Founded in 1850, Waddington’s has watched Canada grow and prosper and we've adapted to each change over the course of our history.
Firmly anchored by our diverse areas of expertise, including fine art, Inuit and First Nations art, decorative arts and design, fine jewellery, and fine wine and spirits, we’ve been entrusted with some of the most interesting and iconic collections of Canadian history. Selling the contents of Maple Leaf Gardens comes to mind, a marathon auction broadcast by TSN which saw us catalogue everything from the rafters down to the benches. More sobering experiences include handling the estates of luminary Canadian politicians, artists and industry leaders.
Some of our most meaningful experiences have been working with clients who we have come to know and consider part of the Waddington’s family. Relationships passed down through families and friends. Collecting interests change – our commitment to providing trusted expertise does not.
As we celebrate our 175th anniversary, we also celebrate Canada and our mutual strength in diversity.
Duncan McLean President, Waddington's
Lot 346
Frederick Grant Banting Cobalt, ca. 1932 (detail)
ROBERT WAKEHAM PILOT, PRCA (1898-1967), CANADIAN LOADING CARGO, LUNENBURG, 1927
oil on panel
signed and dated “27” lower left; titled and dated to gallery labels verso 12.5 x 17 in — 29.8 x 40.6 cm
PROVENANCE:
Watson Art Galleries, Montreal, QC
Manuge Galleries Limited, Halifax, NS
Private Collection, Ontario
EXHIBITED:
Landscapes of Spain and Morocco and Marines of the Coast of Nova Scotia by Robert W. Pilot, Watson Art Galleries, Montreal, QC, Feb 1928, cat. no. 33.
$8,000—12,000
VIEW LOT
302
ALBERT JACQUES FRANCK, RCA (1899-1973), CANADIAN BACK OF OXFORD ST., 1969 oil on hardboard signed and dated “69” lower right; titled to artist and gallery labels verso 30 x 24 in — 76.2 x 61 cm
PROVENANCE:
Collection of Eric Scott, Toronto, ON Galerie Bernard Desroches, Montreal, QC Private Collection, Ontario
LITERATURE: Harold Town, Albert Franck: Keeper of the Lanes. (Toronto: McClelland and Stewart Limited, 1974), 89.
NOTE:
Accompanied by a signed copy of Harold Town’s Albert Franck: Keeper of the Lanes.
$10,000—15,000
VIEW LOT
303
ALEXANDER YOUNG (A.Y.) JACKSON, OSA, RCA (1882-1974), CANADIAN TREES & ROCKS, GEORGIAN BAY, CA. 1938 oil on panel signed lower right; titled and dated to gallery labels verso; with statement of authenticity by Penell Gallery verso 10.5 x 13.5 in — 26.7 x 34.3 cm
PROVENANCE: Penell Gallery, Toronto, ON Laing Galleries, Toronto, ON Private Collection, Ontario
$20,000—30,000
VIEW LOT
304
FRANK HANS (FRANZ) JOHNSTON, OSA, RCA (1888-1949), CANADIAN SPRING IS ON THE MARCH oil on board
signed lower left; titled to artist label verso 24 x 30 in — 61 x 76.2 cm
PROVENANCE:
Private Collection, Toronto, ON
$15,000—25,000
VIEW LOT
t
BERNARD BUFFET
Renowned for his distinctively graphic style and elongated forms, Bernard Buffet was one of the 20th century’s most prolific artists, believed to have painted over 8,000 artworks in his lifetime.
Buffet created uniquely flat yet expressive scenes that captured his penchant for melancholia and that of a post-war France. Gaining prominence early in his career (first exhibiting at the age of 20), Buffet, alongside other young, pivotal tastemakers such as Yves Saint Laurent, helped shape the visual aesthetic of mid-century France.
Championed as a landscape painter in 1953, Buffet’s depictions of quaint towns and villages across France reignited a sense of cultural pride. Poet and leading voice of the French Surrealists, Louis Aragon, famously praised Buffet’s exhibition in a multi-issue review published in Les Lettres Françaises.
“For Aragon, Buffet’s show was nothing less than a complete renewal and revival of the tradition of the French landscape: ‘One can say that he takes his place in the great lineage of French landscape painters from Daubigny to Utrillo, via Corot, Courbet, Boudin and Claude Monet’...Buffet was not just an extraordinarily accomplished young painter, but a painter of whom the nation could and should be proud.” 1
Although created nearly a decade after the critically acclaimed exhibition in Paris, Au bord de la rivière equally displays Buffet’s talent for capturing serene, suburban landscapes. Using a limited watercolour palette, Buffet encapsulates the verdant Mayenne riverbank and the mirror-like reflection of the architecture on the surface of the water. Given the similarities in setting and composition, the watercolour also reads as a study for the oil on canvas painting La rivière aux environs de Mayenne - held previously in the collection of the late CEO of Power Corporation of Canada, Paul Desmarais Sr. In each work, Buffet offers a different perspective of the Mayenne River, with the watercolour emphasizing the meandering nature of the body of water and the work on canvas highlighting the river’s ability to capture and reflect light. Au bord de la rivière ultimately provides insight into the prolific Buffet’s process and manipulation of colour and light within the realm of his graphic, shadowless vignettes.
1 Foulkes, Nicholas. Bernard Buffet: The Invention of the Modern Mega-Artist. Random House, 2016.
305
BERNARD BUFFET (1928-1999), FRENCH AU BORD DE LA RIVIÈRE, 1962
watercolour, gouache, and pastel on BFK Rives paper signed and dated “62” upper right; Galerie David et Garnier stamp verso 19 x 25 in — 48.3 x 63.5 cm
PROVENANCE:
Galerie David et Garnier, Paris, France
Galerie Dresdnère, Toronto, ON
Private Collection, Toronto, ON Private Collection, Ontario
$30,000—40,000
VIEW LOT
306
JOHN GEOFFREY CARUTHERS LITTLE, RCA (1928-2024), CANADIAN RIVERFRONT (BERGE), FLEUVE SAINT-LAURENT AVEC GOÉLETTE, 1969 oil on canvas
signed lower right; signed, titled, and dated to stretcher
36 x 48 in — 91.4 x 121.9 cm
PROVENANCE:
Galerie Walter Klinkhoff, Montreal, QC
Estate of Roland Dubeau, Quebec, QC
Private Collection, Quebec, QC
$30,000—40,000
VIEW LOT
307
JOHN GEOFFREY CARUTHERS LITTLE, RCA (1928-2024), CANADIAN CHABOILLEZ SQUARE, MONTREAL, 1972 oil on canvas
signed lower right; signed, titled, and dated “72” and situated to stretcher 24 x 30 in — 61 x 76.2 cm
PROVENANCE:
Continental Galleries, Montreal, QC
Private Collection, Nova Scotia
$10,000—12,000
VIEW LOT
308
JOHN GEOFFREY CARUTHERS LITTLE, RCA (1928-2024), CANADIAN CARDINAL’S PALACE, QUEBEC, 1966 oil on canvas
signed lower right; titled and dated to stretcher; also titled and dated to gallery label verso 24.25 x 30.25 in — 61 x 76.2 cm
PROVENANCE:
Galerie Walter Klinkhoff, Montreal, QC
Estate of Roland Dubeau, Quebec, QC
Private Collection, Quebec, QC
$20,000—30,000
VIEW LOT
309
ALFRED JOSEPH (A.J.) CASSON, OSA, PRCA (1898-1992), CANADIAN WOODLAND, OXTONGUE LAKE, 1971 oil on board
signed lower right; signed, titled, and dated verso; titled and dated to artist and gallery labels verso 12 x 15 in — 30.5 x 38.1 cm
PROVENANCE:
Roberts Gallery, Toronto, ON Collector’s Gallery, Montreal, QC Waddington’s Auctioneers, Toronto, ON, 20 Nov 2017, lot 75
$15,000—20,000
VIEW LOT
WILLIAM KURELEK
William Kurelek was deeply curious about the world around him. While the Christian artist could sometimes take a moralizing view, moments like those represented in Inukshuks (lot 310) and View on Frobisher Bay (lot 311) bear witness to a refreshing openness. Both works are part of Kurelek’s Cape Dorset series: 30 paintings reflecting a seven-day working trip the artist took in May 1968 to Kinngait on Baffin Island with Terry Ryan, the general manager of the West Baffin Eskimo Co-operative (WBEC). What distinguishes this series, which was exhibited at the Art Gallery of Ontario in 1970-71, is its documentary inquisitiveness.
This tourist’s view, of people and landscape, is frankly observational and refreshingly contemporary—one painting in the series, for instance, depicts locals returning home after watching a “Cowboy Movie.” Frobisher Bay captures Kurelek’s unique sense of awe and humour: a vast and overpowering landscape looms before us, even as a bathetic snowmobile trundles by. The grouping of inuksuit and inunnguat—the latter distinguished as human-shaped—are likely at Inuksugalait, or Inuksuk Point, 90 kilometres from Kinngait. Both paintings are custom framed by the artist, reflecting his professional training in this skilled trade.
The Cape Dorset series was not the only body of work Kurelek made in and about the Arctic; but it is arguably the one that stands the test of time. Unlike his illustrations for the 1976 book The Last of the Arctic—in which Kurelek was urged by his publisher to produce “a record of a pretechnological society” before “it had its streetlights and Skidoos and telephone poles”—the 1968 paintings brim with a candid, authentic sympathy for the north.1
1 Patricia Morley, Kurelek: A Biography (Toronto: Macmillian, 1986), p. 253. Kay Kritzwiser, “Kurelek: Documenting the Ancient Way of Eskimo Life, and Cutting Budget Corners by Eating Only One Meal a Day,” Globe and Mail, May 20, 1978.
Contributed by Andrew Kear, Head of Programs at Museum London and the past Curator of Canadian Art at the Winnipeg Art Gallery. Andrew co-curated the 2011/2012 touring exhibition William Kurelek: The Messenger and is author of the Art Canada Institute’s William Kurelek: Life & Work, available online at www.aci-iac.ca.
WILLIAM KURELEK, OSA, RCA (1927-1977), CANADIAN INUKSHUKS, 1968 oil on hardboard
signed with monogram and dated “68” lower right; titled to frame verso; titled and dated to exhibition and gallery labels verso 10.5 x 18 in — 26.7 x 45.7 cm
PROVENANCE:
Isaacs Gallery, Toronto, ON Walter Klinkhoff Gallery, Montreal, QC Private Collection, Ontario
EXHIBITED:
William Kurelek - A Point of View: Cape Dorset, NWT, 13 Sep 1970-16 Jun 1971, Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, ON.
LITERATURE:
William Kurelek - A Point of View: Cape Dorset, NWT (Toronto: Art Gallery of Ontario, 1969) no. 21 (exhibition pamphlet).
$20,000—30,000
VIEW LOT
WILLIAM KURELEK, OSA, RCA (1927-1977), CANADIAN VIEW ON FROBISHER BAY, 1968 oil on hardboard signed with monogram and dated “68” lower right; titled and dated to frame verso; titled to exhibition and gallery labels verso 9.75 x 13 in — 24.8 x 33 cm
PROVENANCE:
Isaacs Gallery, Toronto, ON Walter Klinkhoff Gallery, Montreal, QC Private Collection, Ontario
EXHIBITED:
William Kurelek - A Point of View: Cape Dorset, NWT, 13 Sep 1970-16 Jun 1971, Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, ON.
LITERATURE:
William Kurelek - A Point of View: Cape Dorset, NWT (Toronto: Art Gallery of Ontario, 1969) no. 22 (exhibition pamphlet).
$15,000—20,000
VIEW LOT
TED HARRISON
Waddington’s is pleased to offer four canvases by acclaimed Canadian artist, Ted Harrison: Brooney’s Farewell, 1992 (lot 312), Evening Clouds, 1982 (lot 313), Girl with a Bucket, 1984 (lot 314), and Sky Children, 1981 (lot 315).
Harrison’s distinct painting style is heavily influenced by his upbringing and vast world experience. Having grownup in a mining town in Durham, England before serving his country in World War II, grim coal mines and war bombings were the visual landscape of his youth, a landscape that runs contrary to the bright and cheerful subjects found in his paintings. However, it is these dark experiences that formed Harrison’s artistic philosophy: “death and destruction are sometimes necessary, and evil exists as surely as does good. But we must, at all costs, choose what is good, what is beautiful.” 1
Harrison moved to Canada in 1968 after living in England, India, East Africa, and New Zealand. He was immediately captivated by the clear air and bright skies of the Yukon: a landscape that became his muse for the next two decades. He gained inspiration from the Woodland School of Art, and his personal art collection grew to include works by Alex Janvier, Norval Morrisseau, Daphne Odjig, Bill Reid, and Arthur Shilling, among others.
The four works on offer are prime examples of Harrison’s prolific mid-period, and wonderfully articulate his many influences. These works exhibit a complex harmony between form and colour and the connection between land and sky. The rolling sky and vibrant sun is a recurring theme in Harrison’s work, and can be largely attributed to his love for classical music. Harrison saw art and music as interchangeable and integrated the rhythm and crescendos of the songs he listened to into the waves and spirals of his painted skies. The brilliance of Harrison’s work lies in his ability to channel his many influences, ideas, and inspirations into a simple projection of the Yukon: its vast, open spaces, vivid sunsets, and the rich culture of these communities.
Harrison’s human subjects were just as integral to the landscape as the mountains and sky, and are central themes in all four of these works. Brooney’s Farewell, 1992 (lot 312) wonderfully references the end of Harrison’s Yukon era. In 1992 Harrison and his wife Nicky made the difficult decision to move from the Yukon to Victoria, BC. This is one of the last canvases Harrison painted during his prolific twenty-four years in the Yukon.
Ted Harrison, The Last Horizon (Vancouver: Merritt Publishing Company, 1980).
$15,000—20,000
VIEW LOT
316
JEAN PAUL LEMIEUX, RCA (1904-1990), CANADIAN LA CÔTE NORD, 1953 oil on hardboard signed and dated “53” lower right; titled verso 14.5 x 19 in — 36.8 x 48.3 cm
PROVENANCE:
Origine Beaux Arts, Islington, ON Private Collection, Edmonton, AB
LITERATURE:
This painting will be included in Michèle Grandbois’s forthcoming catalogue raisonné of the artist’s work.
$10,000—15,000
VIEW LOT
JEAN PAUL LEMIEUX (1904-1990), CANADIAN SANS TITRE, 1965 oil on paper
signed and dated “’65” lower left; signed verso sight 5.5 x 8.5 in — 14 x 21.6 cm
PROVENANCE:
Galerie Art et Style, Baie-Saint-Paul, QC Private Collection, Quebec
LITERATURE:
This painting will be included in Michèle Grandbois’s forthcoming catalogue raisonné of the artist’s work.
$30,000—50,000
VIEW LOT
318
RITA LETENDRE, RCA (1928-2021), CANADIAN
XILITLA, 1977
acrylic on canvas
signed and dated “77” lower right; signed, titled, and dated “77” verso; titled and dated to gallery label verso 60 x 40 in — 152.4 x 101.6 cm
PROVENANCE: Gallery Moos Ltd., Toronto, ON Private Collection, Toronto, ON
$20,000—30,000
VIEW LOT
JACK BUSH
There may be no sweeter pink in the painted oeuvre of Jack Bush than Solo Soprano #1
Sure, Salmon Concerto – now commanding a room at the Art Gallery of Ontario – is a masterwork in pink but it’s different, not as high key, and simply not as sweet as Solo Soprano #1. Mauve and raspberry pinks also appear as the ground colour in other paintings from the same year, 1975, but Solo Soprano #1 stands out with its supranatural pink that is a must-see in person for its full effect.
The year before Bush painted Solo Soprano #1, he received a glossary of musical terms from his youngest son, Terry Bush. It’s tempting to think that the pitch of the pink hues is a conscious attempt by the artist to conjure up the sound of a soprano singer – like a synesthetic experience, where colour represents sound.
Also known simply as Solo Soprano (since there is no evidence that a Solo Soprano #2 ever existed), the painting was sent to Waddington Galleries in London, UK, in October 1975, the same month in which it was painted. In January 1976, Waddington Galleries hosted its seventh solo Bush exhibition since it began representing the artist in 1965. While Solo Soprano was not displayed in that 1976 show, the London art critic Harold Osborne wrote a response to the exhibition which remains relevant to all of the artist’s lyrical paintings:
”The musical titles Bush chooses for these works...carry us back to one of the twin motivations of expressive abstraction at the turn of the century or before, i.e., the hope to create art which, in the words of August Endell, ‘stirs the human soul through forms which resemble nothing known’; but which ‘works solely through freely invented forms, like music through freely invented notes.” 1
Bush also used musical terms to explain his process, such as “ad lib” when explaining how he came up with colour combinations for his paintings. Musically speaking, to ad lib is to improvise rather than preconceive. Bush used the term to suggest that his approach to selecting colours was automatic or shaped only by his free will. If Bush improvised, it was only at the very outset of planning his paintings, when he made small studies. Solo Soprano has a matching study rendered in chalk and pencil on paper (4 x 2¼ inches / 10.2 x 5.7 cm). All the strokes are there, and a patch of pink in the upper left corner signals its key feature: a sea of pink.
There is some debate as to whether his chalk studies of the late 1970s came about as prompts to inspire paintings or as a reminder of what he had painted; either way, these studies do capture their matching paintings in a more intimate manner, like handwritten song lyrics, denoting some of the raw emotion that becomes perfection in paint.
1 Harold Osborne, “Arts Review: Jack Bush”; London ?, February 20, 1976.
Contributed by Dr. Sarah Stanners, independent art historian, curator, and advisor. Dr. Stanners dedicated 13 years to the recently published Jack Bush Catalogue Raisonné as both author and director.
JACK HAMILTON BUSH, OSA, ARCA (1909-1977), CANADIAN SOLO SOPRANO #1, 1975 [STANNERS 3.29.1975.23]
acrylic on canvas signed, titled, and dated “Oct. 1975” verso; titled and dated “Oct ‘75” to stretcher; also titled to exhibition label verso
51 x 32 in — 129.5 x 81.3 cm
PROVENANCE:
Acquired directly from the artist in 1975 by Waddington Galleries, London, UK Woltjen/Udell Gallery, Edmonton, AB
Acquired from the above in 1977 by the present Private Collection, Edmonton, AB
EXHIBITED:
Jack Bush in Edmonton Collections, 1988, Edmonton Art Gallery, Edmonton, AB.
LITERATURE:
Sarah Stanners, Jack Bush Paintings: A Catalogue Raisonné (Toronto: David Mirvish Books in partnership with Coach House Press, 2024), 384–385 (col. illus.), Vol. 4, cat. no. 3.29.1975.23.
$125,000—175,000
tJACK BUSH
Blue-Green Thrust, painted in May 1959, marks a shift in Jack Bush’s practice away from a short-lived exploration of American Abstract Impressionist ideas and toward a “stripped-down abstraction” that we see fully matured throughout the 1960s and beyond.1 Bush met Clement Greenberg in 1957 when the famed art critic visited Toronto -- the beginning of a sustained professional mentorship and genuine friendship. Already by 1959 they were in full dialogue and Greenberg’s counsel becomes evident in Bush’s work at this time. Sarah Stanners writes:
“…Bush took the advice he had received from Clement Greenberg when he painted this picture. In a letter dated 3 March 1959, which Bush transcribed in his diary, Greenberg had suggested that Bush should pursue more "openness" in his compositions and let the unprimed canvas act as paint. Bush did just this and only sized this canvas. He therefore allowed the raw colour of the canvas to show through and form the central thrusting shape.” 2
The earliest instance of what will come to be called the Thrust series, Blue-Green Thrust also demonstrates Bush’s interest in colour and structured composition. Bush went on to create over two dozen paintings from this series throughout the early 1960s and they represent his first “sustained concentration of a single abstract picture type with many variations.” 3
1 Karen Wilkin, “Jack Bush: His Imagery” in Jack Bush, (New York: Hudson Hills Press), 161.
2 Sarah Stanners, Jack Bush Paintings: A Catalogue Raisonné Vol. 2 (Toronto: David Mirvish Books in partnership with Coach House Press, 2024), 179.
3 Marc Mayer, “A Double Life” in Marc Mayer and Sarah Stanners, Jack Bush (Ottawa: National Gallery of Canada, 2014), 22.
320
JACK HAMILTON BUSH, OSA, ARCA (1909-1977), CANADIAN
Jack Bush: Paintings 1959-1974, André Emmerich Gallery, New York, NY, 1978.
Jack Bush: Paintings, Galerie Wentzel, Cologne, Germany, 1983.
Jack Bush: Paintings 1959-1973, Newzones Gallery of Contemporary Art, Calgary, AB, 2004.
LITERATURE:
Jack Bush: Paintings 1959-1974 (New York: André Emmerich Gallery, 1978) unpaginated, (exhibition catalogue).
Marc Mayer and Sarah Stanners, Jack Bush (Ottawa: National Gallery of Canada, 2014), 22, fig. 5 (col. illus.) (exhibition catalogue).
Sarah Stanners, Jack Bush Paintings: A Catalogue Raisonné Vol. 2 (Toronto: David Mirvish Books in partnership with Coach House Press, 2024), 178-179, cat. no. 1.147.1959.353 (col. illus.).
VIEW LOT
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WILLIAM
KURELEK
Volleyball (lot 321) and Lacrosse (lot 322) picture scrums of activity, two moments of truth as players gesticulate and bend in choreographies of competition. While not athletically inclined, the Prairie-born, Toronto-based William Kurelek had always been captivated by play, particularly the jostle and rush of school days witnessed in Farm Children’s Games in Western Canada (1952), King of the Castle (1958-59), and Reminiscences of Youth (1968)—earlier works that came to define his artistic reputation. In contrast, these later paintings are more focused on the dynamics of organised physical contest: the tik-tac-toe of jumping-jack bodies; the harried surge of combatants around the goal.
By the mid-1970s audiences beyond Canada were becoming aware of Kurelek’s art. In addition to finding representation in major institutions, including the Museum of Modern Art, his growing renown was aided by the mass production and distribution of his imagery through books. Between 1973 and 1976 he published 11 books—the award-winning A Prairie Boy’s Winter (1973), A Prairie Boy’s Summer (1975), and A Northern Nativity (1976) being among the best known—in which recollections and anecdotes from the artist’s childhood appear alongside photoreproductions of paintings Kurelek prepared specifically for the publication.
At this time Kurelek’s images were also being widely distributed as prints, a mass marketing campaign led by Pagurian Press. Publisher Christopher Ondaatje recognized the potential of Kurelek’s popular appeal, and the two bonded over a shared work ethic and immigrant backgrounds—Ceylonese and Ukrainian, respectively. Volleyball and Lacrosse are the original paintings from which Pagurian produced two editions of photolithographic prints. Kurelek’s Sporting series also includes scenes depicting tennis, hockey, football, tobogganing, fishing, hunting, skiing, sailing, ice-sailing, and golf. Created in the last year of the artist’s life, and charmingly bound by Kurelek’s handmade frames, Volleyball and Lacrosse are bright, joyous icons to life and youth.
Contributed by Andrew Kear, Head of Programs at Museum London and the past Curator of Canadian Art at the Winnipeg Art Gallery. Andrew co-curated the 2011/2012 touring exhibition William Kurelek: The Messenger and is author of the Art Canada Institute’s William Kurelek: Life & Work, available online at www.aci-iac.ca.
321
WILLIAM KURELEK, OSA, RCA (1927-1977), CANADIAN VOLLEYBALL, 1977 mixed media on board titled and dated to gallery labels verso 15 x 11.75 in — 37.5 x 32.4 cm
PROVENANCE: Galerie Dresdnere, Toronto, ON Loch Gallery, Toronto, ON Private Collection, Ontario
$40,000—60,000
VIEW LOT
322
WILLIAM KURELEK, OSA, RCA (1927-1977), CANADIAN LACROSSE, 1977 mixed media on board signed with monogram and dated “77” lower right; titled and dated to gallery labels verso 14.75 x 12 in — 37.5 x 32.4 cm
PROVENANCE:
Galerie Dresdnere, Toronto, ON Loch Gallery, Toronto, ON Private Collection, Ontario
$40,000—60,000
VIEW LOT
TAKAO TANABE
Summer Foothills 5/82 was painted two years after Takao Tanabe left his position as head of the art program at the Banff Centre for the Arts and returned to British Columbia to work on his art full time. Jeffrey Spalding describes that move as a way to “extricate himself from the tyranny of his own success.” 1 He had already been making the transition to landscape painting in the 1970s with his Land and Prairie Paintings series. The shift in location and focus allowed him to continue to explore space, light and perspective. Painted in Errington, BC where Tanabe set up his new studio, Summer Foothills 5/82 is among the last of the prairie paintings before Tanabe gradually adjusted his painting method to reflect the more dramatic west coast environment.2
Tanabe lays down the paint thinly in Summer Foothills 5/82 to produce an understated yet profound effect. His knowledge of sumi-e, the Japanese art of ink wash painting, is deftly applied in the subtle cast of clouds in the sky on the unprimed canvas and the layers of greens, yellows, browns and blues that make up fields and foothills. He moves quickly after a long planning process, using acrylics because of their quick drying time.3
Anyone who has been to the prairies in the summer can attest to the endless sky, the play of light on the land, the blazing heat, and the smell in the air of a looming rain storm, all which have been captured by Tanabe in this quiet and breathtaking scene.
1 Jeffrey Spalding, “Anatomy of a Wave: Ebb and Flow in Errington,” in Takao Tanabe, ed. Ian Thom (Vancouver: Douglas & McIntyre, Vancouver Art Gallery, and Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, 2005), 123.
2 Ian Thom, Takao Tanabe: Life & Work, (Toronto: Art Canada Institute, 2023), 64
3 Nancy Tousley, “The Prairie Paintings,” in Takao Tanabe, ed. Ian Thom (Vancouver: Douglas & McIntyre, Vancouver Art Gallery, and Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, 2005), 84-85
323
TAKAO TANABE (B. 1926), CANADIAN SUMMER FOOTHILLS 5/82, 1982
acrylic on canvas
signed lower right; signed, titled, and situated “Errington, B.C.” verso 35.25 x 18 in — 90.2 x 45.7 cm
PROVENANCE:
Graphica Gallery, Edmonton, AB
Acquired from the above in 1983 by the present Private Collection, Edmonton, AB
$10,000—15,000
VIEW LOT
324
VLADIMIR GRIEGOROVICH TRETCHIKOFF (1913-2006), RUSSIAN UNTITLED (POINSETTIAS) oil on canvas
signed lower left
47 x 23 in — 119.4 x 58.4 cm
PROVENANCE:
Private Collection, Toronto, ON
$40,000—60,000
VIEW LOT
325
NORA FRANCES ELISABETH COLLYER (1898-1978), CANADIAN TULIPS IN THE PEMBERTON’S GARDEN, MAY 1964 oil on panel
signed lower left; signed, titled, and dated verso; titled and dated to gallery label verso 16 x 18 in — 40.6 x 45.7 cm
PROVENANCE:
Kastel Gallery Inc., Montreal, QC Private Collection, Toronto, ON
$8,000—10,000
VIEW LOT
326
MARY PRATT, RCA (1935-2018), CANADIAN A TUMBLE OF FRUIT IN THE AFTERGLOW, 2001 mixed media on paper signed and dated “01” lower right; titled and dated to gallery label verso image 14 x 20 in — 35.6 x 50.8 cm; sheet 22.75 x 30 in — 57.8 x 76.2 cm
PROVENANCE:
Equinox Gallery, Vancouver, BC Private Collection, London, ON
$8,000—10,000
VIEW LOT
327
MARCELLE FERRON, RCA (1924-2001), CANADIAN
ABSTRACT COMPOSITION, 1964
oil on paper, laid on canvas signed and dated “64” lower left; signed verso
25.75 x 19.75 in — 65.4 x 50.2 cm
PROVENANCE:
Private Collection, Montreal, QC
Sotheby’s Canada, Toronto, ON, 2 Jun 2010, lot 104
Private Collection, Toronto, ON
$20,000—30,000
VIEW LOT
328
MOLLY LAMB BOBAK, RCA (1920-2014), CANADIAN COPENHAGEN oil on board
signed lower right; titled to gallery label verso
8.5 x 12.5 in — 21.6 x 31.8 cm
PROVENANCE: Roberts Gallery, Toronto, ON Private Collection, Ontario
$4,000—6,000
VIEW LOT
329
WALTER YARWOOD (1917-1996), CANADIAN SEASCAPE oil on canvas, laid on board signed lower right; titled verso 24 x 30 in — 60 x 74.9 cm
PROVENANCE: Private Collection, Ontario
LITERATURE: Iris Nowell, Painters Eleven, The Wild Ones of Canadian Art, Toronto, 2010, 276 and 278.
$10,000—15,000
VIEW LOT
330
FRANK HANS (FRANZ) JOHNSTON, OSA, RCA (1888-1949), CANADIAN UNTITLED (SUNSET, ALGOMA)
pastel on paper, laid on card signed lower right
10 x 13 in — 25.4 x 33 cm
PROVENANCE:
Private Collection, South Carolina, USA
$7,000—9,000
VIEW LOT
t
CLARENCE ALPHONSE GAGNON
From June to November 1911, Clarence Gagnon stayed in Italy for the third time. Upon his return to his Paris studio located at 9 rue Falguière, the painter wasted no time in transferring to canvas the impressions inspired by his visit to Assisi.1
As early as February 1912, Canadian art lovers could admire a view of the Monastery of St. Francis in Assisi at the Fifth Annual Exhibition of the Canadian Art Club in Toronto, and again, in March and April 1912, at the 29th Annual Spring Exhibition of Montreal. In April, at the Salon de la Société national des beaux-arts at the Grand Palais in Paris, Gagnon’s painting on the same theme was noticed by French art critic Léon Saint-Valéry, who appreciated the sensations of “the peace of a soft morning of pale gold and transparent mists.” 2
The number of paintings by Clarence Gagnon with Assisi as the subject can be counted on one hand. In this respect, the recent appearance of Untitled (Assisi), 1911 on the Canadian art market is exceptional. This work had been kept hidden from public view in the artist’s family for over a century.
The composition is exemplary of the impressionism and japonisme that permeated Gagnon’s art during this period: the delicate treatment of light through lightly coloured notations, the bold, bird’s-eye view of the monastery when the sun is at its zenith, and the plain of Assisi lost in the distance in atmospheric movements of blue, turquoise and pink, where sky and earth merge. To emphasize the vertiginous space, the painter has ensured that this blurring of forms contrasts sharply with the precision and verticality of the eight cypress trees in the foreground, which rise from the bottom to the top to form a majestic openwork decorative curtain.
1 After Clarence Gagnon’s visit, his compatriot, the painter A.Y. Jackson, traveled to Assisi in the winter of 1912-1913, as evidenced by Cypress Trees, Assisi, 1912 at the National Gallery of Canada.
2 Salon de la Société nationale des beaux-arts, Revue des Beaux-arts (Paris), May 1912.
Contributed by Michèle Grandbois, Ph.D., independent researcher, writer and art historian. Michèle is the author of numerous monographs on Canadian artists including Clarence Gagnon, and Jean Paul Lemieux and is currently compiling a catalogue raisonné of the works of Jean Paul Lemieux.
331
CLARENCE ALPHONSE GAGNON, RCA (1881-1942), CANADIAN
UNTITLED (ASSISI), 1911 oil on canvas
signed and dated lower left
19.5 x 25.5 in — 49.5 x 64.8 cm
PROVENANCE:
Artist’s studio
Gift of the artist to a relative By descent to the present Private Collection, Montreal, QC
$50,000—70,000
VIEW LOT
332
CLARENCE ALPHONSE GAGNON, RCA (1881-1942), CANADIAN MISSES OLIVE AND EDNA PRETTY AND MRS. LUCILE GAGNON, STE-PÉTRONILLE, ILE D’ORLÉANS, 1919
graphite and pastel on paper stamped “Atelier Gagnon” lower right; titled and dated to gallery labels verso; certificate of authenticity signed verso 9 x 12.75 in — 22.9 x 32.4 cm
PROVENANCE: Walter Klinkhoff Gallery, Montreal, QC Private Collection, Ontario
$8,000—10,000
VIEW LOT
333
CLARENCE ALPHONSE GAGNON, RCA (1881-1942), CANADIAN ETUDE DE NU pastel and conte on paper stamped “Altelier Gagnon” lower right; titled to gallery label verso; with certificate of authenticity by Lucile Rodier Gagnon inventory no. 923 verso 13.25 x 9 in — 34.9 x 22.9 cm
PROVENANCE: Walter Klinkhoff Gallery, Montreal, QC Private Collection, Ontario
$1,500—2,000
VIEW LOT
PATERSON EWEN
Paterson Ewen painted Untitled (Abstract) in an episode of exponential artistic development. In the mid-1950s Ewen’s art grew and developed steadily as he progressed from painting diligent copies of magazine images and naïve landscapes in the late 1940s, to a Blaue Reiter-like post-Impressionism, to abstraction. He then intuitively worked through painting techniques via abstract easel paintings made with limited palettes that explored figure-ground relationships. As Ewen found his way in post-war Montreal, Untitled (Abstract) was a milestone marking his acumen, diligence and nascent talent.
Untitled (Abstract) emerged from a crucible of intense activity and scrutiny. When he exhibited a related painting at the MMFA’s 35 peintres dans l’actualité / Painters of Today in January and February 1957 he showed alongside notable Quebec painters Paul-Émile Borduas, John Fox, Jean Paul Lemieux, Jean Paul Riopelle and Goodridge Roberts, and the work was complimented for its energy derived from its colour and strong drawing that would become hallmarks of his œuvre.
The painting’s simple palette of pale green, grey, lavender, ochre, and alizarin crimson secure Ewen’s considered and unfussy composition. The paint was applied with a brush about 1/2 an inch wide in simple strokes that describe the forms. They are neither the drippy Tenth Street touch of some contemporary American painting nor the refined topography of Paul-Émile Borduas’s contemporary paintings and Ewen’s workman-like approach to laying down paint would typify his art for the balance of his career.
Contributed by Gregory Humeniuk, an art historian, consultant, writer, and curator based in Toronto.
334
PATERSON EWEN, RCA (1925-2002), CANADIAN
UNTITLED (ABSTRACT), 1956 oil on canvas
signed and dated “56” lower right; gallery label verso 36 x 30 in — 91.4 x 76.2 cm
PROVENANCE: Galerie du Siècle, Montreal, QC Private Collection, Ottawa, ON
$15,000—25,000
VIEW LOT
t
PETER CLAPHAM SHEPPARD
Peter Clapham Sheppard’s Ocean Freighter debuted in 1933 at the 61st exhibition of the Ontario Society of Artists in Toronto on a weekend when The Toronto Daily Star published an article about German plans for Jewish eradication, and Franklin Delano Roosevelt famously reassured his country, “the only thing we have to fear is fear itself,” in his inauguration speech as America’s 32nd president.1 In the depth of the Great Depression and with Adolf Hitler ascendant, Sheppard saw industry and nobility in Toronto’s urban fabric.
The 1933 OSA exhibition included two other masterful paintings of Toronto by Sheppard: The Market (November) (no. 175)2 and Elizabeth St. (no. 174), which set the current record for a Sheppard painting at auction in November 2018 at Waddington’s. With these paintings Sheppard portrays a city that is much more than a bricks and mortar version of a landscape that could have been painted by any member of the Group of Seven. From the 1910s to the 1930s Sheppard understood the city as an agglomeration of humans persevering against circumstance.
Ocean Freighter’s low horizon elevates the ship’s looming hull, and overcast light gently infuses a composition that is more meditative than demonstrative. As with his other two paintings in that exhibition, Sheppard’s colours are subtly modulated, brushstrokes distinguish foreground and background activity with clear, extended draws defining the hull, water and wharf, and short, broad and overlapping strokes define the overcast city and sky. Ocean Freighter was such a standout that Sheppard submitted it to that year’s exhibition of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts, where it was accepted and then later selected for the touring version of the RCAA exhibition that travelled throughout western Canada and into the United States into late 1934.
Sheppard painted Toronto from street level where it is constantly surprising and enchanting, where barriers are lowest, changes are fastest, and its humanity is closest.
1 “First Inaugural Address of Franklin D. Roosevelt.” Accessed 6 April 2023, https://avalon.law.yale. edu/20th_century/froos1.asp.
2 Tom Smart, Peter Clapham Sheppard: His Life and Work (Richmond Hill, ON / Buffalo, NY: Firefly Books, 2018), 215 repro. col.
335
PETER CLAPHAM SHEPPARD, OSA, RCA (1879-1965), CANADIAN OCEAN FREIGHTER, 1933
oil on canvas
signed lower left; estate stamp verso; press clipping verso 34 x 38 in — 86.4 x 96.5 cm
PROVENANCE:
Private Collection, Toronto, ON
EXHIBITED:
Sixty-First Annual Exhibition of the Ontario Society of Artists, Art Gallery of Toronto, Toronto, ON, 3 Mar.-2 [?] Apr. 1933, no. 176.
Fifty-Fourth Annual Exhibition of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts and exhibition of photographs of buildings submitted by architects for competition for medal of RAIC, Art Association of Montreal, Montreal, QC, 16 Nov.-17 Dec. 1933, no. 217.
Royal Canadian Academy Travelling Exhibition, 1934, [travelling exhibition of 54th Annual Exhibition of the Royal Canadian Academy, organized by the National Gallery of Canada] National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, ON, 26 Jan.-22 (?) Feb. 1934; Winnipeg Art Gallery, Winnipeg, MB, Mar. 1934; University of Saskatchewan, Saskatoon, SK, Apr. 1934; Women’s Art Association, Regina, SK, May 1934; Calgary Exhibition and Stampede, Calgary, AB, Jul. 1934; Calgary Public Museum, Calgary, AB, Jul. 1934; Vancouver Art Gallery, Vancouver, BC, Aug. 1934; Western Washington Fair, Puyallup, Washington, USA, Sep. 1934; Edmonton Museum of Fine Arts, Edmonton, AB, Oct. 1934; Women’s Art Association, Moose Jaw, SK, Nov. 1934, no. 74.
LITERATURE:
Catalogue of the Sixty-First Annual Exhibition of the Ontario Society of Artists; Exhibitions by Young Canadians. (Toronto: Art Gallery of Toronto, 1933), 12, no. 176 (exhibition catalogue).
“Seven Exhibits from the Annual Show of the Ontario Society of Artists.” The Evening Telegram, Toronto, 4 Mar 1933, 14 (repro. b/w).
Catalogue of the Fifty-Fourth Exhibition of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts (Montreal: Art Association of Montreal, 1933) 15, no. 217 (exhibition catalogue).
“Many Fine Works Mark R.C.A. Exhibit.” The Gazette, Montreal, 17 Nov 1933, 10.
“Royal Canadian Academy’s 54th Exhibition.” Montreal Star, Montreal, 22 Nov 1933.
Royal Canadian Academy Travelling Exhibition, 1934 (Ottawa: National Gallery of Canada, 1934), 11, no. 74, (exhibition catalogue).
$25,000—35,000
VIEW LOT
336
SOREL ETROG, RCA (1933-2014), CANADIAN
THE SOURCE II, 1966 bronze
17 x 34 x 17 in — 43.2 x 83.8 x 43.2 cm
PROVENANCE: Private Collection, Ontario
$15,000—20,000
VIEW LOT
337
JEAN ALBERT MCEWEN, CANADIAN
MIROIR SANS IMAGE VERT #8, 1971 oil on canvas
signed and dated “71” lower left; signed and dated “71” to the overflap; titled to the stretcher; also titled and dated to gallery label verso 30 x 30 in — 76.2 x 76.2 cm
PROVENANCE: Galerie Agnès Lefort, Montreal, QC
Private Collection, Toronto, ON By descent to the present Private Collection, Toronto, ON
$20,000—30,000
VIEW LOT
338
MICHAEL WOLF (1954-2019), GERMAN
#01B, FROM ARCHITECTURE OF DENSITY, 2004
lightjet print on Kodak Endura paper signed, titled, dated, and numbered 6/9 to label verso, there were also 2 artist’s proofs
59.1 x 47.2 in — 150 x 120 cm
PROVENANCE:
1918 ArtSPACE, Shanghai, China
Private Collection, Montreal, QC
EXHIBITED:
Architecture of Density, 1918 ArtSPACE, Shanghai Biennale, Shanghai, China, 4 Oct-28 Nov 2006.
$8,000—12,000
VIEW LOT
339
MICHAEL WOLF (1954-2019), GERMAN
NIGHT #3, FROM ARCHITECTURE OF DENSITY, 2004
lightjet print on Kodak Endura paper
signed, titled, dated, and numbered 7/9 to label verso, there were also 2 artist’s proofs
47.2 x 59.1 in — 120 x 150 cm
PROVENANCE:
1918 ArtSPACE, Shanghai, China
Private Collection, Montreal, QC
EXHIBITED:
Architecture of Density, 1918 ArtSPACE, Shanghai Biennale, Shanghai, China, 4 Oct-28 Nov 2006.
$8,000—12,000
VIEW LOT
ARTHUR (ART) MCKAY (1926-2000), CANADIAN MEMORY OF FULFILLMENT, 1961
oil and stove enamel on hardboard signed, titled, and dated “61” verso 48 x 72 in — 122.2 x 183.3 cm
PROVENANCE:
Collection of Mrs. Linda Mitchell, Ottawa, ON By descent to the present Private Collection, Ottawa, ON
EXHIBITED:
Arthur McKay Retrospective, MacKenzie Art Gallery, Regina, SK, 4 Oct-3 Nov 1968, no. 27.
$6,000—8,000
VIEW LOT
t
HAROLD TOWN
With a career spanning four decades, and encompassing painting, drawing, sculpture, collage and print-making, Harold Town was the quintessential artist-polymath. Starting as a commercial artist in the 1940s, Town went on to champion Abstract Expressionism as a member of the Painters Eleven in the 50s, and embraced Pop Art and Minimalism in the following decades. By the end of the 1960s, after exhibiting in the Venice Biennial (twice), participating in Documenta, and appearing on the covers of MacLean's and Time, Town was considered Canada's most famous and commercially successful artist.1
The Auto-da-fé of Don Carlos exemplifies Town's early-60s practice, when he began producing larger-format paintings comprised of harder-edged forms situated within open spaces. He also embarked on what would become a vast collection of drawings and paintings depicting significant historical and contemporary cultural figures.
This painting references Italian composer Guiseppe Verdi's opera Don Carlos (1867), which is based on the brief yet turbulent life of the 16th-century Don Carlos, Prince of Asturias. The painting depicts the characters during the third act when Don Carlos interrupts preparations for an Auto-da-fé (the public burning of heretics) to ask the King and Queen, seated at left, to appoint him ruler of Flanders. (The King rejects the prince's request.) To the right of the central figure of Don Carlos are four condemned heretics in pointed paper hats called capirotes, the forced wearing of which was a form of public humiliation.
Perhaps Town, an ambitious and flamboyant artist working in conservative 1960s Toronto, identified with Don Carlos and his thwarted desires. Ironically, the year after painting The Auto-da-fé of Don Carlos, Town faced opposition when an Italian cardinal successfully ordered the removal of one of his erotic drawings from the Biennial.2 "It's such an honour being banned in Italy, the motherland of sensuality," Town said in response to the controversy. "It's a little like being asked to straighten your tie in a bordello."
1 Gerta Moray, Harold Town: Life & Work (Toronto: Canadian Art Institute, 2014), 11. Online publication, downloaded 5 Apr 2025: https://www.aci-iac.ca/the-essay/reign-of-the-60s-art-scene-by-gerta-moray/.
2 Kevin Griffin, "Harold Town: the most popular artist of his era." Vancouver Sun, 17 Dec 2014. Downloaded April 8, 2025: https://vancouversun.com/news/staff-blogs/harold-town-the-most-popularcanadian-artist-of-his-era.
HAROLD BARLING TOWN, OSA, RCA (1924-1994), CANADIAN THE AUTO-DA-FÉ OF DON CARLOS, 1963 oil and Lucite on canvas signed and dated “63” verso; titled to stretcher verso; also titled and dated to gallery label verso 81 x 74 in — 205.7 x 188 cm
PROVENANCE: Ingram Gallery, Toronto, ON Private Collection, Toronto, ON
EXHIBITED:
Canada: XXXII Biennale di Venezia: Harold Town and Elza Hayhew, 1964.
LITERATURE:
Canada: XXXII Biennale di Venezia: Harold Town and Elza Hayhew, 1964 (exhibition catalogue), unpaginated.
$12,000—18,000
VIEW LOT
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LAWRENCE POONS
Larry Poons established himself in New York City in 1958 at the age of 21, where his career as an artist flourished. He transitioned through several distinct phases of artistic style, aligning himself most notably with the Color Field and Op Art movements. By the latter half of the 1960s, Poons’ ever-evolving method of painting resulted in highly spontaneous and intuitive works, incorporating new media and techniques that would be the hallmark of mid-century abstract art. “He wanted to make paintings based on paint’s materiality, which looked as good as paint itself does. For him, paint was the essential nature of painting, not flatness.1
The 1970s would see Poons diverge from the flat, hard-edged precision of his earlier paintings, resulting in gestural, textured canvases. “Eventually Poons came to feel that the purely optical approach to making art was restricting, and in the late 1970s he began to work by pouring and throwing paint on the canvas [...] in an attempt to compose a painting without leaving traces of the artist’s hand. It was also during this period that he began attaching miscellaneous materials to the canvas—foam balls, for example, or rope.” 2
This trajectory led Poons to a new body of work known as the “elephant skin” paintings, so named by the art critic Michael Fried, who stated: “The ‘skin’ of paint is very aggressive on its own terms [acting] as a barrier, like some impenetrable bark, leprous skin, or lava flow.3 These works, known for their thick, wrinkled surfaces, were achieved by pouring layers of acrylic paint and then manipulating the drying process, often by tilting or folding the canvas, which allowed for a myriad of colours to interact with the applied sculptural elements.
A highly tactile work, With Stevens, 88C-9 (1988) is one of the last paintings from the “elephant skin” series. Its built surface, laden with dripped and pooled acrylic paint, exemplifies Poons’ penchant for new materials, processes, and the element of chance. The resulting painting is complex, featuring a range of textures from smooth and glossy to rough and cracked. With Stevens, 88C-9 was shown for the first time at the Andre Emmerich Gallery in New York the year it was completed. Poons’ artwork of the 1990s would see yet another pivot, his return to the paint brush and evidence of the artist’s hand.
1 Lilly Wei. "Larry Poons: The Maverick." Art & Antiques, Fall 2019. Accessed April 18, 2025. https://www.artandantiquesmag.com/larry-poons/
3 Jeff Perrone. n.d. Review of Larry Poons. Artforum. Accessed April 19, 2025. https://www.artforum. com/events/larry-poons-5-229736/
LAWRENCE (LARRY) POONS (B. 1937), AMERICAN WITH STEVENS, 88C-9, 1988
acrylic and mixed media on canvas signed, titled, and dated verso 79.5 x 22 in — 201.9 x 55.9 cm
PROVENANCE:
Andre Emmerich Gallery, New York, NY Gallery One, Toronto, ON Private Collection, Toronto, ON
$40,000—50,000
VIEW LOT
t
JULES OLITSKI
One of the most accomplished artists associated with mid-20th century American abstraction, Jules Olitski transitioned through many phases of artistic practice. Deemed the greatest painter alive by the driving force behind the Color Field movement, the art critic Clement Greenberg, Olitski’s work was promoted alongside heavyweights such as Kenneth Noland, Barnett Newman, and Helen Frankenthaler. Initially a key figure in Color Field painting, he later diverged from its characteristic flat, stained canvases and traditional brushwork, opting instead to explore the interplay between surface, colour, and texture.
“Throughout the 1970s, Olitski experimented with newly developed acrylic gels, pastes, and mediums, using brooms, mops, and other unconventional tools to apply paint. Paintings from this period are characterized by textured surfaces with underpainting, impasto, chiaroscuro, tinting, and glazing.” 1 With these new sensibilities in mind, he ventured toward another major career achievement: the “Mitt” paintings.
Olitski’s “Mitt” paintings, created between the late 1980s and the early 1990s, exemplify his decades-long exploration of innovative processes and nontraditional materials. He adapted a mitten-like glove used by professional house painters to apply a newly developed acrylic paint made of “interference” pigments. These pigments appear translucent when viewed head-on but reflect light and colour at different angles, creating a shimmering effect. “Opulent and luxurious, the Mitt paintings (so named for the housepainter’s mittens used to create them) are works of baroque exuberance, with inches-thick acrylic crests and troughs that belie their unique illusionistic effects. Olitski finished many of the paintings with fine mists of sprayed color applied at an oblique angle so that his scalloping gesture appears to materialize from within the surface.” 2
Night Light (1988) is an early painting from the “Mitt” series, in which Olitski’s gestural approach, combined with an overlay of dark pigmented spray paint, reveals a unique sculptural effect. Depending on the viewer’s perspective, the painting either glows or recedes into shadow. A completely immersive experience, Night Light’s pulsating atmospheric fields of colour vibrate and shift before the eyes.
1 “Jules Olitski.” 2016. Accessed April 12, 2025. https://olitskifoundation.org/about
2 Alex Grimley, Jules Olitski: The Mitt Paintings 1988–1993, in Brooklyn Rail, October 24, 2024. Accessed April 18, 2025. https://brooklynrail.org/2024/10/artseen/jules-olitski-the-mittpaintings-1988-1993/
343
JULES OLITSKI (1922-2007), AMERICAN NIGHT LIGHT, 1988
ACRYLIC AND OIL BASED ENAMEL ON CANVAS signed, titled, and dated verso 68 x 47 in — 172.7 x 119.4 cm
PROVENANCE: Gallery One, Toronto, ON Private Collection, Toronto, ON
$40,000—50,000
VIEW LOT
WILLIAM PEREHUDOFF
Inspired by his participation in the legendary Emma Lake Artist Workshops of the early 1960s, William Perehudoff had become a central figure in Canadian abstract painting by 1970, creating works that thoughtfully combine the hardedged with the atmospheric. Forwarding modernist ideals while fearlessly experimenting with colour, texture and form, Perehudoff became internationally acclaimed even though he never relocated to a major art centre from his hometown of Saskatoon.
Despite his remote location, Perehudoff established lasting friendships with influential New York-based critics like Clement Greenberg and artists such as Kenneth Noland, the American Colour Field painter, with whom he shared an interest in fostering a viewer's 'aesthetic feelings' when looking at his paintings; that is, emotions like wonder or joy prompted by the work's formal qualities, like its colour palette or size.
Painted in the mid-1970s, AC-77-15 (lot 344) and Okema #7 (lot 345), are examples of Perehudoff at the height of his powers. By this time, Perehudoff was widely recognized as an "ambitious and innovative painter" who was responding to the work of his international contemporaries (like Noland, as well as Jules Olitski and Larry Poons) without becoming derivative.1 Composed of diffuse planes of colour superimposed by solid parallel bars, AC-77-15 and Okema #7 find the artist exploring the dynamics between light and dark, transparency and opacity, and foreground and background.
These formal considerations, however, are further shaped by Pereduhoff's deep attachment to the landscape in which he lived and worked – the vast spaces of the Canadian Prairies, with their expansive horizons and generous skies. The horizontal breadth of the former, with its three bars in varying hues of sky blue, suggests a landscape reduced to its elements, while the subtly wavering vertical lines comprising the latter's background bring to mind the shimmering and elusive quality of the northern lights.
1 Roald Nasgaard, Abstract Painting in Canada, (Vancouver: Douglas & McIntyre; Halifax: Art Gallery of Nova Scotia, 2007), 290.
344
WILLIAM PEREHUDOFF, RCA (1918-2013), CANADIAN AC-77-15, 1977
acrylic on canvas signed and titled verso 53 x 27 in — 134.6 x 68.6 cm
PROVENANCE: Private Collection, Edmonton, AB
$15,000—20,000
345
WILLIAM PEREHUDOFF, RCA (1918-2013), CANADIAN OKEMA #7, 1974 acrylic on canvas signed, titled, and dated verso; titled and dated to exhibition labels verso 36 x 92 in — 91.4 x 233.7 cm
PROVENANCE:
Waddington Galleries, Toronto, ON Private Collection, Toronto, ON
EXHIBITED:
Norman Mackenzie Art Gallery, Regina, SK, William Perehudoff: Recent Paintings, 1978.
$25,000—35,000
VIEW LOT
VIEW LOT
t
FREDERICK GRANT BANTING
In late September 1932, Dr. Frederick Grant Banting of insulin fame and Nobel Prize winner in Medicine (1923) arrived in Cobalt, Ontario to meet up with A.Y. Jackson where they sketched together into mid-October. They first met at Toronto’s Arts & Letters Club in 1927 and soon became close friends. Jackson took Banting under his tutelage with a trip to the Arctic, followed by trips to Saint Fidèle and Saint-Irène, Quebec.
Banting respected the rhythm in Jackson’s landscapes, remarking that, “Rhythm in a picture is a subtle something which cannot be described but only felt (If a painting has not got rhythm it is not a Jackson).” 1 Banting appreciated these excursions as they gave him much needed time away from the public life his medical career demanded.
By the time Banting arrived in Cobalt, the place was an environmental calamity after three decades of silver extraction. Banting produced sketches of the derelict mines and residential areas. They experienced poor weather including rain and snow. As Jackson recalled to a friend, a storm had made the roads almost impassable, cars were stalled all over, and nearly a foot of snow was piled on top of everything. Both Banting and Jackson made good use of the fresh snow to pretty up the ruins in Cobalt, but not in this sketch which presents a harsher reality of Cobalt’s then lifeless hills and broken-down structures. Three power poles in the far distance lean awkwardly from lack of maintenance but they do bring attention to the towering mine shaft and sky, Banting’s principal subjects. It was on a clear day that Banting painted this accomplished sketch with its deep blue sky and two huge cumulus clouds.
Cobalt only formed a small element of Banting’s painting activities, but his work there was significant enough for inclusion in his memorial retrospective at Hart House, University of Toronto held in February 1943, after Banting’s regrettable death in a plane crash during war service on February 21, 1941 at age 49.
1 Catharine Mastin, Cobalt: A Mining Town and the Canadian Imagination (Kleinburg: McMichael Canadian Art Collection, 2024), 104.
Contributed by Catharine Mastin, PhD, an independent curator and writer. She was the guest curator of Cobalt: A Mining Town and the Canadian Imagination presented at the McMichael Canadian Art Collection in Kleinburg in 2024 and author of the accompanying catalogue. She is currently writing the first biography on Franklin Carmichael.
FREDERICK GRANT BANTING (1891-1941), CANADIAN COBALT, CA. 1932
oil on panel artist stamp to frame verso; titled and dated to exhibition label verso
11 x 13 in — 27.9 x 33 cm
$25,000—35,000
PROVENANCE:
Artist’s studio
Beatrice McElroy Reid, ca. 1937
Mary Millard, Toronto, ON, ca. 1973
Donald Taylor, Toronto, ON, 1977
Valerie Taylor, Toronto, ON, 1998
By descent to the present Private Collection, Toronto, ON
EXHIBITED:
Cobalt: A Mining Town and the Canadian Imagination. McMichael Canadian Art Collection, Kleinburg, ON, 18 Nov-21 Apr 2024 no. L2023.155. Toured to Art Gallery of Algoma, Sault Ste. Marie, ON, 30 May-12 Oct 2024.
LITERATURE:
Catharine Mastin, Cobalt: A Mining Town and the Canadian Imagination. Kleinburg: McMichael Canadian Art Collection, 2024, illustrated 195.
REFERENCE:
D.B.G. Fair, Banting & Jackson: An Artistic Brotherhood London Regional Art & Historical Museums and The Canadian Medical Hall of Fame, 1997.
Stephen Eaton Hume, Frederick Banting: Hero, Healer, Artist. Lantzville, B.C.: XYZ Publishing, 2001.
A.Y. Jackson, Frederick Banting as an Artist, Toronto: Ryerson, 1943.
VIEW LOT
347
KATHLEEN FRANCES DALY, OSA, RCA (1898-1994), CANADIAN LITTLE FOX RIVER, QUEBEC, 1930 oil on panel
signed and dated “30” lower right; signed and titled verso; titled to gallery labels verso 14.5 x 16.5 in — 36.8 x 41.9 cm
PROVENANCE:
Kaspar Gallery, Toronto, ON Joyner Fine Art, Toronto, ON, 15 May 1990, lot 105 Private Collection, Toronto, ON
$8,000—12,000
VIEW LOT
GORDON APPELBE SMITH
Despite being born in the United Kingdom, Gordon Appelbe Smith became a master at distilling the essence of the Canadian landscape within his paintings.
Arriving in Winnipeg as a teenager in 1933, Smith pursued studies at the Vancouver School of Art. His earliest works and exhibitions were comprised of landscape paintings; however, seeing the abstract paintings of American artists Clyfford Still and Richard Diebenkorn when attending the California School of Fine Arts in the early-50s significantly shaped Smith's future painting practice.1
Primarily considered an abstract artist throughout the 50s, Smith intentionally based his paintings on real-life subject matter, such as the latticework of intertwined tree branches or the grid of a cityscape, as a means of giving an underlying structure to his compositions. Always in tune with the art of his time, Smith pursued a harder-edge form of Colour Field-based abstraction in the 1960s; however, when he resumed landscape painting in the 1970s, it was immediately apparent to critics that he hadn't lost his passion for it, calling Smith's work at this time "witty," "spritely," and "lyrical." 2
Smith remained dedicated to interpreting Canada's west coast landscape for the rest of his life. The impressionistic forest scene depicted in Feb. 15, 1990 is a marvelous example of the artist's unwavering skill at balancing painterly dynamism and compositional control. A spontaneous energy animates the brushstrokes delineating the trees and branches, and the juxtaposition of electric blues, acid greens, and burnt oranges conveys chromatic daring. White spaces throughout the painting can be interpreted as snow, making it a northern or winter scene; however, with these open spaces the artist purposefully provides the composition with room to breathe and gives viewers areas on which they can pause and refresh their eyes before continuing their exploration of this canvas's richly detailed surface.
1 Roald Nasgaard, Abstract Painting in Canada, (Vancouver: Douglas & McIntyre; Halifax: Art Gallery of Nova Scotia) 2007, 134.
2 Ibid., 136.
348
GORDON APPELBE SMITH, RCA (1919-2020), CANADIAN FEB 15, 1990
acrylic on canvas
signed lower right; signed, titled, and dated to frame; titled and dated to gallery labels verso 50 x 67 in — 139.7 x 167.6 cm
PROVENANCE:
Bau-Xi Gallery, Vancouver, BC Private Collection, British Columbia
$40,000—60,000
VIEW LOT
349
SABIN BALASA (1932-2008), ROMANIAN PROMETEU, 1986 oil on canvas signed and dated “86” upper right 35 x 24 in — 88.9 x 61 cm
PROVENANCE: Acquired directly from the artist in 1986 Private Collection, Michigan, USA
$10,000—15,000
VIEW LOT
350
LIONEL LEMOINE FITZGERALD (1890-1956), CANADIAN UNTITLED (BRIDGE), 1921 oil on canvas, laid on board signed and dated lower right
9.75 x 11.75 in — 24.8 x 29.8 cm
PROVENANCE: Private Collection, Edmonton, AB
$8,000—12,000
VIEW LOT
PETER CLAPHAM SHEPPARD
tThe Canadian-born subject of Peter Clapham Sheppard’s Chief Thundercloud was perhaps the most painted, photographed, and well-paid First Nations artist's model of the 19th and early 20th century. He posed at the Cleveland School of Art, the Ontario College of Art, the New York Art Students’ League, for the Toronto Arts and Letters Club and for individual artists as far-ranging as Frederick Remington, George Agnew Reid, John Singer Sargent, Emanuel Hahn and Eulabee Dix whose portrait of Thundercloud in the National Portrait Gallery in Washington bears a strong resemblance to Sheppard’s work. Thundercloud’s visage also appeared on American $5 and $20 gold coins, and some say his was the face on the American nickel. Who was this successful man?
Thundercloud was born in 1856 as Dominique [La] Plante on the Kahnawake Reserve near Montreal, where predominantly persons of the Mohawk Nation resided. Since Thundercloud identified as Blackfoot, his mother Marie Plante Kaniratschon was likely Blackfoot and journeyed to that Nation’s lands in Alberta to raise him. From that point on, Thundercloud’s trajectory through life was amazing. He joined the U.S. Army as a scout at 15 and served in the Indian Wars from 1872-1876. In a Toronto Daily Star article (May 13, 1913) Thundercloud, dressed in western clothes, stated, “Those were wild days in the Western States -- very different times then from now. I was a scout with the American force to put down the Indian risings in Wyoming. I knew all that country well, but it was dangerous work…”
In 1878 Thundercloud joined the Buffalo Bill show that toured through the Americas and Europe. The hugely popular Wild West extravaganza came to Toronto in 1885. During his decade-plus of appearances, the persona of “Chief Thundercloud” captured artists’ imaginations at a time when depictions of “the Noble Savage” were sought-after tropes for the colonial imagination. Young [La] Plante eagerly served as an artist's model, feeding the popular stereotypes while he made a good living, first for himself, then also for his wife and daughter. In 1896 Thundercloud had made headlines across the U.S. when he married Vassar graduate and New York City artist, Hattie Hashagan, for whom he had modeled. Some headlines evoked the era’s prejudices: “She Married a Big Injin” but others rose to the romance. Prejudice did not stand in the way of a very successful marriage whose home base was Dingmans Ferry in Pennsylvania for the next 20 years.
In 1913 Thundercloud’s busy modeling career brought him to Toronto, where he posed at the Ontario College of Art, for the Arts and Letters Club, and for individual artists. M.O. Hammond captured his appearance at the Arts and Letters Club. Thundercloud kept modeling for another three very full years before he died of tuberculosis in 1916.
Peter Clapham Sheppard’s Chief Thundercloud represents the complex history of what it meant to be a member of a First Nation at a time when artists’ images fed misrepresentation. While Dominique [La] Plante’s life itself perpetuated colonial stereotypes, (fighting “savages” in the Indian Wars, performing in brazen distortions of the West in the Buffalo Bill shows, and posing for settler representations, such as George Agnew Reid’s The Coming of the White Man) he was a successful businessman. Was he wrong to feed the stereotypes? It is this very complexity of the Thundercloud story that makes Peter Clapham Sheppard’s work a valuable discussion piece for any collection.
Contributed by Angie Littlefield, an author and editor with an interest in Canadian artists. Angie is the author of the soon to be published Painted Out of the Picture: The Wives of the Group of Seven (Cormorant Books, 2027).
351
PETER CLAPHAM SHEPPARD, OSA, RCA (1879-1965), CANADIAN THUNDER CLOUD 1912-14 oil on canvas estate stamp verso
34.5 x 24 in — 87.6 x 61 cm
PROVENANCE: Private Collection, Toronto, ON
$15,000—20,000
VIEW LOT
352
JAMES WILSON MORRICE, RCA (1865-1924), CANADIAN BOAT ON A BEACH, 1906 oil on panel studio stamp verso
4.25 x 5.5 in — 10.8 x 14 cm
PROVENANCE:
Private Collection, New York, NY
Fine Paintings, Watercolours and Drawings by Canadian Artists, Christie, Manson & Woods (Canada) Ltd., Montreal, QC, 3 May 1974, lot 113
Private Collection, Edmonton, AB
$25,000—35,000
VIEW LOT
353
ALEXANDER YOUNG (A.Y.) JACKSON, OSA, RCA (1882-1974), CANADIAN LES EBOULEMENTS, 1932 oil on panel
signed lower right; titled and dated verso; also titled and dated to gallery labels verso 8.5 x 10.5 in — 21.6 x 26.7 cm
PROVENANCE:
Watson Art Galleries, Montreal, QC
Continental Galleries Inc., Montreal, QC
Downstairs Gallery, Edmonton, AB
Private Collection, Edmonton, AB
$30,000—40,000W
VIEW LOT
SOREL ETROG, RCA (1933-2014), CANADIAN THE COUPLE STUDY bronze sculpture 13 x 3.5 in — 30.5 x 8.9 cm; incl. base 16.5 x 3.5 in — 41.9 x 8.9 cm
PROVENANCE:
Private Collection, Toronto, ON
$8,000—10,000
VIEW LOT
FRANCISCO ZÚÑIGA (1912-1998), COSTA RICAN/MEXICAN
VIRGINIA SENTADA CON ROPAJE, 1978
bronze with dark brown patina signed, dated, and numbered in Roman “IV/VII” to base 31 x 16 x 15 in — 78.7 x 40.6 x 38.1 cm
PROVENANCE:
Private Collection, Toronto, ON
LITERATURE:
Francisco Zúñiga: Sculpture/Drawings, New York, Sindin Galleries, 19 (another cast illustrated).
Francisco Zúñiga, Mexico City, Galería de Arte Misrachi, 1980, 276, no. 316 (another cast illustrated).
Francisco Zúñiga: Catálogo Razonado Volúmen I, Escultura 1923-1993, Albedrío & Fundación Zúñiga Laborde, Mexico City, 1999, no. 792 (another cast illustrated).
$8,000—12,000
VIEW LOT
356
FRANK HANS (FRANZ) JOHNSTON, OSA, RCA (1888-1949), CANADIAN GLOW OF GOLD oil on board
signed lower left; signed and titled verso 20 x 30 in — 50.8 x 76.2 cm
PROVENANCE:
Acquired directly from the artist ca. 1930 Private Collection, Toronto, ON By descent to the present Private Collection, Toronto, ON
$20,000—30,000
VIEW LOT
357
JEAN DUFY (1888-1964), FRENCH BORDS DE RIVIÈRE, 1920 watercolour on wove paper signed and dated lower right 17 x 21.5 in — 43.2 x 54.6 cm
PROVENANCE:
<p>La Galeria, Kansas City, MO Private Collection, Winnipeg, MB
LITERATURE:
A certificate of authenticity signed by Jacques Bailly will be delivered to the buyer. Bords de Rivière will be featured in the forthcoming Catalogue raisonné de l’oeuvre de Jean Dufy, Volume IV, under the number 4960.
$12,000—18,000
VIEW LOT
358
SAMUEL BORENSTEIN (1908-1969), CANADIAN STREET SCENE CARTIERVILLE, PQ, 1963 oil on canvas
signed and dated “63” lower right; titled to stretcher verso 21 x 32 in — 81.3 x 53.3 cm
PROVENANCE:
Walter Klinkhoff Gallery, Montreal, QC Private Collection, Ontario
EXHIBITED:
Sam Borenstein Retrospective, Walter Klinkhoff Gallery, Montreal, QC, 22 Jan-5 Feb 1979.
$15,000—20,000
VIEW LOT
359
RITA MOUNT, RCA (1888-1967), CANADIAN MARCHÉ ST-JEAN BAPTISTE, MONTREAL oil on canvas
signed lower left; titled to nameplate
31 x 20.5 in — 78.7 x 52.1 cm
PROVENANCE:
Private Collection, Ontario
$8,000—10,000
VIEW LOT
360
ALEXANDER YOUNG (A.Y.) JACKSON, OSA, RCA (1882-1974), CANADIAN UNTITLED (LANDSCAPE) oil on panel
signed lower right
10.5 x 13.25 in — 26.7 x 33.7 cm
PROVENANCE:
Private Collection, Edmonton, AB
$15,000—20,000
VIEW LOT
361
ALEXANDER YOUNG (A.Y.) JACKSON, OSA, RCA (1882-1974), CANADIAN THE KEMMEL - VIERSTRAAT ROAD, 1917 graphite on paper signed lower right; titled and dated “20.10.27” lower left
4.75 x 8 in — 12.1 x 20.3 cm
PROVENANCE:
Private Collection, London, ON
$5,000—7,000
VIEW LOT
VICTOR CICANSKY, RCA (1935-2025), CANADIAN
UNTITLED (GARDEN COUPLE), 1987
glazed ceramic sculpture signed and dated “87” to the underside 16 x 15 x 11 in — 45.7 x 50.8 x 27.9 cm
PROVENANCE:
Private Collection, Ontario
$4,000—6,000
VIEW LOT
May 8 - 29, 2025
363
JOHN WILLIAM BEATTY, OSA, RCA (1869-1941), CANADIAN ACADÉMIE (FIGURE STUDY), 1912-14
