From now until sometime in May 2007, we are very fortunate in Southern Ontario to have two great exhibits underway. The McMichael Gallery in Kleinburg is currently hosting an extensive collection of works by BC artist Takao Tanabe. Meanwhile, The Art Gallery of Ontario in Toronto, which is deep in the throes of a massive re-construction project and consequently has many sections closed to the public, is showing 200 of the finest works of the late Emily Carr.
Alex and I were not able to attend the presentation in Kleinburg by the artist Tanabe, but we did manage to tour the gallery last weekend. Tanabe is perhaps best known for his dramatic horizontal lines, which many viewers find to be both soothing and haunting. What I learned at McMichael is that the earliest works by Tanabe were largely abstracts. We were struck by the delicate curves and bold colours of many of those earlier pieces.
McMichael has strategically presented Tanabe’s work chronologically, allowing the viewer to follow the artist’s progression from the glowing abstracts to the somewhat disturbingly serene minimalist landscapes, and finally to the detailed and once again exceptionally delicate and colourful landscapes of his most recent work. His translation of the BC interiors is controlled and yet loving. One can almost feel the gentleness of his brush as the imagery tiptoes to life on his canvas.
Tanabe was born in Prince Rupert in 1926, and was interned along with fellow Japanese-Canadians on Canada’s West coast during the Second World War. He studied in Canada, Europe, Japan and New York, but his love of BC’s majestic terrain is clear throughout his body of work.
Yesterday, Alex and I took a chance and paid full price to tour the largely ‘closed’ AGO. We were not disappointed. The selection of Carr’s work is sufficiently brilliant to convert even the most determined of non-fans. Again, the work is laid out according to the artist’s development, keeping in mind that for a stretch of over 15 years Carr ‘lost faith’ in her painting and gave her efforts over to trying to earn a living as a landlady and a breeder of dogs. One could imagine that her supposed loss of faith in her talent might have had much to do with the struggle for a single woman to survive in that place and time. Mere survival would be challenge enough – gaining recognition for what could only in retrospect be labelled as genius would be entirely another matter.
In an International context, Carr is being widely compared to US artist Georgia O'Keefe and Mexican painter Frida Kahlo as one of North America's foremost independant and ground-breaking female artists.
As we enter the exhibit, we are confronted with image after image of Carr’s earliest work, her attempt to capture the disappearing reality of BC’s Native interior. Totem poles are prevalent throughout this period. Many have called this work 'phallic', which should not be surprising. After all, if the artist paints what she sees, then the majestic verticals and vibrant colours of BC’s forests would necessarily dominate the landscapes.
These images seem almost child-like in their attempt to portray the people as well as the place, unlike many other artists of the period whose first focus was on the place, with an almost blind eye to the people who inhabit it. In the latter part of the 1900’s, Arthur Shilling’s work brings back memories of these early Carr pieces – the innocence and resignation of people who are facing absorption into a reality that is too fast and too overwhelming to be understood.
Later, we move away from these deceptively simple snapshots, into the more spiritual works focussing on the living forests. Here Carr shows us the life within the landscape, as mountains, clouds, trees, buildings are all seen to be breathing, to be growing organically out of the earth. These works are powerful in their statements. Gone is any sense of hesitation in Carr’s strokes. She now knows what she is trying to tell us.
From these masterpieces we are drawn ever-deeper into the living art of Carr’s BC. Suddenly we are faced with vibrant, singing skies and trees that shimmer with spirit. These later pieces are, in my opinion, what mark Carr as a true master. During this period she has shed any self-doubt, and the message is clear: Life is everywhere. It must be acknowledged.
Finally and almost anti-climatically we wander into the section that houses the portraits, both Carr’s self-portraits, and the photographs of her beloved family of animals. These images tell us who the artist was. But without a doubt it is her landscapes that define her more deeply and with a more lasting impression.
So, here we have two great artists from the West – Emily Carr and Takao Tanabe. One cannot resist the temptation to compare their work. But can we? As viewers, it is our eyes alone that bring meaning to the work, just as it is the eyes of the artists that brought meaning to the landscapes. Tanabe’s gentle, loving horizontal strokes cannot possibly be portraying the same province as Carr’s vibrant, almost frenetic vertical assertions of colour.
Can they?
