The Group Of Seven And Tom Thomson

This book celebrates the artisitic legacy of eleven artists who broke with tradition and established a new way of painting Canada. Although they called themselves the Group of Seven, the members eventually numbered ten. Tom Thompson, who died before the group was established, was always present in spirit and in the public mind--Page 4 of cover.

Published to accompany exhibition organized by Dulwich Picture Gallery and the National Gallery of Canada, in collaboration with the National Museum of Art, Architecture and Design, Oslo, and the Groninger Museum.

Beginning in 1912, Defiant Spirits traces the artistic development of Tom Thomson and the future members of the Group of Seven, Franklin Carmichael, Lawren Harris, A. Y. Jackson, Franz Johnston, Arthur Lismer, J. E. H. MacDonald, and Frederick Varley, over a dozen years in Canadian history. Working in an eclectic and sometimes controversial blend of modernist styles, they produced what an English critic celebrated in the 1920s as the “most vital group of paintings” of the 20th century. Inspired by Cézanne, Van Gogh and other modernist artists, they tried to interpret the Ontario landscape in light of the strategies of the international avant-garde. Based after 1914 in the purpose-built Studio Building for Canadian Art, the young artists embarked on what Lawren Harris called “an all-engrossing adventure”: travelling north into the anadian Shield and forging a style of painting appropriate to what they regarded as the unique features of Canada’s northern landscape. Rigorously researched and drawn from archival documents and letters, Defiant Spirits constitutes a “group biography,” reconstructing the men’s aspirations, frustrations and achievements. It details not only the lives of Tom Thomson and the members of the Group of Seven but also the political and social history of Canada

We are drawn immediately to their powerful, dramatic visions of a vast and austere land. To commemorate the 75th anniversary of the founding of the Group of Seven, contemporary Canadian art expert Joan Murray has chosen more than 125 works of art for inclusion in this volume, including some paintings never before seen by the public. (1994)

A stunning, full-colour collection of the brilliant paintings that revolutionized Canadian art. In the early twentieth century a group of young artists strived to create, in Lawren Harris’s words, paintings that would “embody the moods and character and spirit of the country.” The fifty-four breathtaking colour plates in this book confirm their success. Well-loved landscapes, like Tom Thomson’s Jack Pine, appear beside some unexpected treasures like Edwin Holgate’s Nude in a Landscape. The essays by Joan Murray and Harris give historical context to the Group of Seven, and fascinating captions provide biographical notes and insightful critiques of each member’s style. No Canadian library is complete without this beautiful volume.

Includes reproductions of original paintings by the Group of Seven and contemporary photographs of the locations where the original works were created.

A stunning new edition of the Canadian classic with never-before-seen paintings First published in 1977 to commemorate the centenary of the birth of a Canadian painter whose brief, brilliant life, and untimely death in a mysterious canoe accident, gained him mythic status in his homeland, Tom Thomson: The Silence and the Storm quickly attained legendary status in its own right. This newly designed and expanded edition revives a classic and adds more than 25 never-before-seen paintings and a new introduction. Co-authors Harold Town, a founder of the Painters Eleven and an icon of Canadian art himself, and art historian David P. Silcox, former head of Sotheby's Canadian division, celebrate this early associate of the Group of Seven as a key creative figure without falling into the trap of cultural jingoism. Thomson, the authors maintain, was an inspired regional painter—in the best sense of that term—who stumbled upon the bold Expressionist palette pioneered by Matisse and his contemporaries despite working from a provincial backwater. Thomson's finest works are reproduced here in painstakingly colour-matched plates, including more than 80 of Thomson's famous oil sketches in exactly their original size.

A beautiful introduction to Canada’s famous artists. In 1920, a group of Toronto artists exhibited their work together for the first time. They called themselves the Group of Seven. Their paintings were very different from the art of the time. Some people were excited by their unique styles, and some were horrified. It took years for their work to be fully appreciated. But today, the Group of Seven are some of Canada’s best-loved artists. Here’s a must-have reference to the artists who changed the landscape of Canadian art forever.