Art canadien classique
Chicoutimi Falls, 1920 (circa)
Oil on panel
12 x 16 in
30.5 x 40.6 cm
Alan Klinkhoff Gallery Cullen Inventory No. AK0839.
Walter Klinkhoff Gallery Cullen Inventory No. 839.
30.5 x 40.6 cm
Alan Klinkhoff Gallery Cullen Inventory No. AK0839.
Walter Klinkhoff Gallery Cullen Inventory No. 839.
This painting is available to view at our Toronto gallery.
$18,500
Inscriptions
signed, 'M. CULLEN' (lower right); inscribed in pencil in an unknown hand, (possibly William Watson or Watson Gallery assistant), "#2750 / MC86 [enclosed in a rectangle]" / "to be framed. [underlined] (verso, upper centre); stamped with artist's black ink estate stamp and crossed out in ink, "STUDIO / MAURICE CULLEN R.C.A. / GUARANTEED BY / WATSON GALLERIES / ____ / _____ RECORD NO. ______ " (verso, centre);stamped again with artist's black ink estate stamp, "STUDIO / MAURICE CULLEN R.C.A. / GUARANTEED BY / WATSON GALLERIES", signed and inscribed in ink by William Watson, "William R. Watson" / 1935 / MC86" (verso, lower centre).Provenance
Estate of the artist
Watson Gallery, Montreal, Inventory No. 12973, inventoried in 1935 and probably sold in 1947
Private collection, Ottawa
Galerie Alan Klinkhoff Inc., Montreal
Acquired from the above by the present private collection, Toronto, July 15, 2019
Catalogues
Sylvia Antoniou, Maurice Cullen (Kingston: Agnes Etherington Art Centre: 1982), p. 107
This painting is an excellent accomplishment of the power of sunlight acting upon the landscape and the falls. Such are/were the temptations of the spirit of impressionism to Maurice Cullen and his peers.
William R. Watson, the legendary Montreal based art dealer who exhibited Maurice Cullen’s works wrote about his friend in his recollections;
“Cullen was considered a revolutionary by his Canadian contemporaries, and indeed he was. His broad, bold compositions, his scorn for irrelevant details, and his robust colour, were rather disturbing to the maulstick painters of his day. The younger artists, such as Clarence Gagnon and Albert Robinson, were stimulated and influenced by him and A.Y. Jackson has called him ‘our hero’.” [1]
Cullen’ s importance is well demonstrated in the National Gallery of Canada’s Canada and Impressionism: New Horizons exhibition presently on view at The Gallery. Cullen’s contribution to Canadian art will be better understood and appreciated in a few years when the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts expects to present an exhibition dedicated exclusively to Maurice Cullen.
_____________
Footnote:
[1] Watson, William R., Retrospective: Recollections of an Art Dealer, Toronto, University of Toronto Press, 1974, p. 31
William R. Watson, the legendary Montreal based art dealer who exhibited Maurice Cullen’s works wrote about his friend in his recollections;
“Cullen was considered a revolutionary by his Canadian contemporaries, and indeed he was. His broad, bold compositions, his scorn for irrelevant details, and his robust colour, were rather disturbing to the maulstick painters of his day. The younger artists, such as Clarence Gagnon and Albert Robinson, were stimulated and influenced by him and A.Y. Jackson has called him ‘our hero’.” [1]
Cullen’ s importance is well demonstrated in the National Gallery of Canada’s Canada and Impressionism: New Horizons exhibition presently on view at The Gallery. Cullen’s contribution to Canadian art will be better understood and appreciated in a few years when the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts expects to present an exhibition dedicated exclusively to Maurice Cullen.
_____________
Footnote:
[1] Watson, William R., Retrospective: Recollections of an Art Dealer, Toronto, University of Toronto Press, 1974, p. 31
