Lot 70
LAWREN STEWART HARRIS
Provenance:
Bess Harris Collection, Vancouver.
Dominion Gallery, Montreal.
Private Collection, Edmonton.
Private Collection, Ontario.
Literature:
Lisa Christensen, “A Hiker’s Guide to the Rocky Mountain Art of Lawren Harris”, Calgary, 2000, pages 67 and 75.
Note:
Harris and A.Y. Jackson first visited Mount Robson Provincial Park in 1924, painting such subjects as Maligne Lake, the Colin Range and the Athabasca River and Valley.
An avid believer in Theosophy, Harris was interested in divine mysteries and their relationships to human origins. The artist’s time spent in the mountains would provide an experience with the sublime that he had not previously encountered. Harris once described how he applied this awareness to his art: “If we view a great mountain soaring into the sky, it may excite us, evoke an uplifted feeling within us. There is an interplay of something we see outside of us without inner response. The artist takes that response and its feelings and shapes it on canvas with paint so that when finished it contains the experience.” This lot conveys the dramatic visuals of the western Canadian landscape while capturing Harris’ deepening interest in abstract forms.