English Canada but also the French and the Native populations, and distinct from both Britain and the United States.
In politics, in commerce, and in culture, people looked within their borders for national autonomy and identity. The provinces had been gathered together under a federal system, and a national railway helped bind them together. But Canadaâs past, and its identity, were closely entwined with those of Britain and France. Most people traced their origin to Europe. The new Canada needed its own myths and images, drawn from its own landscape.
Artists were part of the turning away from colonial attitudes. Many rejected, as irrelevant to the Canadianexperience, both the English landscape tradition and the domestic imagery of French Post-Impressionism. They wanted something that was authentic to their own countryâin both style and in subjectâand that was also modern. But, as yet, there was neither a national art style nor a movement comparable to those in Europe.
One fact dominated the imagination of the country: the wilderness. Nature is formidable in Canada. It evokes awe and terror and an impulse to come to terms with the mystery of its vast spaces. Some painters believed they could capture the spirit of the country through landscape painting, by showing both the physical and spiritual essence of the lakes, forests, and mountains. Europe had landscapes, but none as sublime and majestic as Canadaâs, and none that were as yet unpainted.
In the 1920s a handful of like-minded painters in Ontario joined together and called themselves the Group of Seven. They shared an interest in painting the landscape. But not just any landscape. They wanted to paint something unique to Canada, in a style that was also unique to Canada. The position they took was radical: they would paint in a modernist style and they would paint the wilderness. Perhaps even more radical, for the times, was the idea that through direct communion with the wilderness, a trulyCanadian style and technique could arise that would be the visual definition of the nation.
In building an image of themselves, the group drew on two symbols: that of the prospector and of the trapper. Both represented straightforward, hardy outdoorsmen in the best Canadian tradition. Not for these painters the convenient studios and comfortable drawing rooms of the cities. They travelled by canoe and lived in shacks and tents as they explored the uninhabited regions of the country.
When Emily met members of the group, and saw their paintings, she was struck by how much their intentions echoed hers. She, too, had been striving to define her experience in relation to a unique, sparsely populated landscape, and to find an original style in which to paint it. She wrote in her journal of the group, âI know that they are building an art worthy of our great country, and I want to have my share, to put in a little spoke for the West, one woman holding up my end.â In the beginning, the group met with derision from both public and critics, but gradually their enterprise began to succeed. They also had their supporters, notably in Eric Brown, the director of the National Gallery. Brown favoured not only the development of the groupâs nationalistic impulse, but also the promotion of modernist styles. However, for better or for worse, the group was based inOntario. Although some of its members made painting trips to the West, they could not be considered representative of the nation as a whole. This fact was not lost on Western artists, who protested their exclusion from exhibitions at the National Gallery.
A colleague of Brownâs, Marius Barbeau, an ethnographer from Ottawaâs Victoria Memorial Museum, had an overriding interest in the Native arts of the West Coast. Barbeau was familiar with totem poles. He saw them not only as something unique to Canada, but also as having stylistic similarities to the abstract elements in modern art. Brown and
In politics, in commerce, and in culture, people looked within their borders for national autonomy and identity. The provinces had been gathered together under a federal system, and a national railway helped bind them together. But Canadaâs past, and its identity, were closely entwined with those of Britain and France. Most people traced their origin to Europe. The new Canada needed its own myths and images, drawn from its own landscape.
Artists were part of the turning away from colonial attitudes. Many rejected, as irrelevant to the Canadianexperience, both the English landscape tradition and the domestic imagery of French Post-Impressionism. They wanted something that was authentic to their own countryâin both style and in subjectâand that was also modern. But, as yet, there was neither a national art style nor a movement comparable to those in Europe.
One fact dominated the imagination of the country: the wilderness. Nature is formidable in Canada. It evokes awe and terror and an impulse to come to terms with the mystery of its vast spaces. Some painters believed they could capture the spirit of the country through landscape painting, by showing both the physical and spiritual essence of the lakes, forests, and mountains. Europe had landscapes, but none as sublime and majestic as Canadaâs, and none that were as yet unpainted.
In the 1920s a handful of like-minded painters in Ontario joined together and called themselves the Group of Seven. They shared an interest in painting the landscape. But not just any landscape. They wanted to paint something unique to Canada, in a style that was also unique to Canada. The position they took was radical: they would paint in a modernist style and they would paint the wilderness. Perhaps even more radical, for the times, was the idea that through direct communion with the wilderness, a trulyCanadian style and technique could arise that would be the visual definition of the nation.
In building an image of themselves, the group drew on two symbols: that of the prospector and of the trapper. Both represented straightforward, hardy outdoorsmen in the best Canadian tradition. Not for these painters the convenient studios and comfortable drawing rooms of the cities. They travelled by canoe and lived in shacks and tents as they explored the uninhabited regions of the country.
When Emily met members of the group, and saw their paintings, she was struck by how much their intentions echoed hers. She, too, had been striving to define her experience in relation to a unique, sparsely populated landscape, and to find an original style in which to paint it. She wrote in her journal of the group, âI know that they are building an art worthy of our great country, and I want to have my share, to put in a little spoke for the West, one woman holding up my end.â In the beginning, the group met with derision from both public and critics, but gradually their enterprise began to succeed. They also had their supporters, notably in Eric Brown, the director of the National Gallery. Brown favoured not only the development of the groupâs nationalistic impulse, but also the promotion of modernist styles. However, for better or for worse, the group was based inOntario. Although some of its members made painting trips to the West, they could not be considered representative of the nation as a whole. This fact was not lost on Western artists, who protested their exclusion from exhibitions at the National Gallery.
A colleague of Brownâs, Marius Barbeau, an ethnographer from Ottawaâs Victoria Memorial Museum, had an overriding interest in the Native arts of the West Coast. Barbeau was familiar with totem poles. He saw them not only as something unique to Canada, but also as having stylistic similarities to the abstract elements in modern art. Brown and
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