Studio: international art (70.1917)

The Royal Canadian Academy of Arts

for technical guidance and encouragement.
His great love of nature had led him to pass
months at a time in the wilds of Northern
Ontario, where quite alone he lived the life
of a voyageur. Presently he experienced the
desire for expression, and made his first essays
in monochrome, producing sketches and little
pictures that revealed latent power and deep
feeling. It is only within the last three or four
years that he has added to the strange charm
of his productions the interest of strong and
brilliant colour. His landscapes, while frankly
decorative in treatment, nevertheless potently
express the spirit of the Canadian nort'hland—
its dignified and splendid calm and its pathetic
aloofness and isolation. He was represented
in the exhibition under review by one picture
only, The Hardwoods, which indicates a maturer
perception and a more experienced control of
the medium employed for its expression.

The examples of the work shown by most of
our landscape painters of established reputation
were well up to, and in some instances in
advance of, the standard which we have become
accustomed to expect. Our winter, with its
brilliancy and colourfulness, is
ever an unfailing inspiration to
the native-born artist ; and as
usual a number of pictures were
exhibited on this occasion
wherein snow and ice figured
prominently. One such was Mr.

Maurice Cullen’s A Northern
Brook, a picture relatively small
in size but of exceptionally fine
quality; and another, Early
Spring, by Mr. J. W. Beatty, was
notable for its breadth and bold-
ness of treatment and handling.

Of Mr. Clarence A. Gagnon’s
four pictures, two were en-
deavours to represent the glory
of sun-emblazoned snow, and his
Late Afternoon Sun, Winter, a
wondrous juxtaposition of ruby
and amber. In a fourth picture,

The Wayside Cross, the motif was
essentially the effect of mystery
that is imparted by the soft
enshrouding mists of an early
autumn morning to the hills of
the Laurentians. This has been
purchased by the Canadian

Government. Mr. A. Y. Jackson, who with four
other members or associates of the Academy
is serving with the colours in France, and has
been already once wounded in the performance
of that duty, exhibited Factories at Leeds,
England, and The Cedar Swamp, both of them
distinguished works. Mr. Jackson has not
only a fine sense of harmonious design, but a
manner of expression that is as virile as it is
sincere.

The President of the Academy, Mr. Wm.
Brymner, C.M.G., was represented by four
admirable landscapes, of which A Lonely Grave,
Louishurg, N.S., and Sunset, Louisburg, N.S.,
may be specially noted. In addition to its
decided artistic appeal, a certain historic
interest attaches to the former of these paintings,
since the grave in question is that of Ford
Dundonald, an ancestor of that Lord Dun-
donald who not long since served for a term of
years in Canada as general officer commanding
the Canadian forces. Lord Dundonald died
in 1758. Typically Canadian also, and at the
same time expressive of personality and tempera-
ment, were the landscapes exhibited by Mr.

HARBOUR OF ST. IVES

34

BY HARRY BRITTON