million people and growing, construction everywhere, including the road system and a new bridge across the Saint-Lawrence river. People everywhere, traffic, very cosmopolitan and French.

I was staying with an old friend in the Côte des Neiges neighbourhood, near the Jewish General Hospital and the Université de Montréal. Montreal has 4 universities. The neighbourhood is multi-ethnic and multi-cultural, though everyone speaks French and all signs are in French, you will hear a multitude of languages from around the world.

On Monday we went to a German grocery store which sells all manner of product from Germany and Austria but also has a great lunch counter with specialties as you would find them in Europe. It seems that many customers spoke German with the staff and French with everyone else. The food was very good, this business has been on the same corner of Queen Mary and Côte des Neiges for 60 years.

Then I went downtown, to look around and was very surprised at how much familiar streets where my parents lived and worked had completely changed to the point I could not remember what was previously there. The area around the old Windsor Station which is now a complex of tall stylish condo buildings, there is about 9 new towers. The Queen Elizabeth Hotel, my Mom’s favourite in Montreal has been completely redecorated for its 60th anniversary and it is very nicely done. The old Birks & Sons Jewellery store on Phillips Square is being remodelled into a luxury hotel but is keeping the famous jeweller on the ground floor.

Birks and Sons Jeweller on Sainte-Catherine street at Phillips Square under renovations.

A new Four Seasons Hotel is being built next to Ogilvy’s department store which is now amalgamated with Holt Renfrew. I thought of Dad when I saw this project, he knew all about it, it has been in the works for 10 years and is now coming to completion. My father opened the first Four Seasons Hotel in Montreal back in the 70’s, how he would have love to see this one, a tall tower of black glass.

I also walked by the former Mount Stephens Club which was the home of Sir George Stephens the builder with Sir William Cornelius Van Horne of the transcontinental railway in Canada in 1888.  Today the mansion has been restored preserving the rare and exotic wood panelling and original decor and is used as meeting rooms and bar, dining rooms  and joined at the back to a new hotel tower part of the Leading Hotels of the world collection.

Detail of the interior of the house, top is the former reception room panelled in Lemonwood or Degame, beautiful soft yellow colour. The other bottom photo shows the top of the staircase all in mahogany, the windows have Tiffany glass, it is very dark despite the very large windows, giving the house a very formal atmosphere.

Then on Sherbrooke Street I went to the Musée des Beaux Arts also known as the museum of Fine Arts to see what was on show. The museum has 2 new wings, one called Le Pavillon pour la Paix, a gift of Michal and Renata Hornstein and the other is the Pavillon Claire et Marc Bourgie, a gift of the Bourgie family, the premier undertakers for funerals of distinction in Quebec. The Museum was founded about 120 years ago by art lovers in Montreal on the same location it is now but with the years it has grown into a 7 building complex. What is interesting about its expansion is how organically it grew, incorporating other landmarks around it like the Erskine & American United Church with its 17 famous Tiffany Stain glass windows of 1897. I love this museum, the collections are superb and if you go to Montreal you really should make an effort to visit, even if just for one hour. The restaurant of the museum is also wonderful, I had lunch there and the food is very good as is the wine selection, I had a grilled octopus salad accompanied by a Pouilly Fuissé Chardonnay and then a Magret de Canard, very good indeed.

I return by Métro to my friend’s home, tired but very happy for this first day.

 

 

The 5 Fallacies about Art

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art., fallacies, MBAC, NGC, Ottawa

Here we have Marc Mayer, Director of the National Gallery of Canada in Ottawa presenting his arguments to debunk fallacies about art. I find it very helpful in my conversations with the public at the Art Gallery.

 

A painting

Tags

AGCC, art., Canada., docent, guide, ingres, Museums, NGOC, paintings

Years ago in my first job as a guide-docent at the National Gallery of Canada I came across many paintings from as early as 1200 to today, many periods and artists from Europe and North America. We were trained by the Education dept., as part of our training we were also advised on what to expect from visitors. We were told to be careful with children under the age of 11 and with children between 11 and 16. We were told what not to show and how to avoid controversy or questions which might be delicate to answer. The real concern was not the kids but the parents, some parents who have a certain world view or philosophy of life might object to art depicting topics like nudity, violence, religious or biblical scenes, young naked children, dark colours or modern contemporary art like the surrealist art of Dali, Picasso, Magritte.

So what do you show exactly beyond a vase with flowers and more importantly how do you avoid such art on the walls as you walk through the galleries.

This painting is a case in point,  it is in the National Gallery in Ottawa on the Second floor. The subject is Actaea the Nymph on the sea, by Frederic Lord Leighton, in his Pre-Raphaelite style so loved by Queen Victoria.

So we were instructed by the Education Dept to avoid that corridor and if not, see if we could not attract the attention of the children to the opposite wall where one could look at Italian and French landscapes. Did you notice that Actaea is looking at dolphins? Kids love dolphins, they fascinate them. So one day I had a class of grade 5 student, so around 10 years old, also with our group was their teacher and one parent who appeared indifferent which is often the case.

I was trying to get this group of 20 kids to look at a painting by Camille Corot, The bridge at Narni.

We had just walked by the Venus by Lucas Cranach the Elder and one boy asked me why was the Lady naked.

So back to Actaea, while I do my best to speak of the Corot painting and the ruined bridge at Narni, I suddenly notice that I lost my audience, the kids are all looking at the dolphins. I look at the teacher and ask, what should I do? Teacher says; you better explain the dolphins. The children were oblivious to the naked Nymph and all they wanted to know was the names of the dolphins and where they could see them. Now that was a tough question to answer. After that episode I decided that whatever was in the Museum I would simply present and give honest answers to children’s questions. I have found that they are perfectly happy with that approach.

Kids are fascinated at that age by things they see and are trying to understand  and make it fit in their world view, which is completely different from the adult world.   Renaissance paintings with Biblical scenes of violence as a moral lesson, also attracts them, what they want to know is how was it done, not the violence itself.

Currently at the Art Gallery of the Confederation Centre I have not had this dilemma, with one exception recently. We currently have a study in our Summer show one art work the artist took as a subject La grande baigneuse de Valpinçon by Ingres and modernized or updated it.

So last week I had two groups of 13 year old students and the boys found it quite funny, sort of the funny embarrassed laughter of boys in puberty.

This is where it gets tricky as children enter puberty and their world changes drastically, no longer children but teenagers. Luckily I have lots of other works to show them and start discussions around. Never a dull moment at the Gallery.

Art Weekend

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2017, AGCC, Art Gallery, art., Canada., CCOA, Charlottetown, Confederation, Festival, PEI, Robert Houle, Saulteaux, theatre

This has been a busy weekend with the Opening of the Summer Theatre Festival at the Confederation Centre of the Arts and then on the next night the Opening of the Summer Exhibit at the Art Gallery. In both cases it brought out the whose who of PEI Society from the Lieutenant-Governor to Members of Parliament, Senators, Chief Justice and many others actors on our social scene.

The Opening play is Million Dollar Quartet which tells the story of the meeting at Sun Records in December of 1956 of four greats of the Rock and Roll scene, Jerry Lee Lewis, Elvis Presley, Johnny Cash and Carl Perkins in Memphis.

The reception before and after was a lot of fun with a live orchestra and great food by the new Chef of Mavor’s Miguel Cervantes.

The next night was the opening of the Summer Exhibit of the Art Gallery of the Confederation Centre. This being the 150th Anniversary of Confederation, the exhibit highlights the Collection of the Art Gallery, the best pieces of our 17,000 works of Art by great Canadian artists. The Art Gallery is mandated to show only Canadian Art since the Centre is a Memorial to the Fathers of Confederation.

We also unveiled a new giant painting by Canadian Native Artist Robert Houle Aka Blue Thunder who is a  from St-Boniface, Manitoba. It joins the other great canvasses on the same theme by Jean-Paul Lemieux, John Fox, Jane Ash Poitras, Yvon Gallant, Wanda Koop, Jack Shadbolt.

Robert Houle, Blue Thunder (born 1947) is a Saulteaux First Nation Canadian artist, curator, critic, and educator. Houle has had an active curatorial and artistic practice since the mid-1970s. He played an important role in bridging the gap between contemporary First Nations artists and the broader Canadian art scene through his writing and involvement in early important high-profile exhibitions such as Land, Spirit, Power: First Nations at the National Gallery of Canada (Ottawa, 1992). As an artist, Houle has shown both nationally and internationally. He is predominately a painter working in the tradition of Abstraction, yet he has also embraced a pop sensibility by incorporating everyday images and text into his works.

We were told or ‘O-ween du muh waun’ by Robert Houle, 2017

Me and the artist

This great canvas represents the Delaware in the classical pose from the celebrated propaganda painting of Benjamin West, The Death of General Wolfe which is in the National Gallery of Canada.

The Death of General Wolfe by Benjamin West, 1770. The Official story as told is of Wolfe dying on the Plains of Abraham in September 1759 during the famous battle against French General Montcalm. This scene was pure fantasy but it was necessary for propaganda purpose in England to raise taxes to pay for the Seven Year War, the tax raise led a few years later to the American Revolution.

In his painting Houle presents a different narrative, he rejects the fantasy painting of West and presents not a battle scene, stating that who won the battle is not really important and should not be celebrated. For Houle on this anniversary we should celebrate today’s Canada. Further being from the Saulteaux First Nation the idea of 150 years does not apply to his people since they have lived in North America for 15,000 years.

 

I also got a very nice gift this weekend, I often give tours to school children aged 8 to 12.

Once class sent me several thank you notes designed and written by the students.

Each card as a personal message addressed to me as a thank you from a student. I am very proud of this gift and happy that for some kids the day at the Art Gallery meant something.