Alex Colville War Paintings

Rhoda colville a gifted artist and witty poet dies at age 91 dec 31 2012 chronicle herald.

Alex colville war paintings.

Category paintings of world war ii by alex colville in the canadian war museum. Alex colville died peacefully at home on july 16th 2013. About alex colville the pictures of canadian artist alex colville bear more affinity to the american precisionists of the 1930s than to photo realism. The canadian army wasn t sure what to do with alex colville when he enlisted in 1942.

The canadian war museum holds more than 340 of colville s works in its collection. 1920 colville enlisted in the canadian infantry in 1942. He left teaching to devote himself to painting and print making full time from a studio in his home on york street. This building is now named colville house.

Alex colville 1920 2013 one of canada s best known artists was an official war artist from 1944 to 1946. Colville returned to new brunswick after the war and became a faculty member with the fine arts department at mount allison university where he taught from 1946 to 1963. His perfect compositions are based on an abundance of sketches and studies which are first brought into an abstract geometric scheme before drawings are made from the live model and proportioned according to the planned format. In 1982 alex colville donated his remaining wartime drawings and sketches to the canadian war museum to join those that had already become part of the war art collection.

From wikimedia commons the free media repository. Nor do they make more than a cursory link between colville s official war paintings whose genesis lies in field sketches and his current output. In 1944 he was appointed an official war artist and painted in england france holland and germany. Ranging from quick pencil sketches to carefully composed oil paintings they help capture the human dimension of the second world war.

When folks think of artists perhaps an image of someone working frenetically against the clock comes to mind. These works are the result employment as an official war artist for canada and are thus were subject to crown copyright which has since expired. Today colville is celebrated for his magic realist art. He was one of three canadian artists who visited belsen concentration camp after its 1945 liberation.

These unseen paintings hail from around that time 1939 to 1946. Colville exhibited extensively across canada and internationally including at the tate gallery in london and the beijing exhibition centre in beijing in 1983 an international touring retrospective of his work was organized by the art gallery of ontario. The man who would later become one of the country s most celebrated artists was then only a baby faced fine arts graduate fresh out of mount allison university in new brunswick his only contribution to the war effort prior to volunteering for battle had been a poster he d created for the.