Still controversial, sixty years on: an Emily Carr biographer examines a new cross-Canada exhibition and its accompanying book of essays.

Still controversial, sixty years on: an Emily Carr biographer examines a new cross-Canada exhibition and its accompanying book of essays. Emily Carr (December 13, 1871 – March 2, 1945) was a Canadian artist and writer. She was born in Victoria, British Columbia, and moved to San Francisco in 1890 to study art after the death of her parents. : New Perspectives on a Canadian icon Ian M. Thom,Charles C. Hill and Johanne Lamoureux, eds. Douglas and McIntyre 336pages, hardcover ISBN ISBNabbr.International Standard Book NumberISBNInternational Standard Book NumberISBNn abbr (= International Standard Book Number) → ISBN m9781553651734 Shortly before her death in the spring of 1945, Emily Carr told herconfidant, Ira Dilworth, that the next generation would probably"scoff" at her honours and consider her "trash." Itdid not happen quite like this. Carr's contemporaries weresuccessful in keeping her name and her reputation before the Canadianpublic, apparently defying the wheel of fashion. They did this in several ways. In 1945 the joint executor ofCarr's artistic work, former Group of Seven artist Lawren Harris Lawren Stewart Harris (October 23, 1885 – January 29, 1970) was a Canadian painter. He was born in Brantford, Ontario and is best known as a member of the Group of Seven who pioneered a distinctly Canadian painting style in the early twentieth century. A. Y. ,helped mount the exhibition "Emily Carr: Her Paintings andSketches" at the Art Gallery of Toronto (now the Art Gallery ofOntario The Art Gallery of Ontario (AGO) is an art museum on the eastern edge of Toronto's downtown Chinatown district, on Dundas Street West between McCaul Street and Beverley Street. ). Travelling from Toronto to Ottawa, Montreal and then toVancouver, the exhibition exposed Canadians to 177 oil paintings, watercolours, oil-on-paper sketches, charcoal and brush drawings producedduring the artist's long career. Moreover, Carr's literaryreputation--she received the Governor General's Award Since their creation in 1937, the Governor General's Literary Awards have become one of Canada's most prestigious prizes, awarded in both French and English in seven categories: Fiction, Non-fiction, Poetry, Drama, Children's Literature (Text), Children's Literature (Illustration), for Klee Wyckfour years before her death--was equally maintained. In 1953 Dilworthpublished a number of Carr's short stories in Pause: A Sketch Book sketch bookn → bloc m de dibujosketch bookn → carnet m �� dessinsketch bookn → album and The Heart of a Peacock. After he died in 1962, the ownership ofCarr's manuscripts fell into the hands of his niece. Phyllis Inglisbrought out Carr's journals, Hundreds and Thousands, in 1966. Otherkeepers of the flame, among whom were Ruth Humphrey, Flora HamiltonBurns and Carol Pearson, produced their recollections of the artist inbook or essay form. Nor did the next two generations forget about Emily Carr. JackShadbolt Jack Leonard Shadbolt (February 4 1909 – November 22, 1998) was a Canadian painter.Born in Shoeburyness, England, he came to Canada with his parents in 1912, and was raised in Victoria, British Columbia. , Pat Martin Bates Martin Bates is the name of: Martin Van Buren Bates (1837-1919), American giant Martin W. Bates (1786-1869), U.S. Senator from Delaware and Gordon Smith For other people by this name see Gordon Smith (disambiguation)Gordon Harold Smith (born May 25, 1952) is Oregon's junior United States Senator, currently serving his second term. He is a member of the Republican Party. produced provocative prints,oil and acrylic paintings that paid homage to Carr's work. DorothyLivesay Dorothy Kathleen May Livesay, OC, OBC, M.Ed, D.Litt, FRSC (12 October 1909 - 29 December 1996) was a Canadian poet.Born in Winnipeg, Manitoba, the daughter of J.F.B. Livesay and Florence Randal Livesay, she moved to Toronto, Ontario with her family in 1920. , Kate Braid Kathleen (Kate) Braid (born March 19, 1947) is a Canadian poet.Born in Calgary, Alberta, she was raised in Montreal, Quebec, and attended Mount Allison University and Simon Fraser University. and Susan Musgrave made Carr the subject of theirpoems. Composer Jean Coulthard Jean Coulthard (February 10, 1908 - March 9, 2000) was a Canadian composer and academic.Born in Vancouver, British Columbia, she taught theory and composition at the University of British Columbia from 1947 to 1973. wrote a musical tribute, The Pines ofEmily Carr. Anna Wyman choreographed Klee Wyck: A Ballet for Emily Carr.The Vancouver Art Gallery The Vancouver Art Gallery (VAG) is the fifth-largest art gallery in Canada and the largest in Western Canada. It is located at 750 Hornby Street in Vancouver, British Columbia. revisited Carr's work in 1971 when itmounted her second major retrospective, "Emily Carr: A CentennialExhibition Celebrating the One Hundredth Anniversary of Her Birth."A few years after this, Doris Shadbolt Doris Meisel Shadbolt (November 28, 1918 – December 22, 2003) was a Canadian art curator, writer and co-ordinator of exhibitions.Born in Preston, Ontario, she studied fine arts at the University of Toronto. , who had curated this exhibition,brought out The Art of Emily Carr. This was published in 1979, as I havegood reason to remember. The previous week saw the publication of my ownbook, Emily Carr: A Biography, which Ian Thom graciously acknowledges inthe book under review. I like to think that my biography, along with Shadbolt's artbook form a bridge between the old and the new way of writing andthinking about the life and work of Emily Carr. Certainly much has happened since these two books were published in1979. First Nations peoples The following is a list of First Nations peoples organized by Indigenous geographic area. This list does not include Metis or Canadian Inuit groups. The areas used here are in accordance to those used by the Canadian Museum of Civilization [1] have become more politically assertive. InBritish Columbia British Columbia,province (2001 pop. 3,907,738), 366,255 sq mi (948,600 sq km), including 6,976 sq mi (18,068 sq km) of water surface, W Canada.Geography , for example, the Nisga'a, Gitxsan andWet'suwet'en have renewed their land claims and the Haida havefought hard to preserve the wilderness on Haida Gwaii. And non-Nativeshave become better disposed toward First Nations peoples and moreappreciative of their art. Given this new awareness of and appreciation for Native peoples andtheir culture, where does Emily Carr fit? In 1990 the National Galleryof Canada National Gallery of CanadaNational art museum founded in Ottawa in 1880. Its holdings include extensive collections of Canadian art as well as important European works. Its nucleus was formed with the donation of diploma works by members of the Royal Canadian Academy. answered this question when it mounted the third retrospectiveof Emily Carr's work to mark the 20th anniversary of the Report ofthe Royal Commission on the Status of Women Noun 1. Commission on the Status of Women - the commission of the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations that is concerned with the status of women in different societies in Canada. But there wasdissent. Why? Because, according to according toprep.1. As stated or indicated by; on the authority of: according to historians.2. In keeping with: according to instructions.3. some commentators, the organizers ofthe exhibition suggested that Carr's paintings and her prose spokefor and thereby represented the Native peoples of British Columbia.Criticism was not only directed toward the curators of the exhibitionbut also at Carr herself. She was accused of appropriating aboriginalculture for her art: of lacking sincerity toward and knowledge of theprovince's First Nations peoples. Of ignoring the legislativeoppression under which her aboriginal friends lived. And of including sofew Natives in her paintings. Criticism came from the aboriginal community as well as fromcommentators like Globe and Mail critic John Bentley Mays, who used theoccasion to champion his disdain for artists living west of the RockyMountains Rocky Mountains,major mountain system of W North America and easternmost belt of the North American cordillera, extending more than 3,000 mi (4,800 km) from central N.Mex. to NW Alaska; Mt. Elbert (14,431 ft/4,399 m) in Colorado is the highest peak. . Now the National Gallery of Canada has responded to itscritics by mounting "Emily Carr: New Perspectives on a CanadianIcon." The eight authors who provide the essays for the accompanyingbook-length catalogue devote a good deal of space to rapping Carr on theknuckles from the perspective of 21st-century political correctness politically correctadj. Abbr. PC1. Of, relating to, or supporting broad social, political, and educational change, especially to redress historical injustices in matters such as race, class, gender, and sexual orientation. . Inthe essay "Reconstructing Emily Carr in Alaska," Jay Stewart Jay Stewart (real name Jay Fix September 6, 1918 - September 17, 1989) was an American television and radio announcer most famous for his work on several game shows. and Peter Macnair Peter Livesay Macnair, Canadian Anthropologist (1940 - Present)Born in Vancouver, British Columbia, the son of Dorothy Livesay and Duncan Macnair.From 1965 until 1996 Macnair was the Curator of Ethnology at the Royal British Columbia Museum. criticize Carr for referring to Native women as"squaws" and the work that they produced as"curios." In "The Other French Modernity of EmilyCarr," Johanne Lamoureux takes Carr to task for "appropriatingFirst Nations designs to make pottery and rugs." In "EmilyCarr: Clear Cut," Andrew Hunter suggests that Carr's vision ofthe forest landscape was "flawed." Indeed, Hunter seems onlycapable of celebrating what he calls Carr's "industrial"landscape paintings. Above the Gravel Pit is, in Hunter's view,successful because it is "free of the iconography of Native totempoles and visions of the forest that tend to elicit the flawed andromantic ideas often projected onto Carr's work." In anotherwise even-handed essay investigating the differences betweenhistory and memory in Carr's writing, First Nations scholar MarciaCrosby questions the artist's claim that she was a "friend ofthe Indian." Finally, Shirley Bear and Susan Crean reproduce theopening dialogue of their performance piece "Dear Sophie/DearEmily": "Susan, would you say that Emily Carr was aracist?," Bear asks. "It goes without saying," Creanresponds, "only we do need to say it." So what is going on here? Do these sorts of claims enhance ourunderstanding of an artist who died more than 60 years ago? For onething, while Carr might have idealized i��de��al��ize?v. i��de��al��ized, i��de��al��iz��ing, i��de��al��iz��esv.tr.1. To regard as ideal.2. To make or envision as ideal.v.intr.1. or romanticized the people shemet in the West Coast villages, there is no doubt that she was genuinelysympathetic toward the aboriginal people--as I have suggested in my ownwritings and as Gerta Moray Moray, alternate spelling of MurrayMoray.For Scottish names spelled thus, use Murray.Moray, council area and former county, ScotlandMoray(mûr`ē)has also argued in her long-awaited book,Unsettling un��set��tle?v. un��set��tled, un��set��tling, un��set��tlesv.tr.1. To displace from a settled condition; disrupt.2. To make uneasy; disturb.v.intr. Encounters: First Nations Imagery in the Art of Emily Carr.Nor, surely, should Carr's efforts to understand First Nationspeoples be so casually dismissed. She consulted an impressive amount ofethnographical material. She took great pains to make this material,along with the artwork she produced, available to a largelyunsympathetic Euro-Canadian public. Had the authors made an effort tosituate sit��u��ate?tr.v. sit��u��at��ed, sit��u��at��ing, sit��u��ates1. To place in a certain spot or position; locate.2. To place under particular circumstances or in a given condition.adj. Carr's work and life within the historical context in whichit was produced they might have been less critical. Looking athistorical events through today's lens is the first thing that anystudent of history learns to avoid. One problem is a matter of scholarship. Much of the evidence citedby Crean, Bear, Stewart, Macnair, Crosby and Hunter is based onCarr's published works. Surely any serious scholar would have takenthe time to consult Carr's manuscripts, which reveal the extent towhich her editor, Ira Dilworth, modified the material for publication ina climate very different from today. After all, Carr's manuscripts,with Dilworth's annotations, are there for everyone to see at theBritish Columbia Archives in Victoria. The authors of Emily Carr: New Perspectives on a Canadian Iconthrust their own point of view on the readers in other ways that detractfrom our understanding of Emily Carr. Hunter's effort to establishCarr as a painter of ruins and to affirm what he describes as "theoften utterly banal nature of the sites she painted," pays littleattention to the lyrical oil-on-paper sketches produced on theGoldstream Flats and in Mount Douglas Park--two locations that inspiredmany of her best canvases of forest interiors. Likewise, Lamoureux's determination to link Carr with the"rebel" artists of French modernism is absurd since Carr wasclearly not sympathetic to them. While it is tempting to associate Carrwith names such as Picasso and Matisse, surely a consideration of theless famous and less modern artists with whom she actually studied inFrance--John Duncan Fergusson, Phelan Gibb and Frances Hodgkins--musttake priority. Carr's meeting with and subsequent study underHodgkins at the seaside town of Concarneau was particularly significant.Hodgkins was not only a role model as a female artist; she was also aninterpreter of aboriginal culture, albeit of the Maori in New Zealand New Zealand(zē`lənd), island country (2005 est. pop. 4,035,000), 104,454 sq mi (270,534 sq km), in the S Pacific Ocean, over 1,000 mi (1,600 km) SE of Australia. The capital is Wellington; the largest city and leading port is Auckland. .Following this line of thinking, however, would not have allowedLamoureux to suggest that after Carr's purported encounter with theFrench Modernists she "no longer felt the need to practice thegenre of caricature." The fact is that, far from abandoning thatgenre after she returned from France in 1911, Emily Carr produced acaricature every week for the Western Woman's Weekly. Begun in1917, her sketches addressed her own concerns as a landlady landladyn. female of landlord or owner of real property from whom one rents or leases. (See: landlord) , as well asissues relating to the election of women to parliament, to women'ssuffrage and to pensions for mothers. Jay Stewart and Peter Macnair are also guilty of cherry-pickingevents from Carr's life to serve their own purpose. In their essayconcerning Carr's 1907 trip to Alaska, they ought to haveconsidered Carr's experiences of sketching and painting Nativethemes on two previous occasions. The first was in the environs ofVictoria in the early 1890s and the second--more important--was in 1898,when Carr spent a summer sketching the Native peoples and their art atUcluelet on the west coast of Vancouver Island, where her sisterElizabeth was training to be a missionary. Even the less contentious essays in Emily Carr: New Perspectives ona Canadian Icon are marred by inaccuracies. Charles Hill, who helpedDoris Shadbolt mount the controversial exhibition in 1990, has thecommendable intention of situating the "Exhibition of Canadian WestCoast Art: Native and Modern" in the historical context; but it isunfortunate that he gets this wrong in significant ways. Mounted by the National Gallery of Canada in 1927, the exhibitioncombined aboriginal art with the paintings of those artists--A.Y.Jackson, Edwin Holgate, Anne Savage, among others--whose works had beeninspired by their encounter with Native culture. Hill's efforts torecreate the 1927 exhibition within Emily Carr: New Perspectives on aCanadian Icon should be applauded. And many people viewing the remnantsof that exhibition today will be likely to perceive that the mostaccomplished work in it comes from the anonymous aboriginal artists andnot from the non-Native artists whose work they inspired. This was not,of course, the intention of the curators in 1927, but, one wonders, wasit the intention of the curators in 2006? Hill's analysis of the exhibition does not explore thisinteresting shift in perception, although it is an issue that begs to beaddressed explicitly. Nor does he make any effort to situate the Nativeart on display within its own art-historical context. Hill is moreinterested in providing a non-Native context for the 1927 show. However,his insistence that this exhibition and the one held in Paris a fewmonths earlier marked the first time that work by First Nations artistshad been exhibited is incorrect. Native art was exhibited in London bythe Canadian government from the 1851 Great Exhibition to the 1926exhibition at Wembley, where the work of Native and non-Native artistswas hung side by side. Moreover, in his effort to contextualize con��tex��tu��al��ize?tr.v. con��tex��tu��al��ized, con��tex��tu��al��iz��ing, con��tex��tu��al��iz��esTo place (a word or idea, for example) in a particular context. the 1927exhibition, Hill almost loses sight of Carr. Even though the work Carr contributed to the exhibition had beenproduced more than 20 years earlier, the importance of her inclusion inthe 1927 exhibition can hardly be overstated o��ver��state?tr.v. o��ver��stat��ed, o��ver��stat��ing, o��ver��statesTo state in exaggerated terms. See Synonyms at exaggerate.o . When she travelled toToronto for the opening, she was introduced to the Group of Seven andcentral Canadians were introduced to her work. Meeting Lawren Harris,along with like-minded female artists, changed the direction of her art.Above all, after 1927, Carr no longer felt like a little woman on theedge of nowhere. Retrospective exhibitions of an artist's work fall into twogeneral categories. There is the retrieval--or in some cases--the makingof a reputation. And there is the celebration of the work of along-established artist. Whichever category the retrospective fallsinto, there are problems. Should every work be included or just thosedeemed by the curators to be the best? This is a difficult task in thecase of an established artist where auction houses and art galleryshowrooms have put a high price on every work produced by the artist,regardless of "quality." The curators of "Emily Carr: New Perspectives on a CanadianIcon" chose to divide the exhibition into six sections--1927Reconstructed, Modernism Remembered, Affective Resonance, UnnaturalLandscapes, Cultural Tourist, and Between the Mirror and the Echo.Viewers are not only given Carr's more mature interpretations ofNorthwest Coast Native culture, but also her cartoon sketches and forestpaintings, her self-portraits and paintings of her beloved animals.While this offers a visual feast for anyone interested in the art ofEmily Carr, it does her a disservice by including many inferiorpaintings and sketches. Carr was always experimenting and because of this she produced workof uneven quality. This raises the question: should every work,regardless of quality, have been included? Yes, providing sufficientexplanation is offered. This, however, was not done here. Rather, thecurators chose to privilege undifferentiated context and point-scoringover artistic analysis. Even more disturbing, they allowedunderstanding, empathy and historical wisdom to be sacrificed for theirown present-day political agenda. Given the resources that went into themounting of the exhibition and the production of an accompanyingcatalogue, this represents a missed opportunity. We still need are-evaluation of the work of Emily Carr, going beyond the predictablescoffing and trashing that she herself feared. Maria Tippett is the author of ten books and the recipient of theGovernor General's Award for Non-Fiction for Emily Carr: ABiography (Oxford University Press, 1979). Her next biography, of thephotographer Yousuf Karsh, will be published by House of Anansi Press House of Anansi Press is a Canadian publishing company, founded in 1967 by writers Dennis Lee and Dave Godfrey. The company specializes in finding and developing new Canadian writers of literary fiction, poetry, and non-fiction. in2007.