Lot 72
JOHN GEOFFREY CARUTHERS LITTLE, R.C.A.
Provenance:
Charles Bronfman’s Claridge Collection, Montreal
Note:
Reminiscent of British painter L.S. Lowry’s teeming crowds of “stick people figures” all going about their business in the bustling urban scenes, Little captured moments of Montreal and Quebec City at a time when much of it was being demolished by city-wide building projects. He celebrated the urban core and ethnic communities of the city centre. Depictions like Quebec City, brought Little early acclaim in his career. The busy, communal city is lifted by bright punches of colour with painted storefronts and gleaming sleds.
Dorothy Pfeiffer, reviewing his work in 1964, noted, "Those bemoaning the seemingly ruthless demolition of hundreds of Montreal’s gracious old-world homes and other buildings, the disappearance in the name of progress of various little nooks and parks... will gain nostalgic pleasures from John Little’s show, for he had dedicated his painting to the preservation of such items for posterity. ...Three important qualities it certainly contains: assurance, individuality and artistic honesty."
Sold to benefit Historica Canada.