Lawren Harris (1885-1970)

• painter, one of the Group of Seven
• born in Brantford, Ontario
• family co-owned the Massey-Harris (later Massey-Ferguson) farm machinery company, which allowed him to pursue art, without worrying about finding a paying job
• after one year at the University of Toronto, studied art in Europe
• returned to Canada in 1908, and became caught up in the cultural scene
• was a founding member of the Arts and Letters Club
• married painter Bess Housser
• worked as an illustrator for Harper's, but decided to devote himself to painting
• early paintings were of houses in the "Ward", the lower class immigrant district near the University of Toronto (University Ave. and College St.)
• helped plan and finance the Studio Building, which still stands on Severn Street (near Yonge and Bloor), Toronto
• the Studio Building was completed in 1914 as a workshop for Canadian painters
• Jackson and Thomson were the first to move in, followed by Harris and MacDonald, and finally Carmichael
• works such as Red Sleigh, House Winter (1919, McGill University, Montreal), a snow scene viewed through branches, exhibited strong composition and abstraction that marks his style
• in his landscapes of the Canadian wilderness in the 1920s, Harris used boldly stylized forms of trees and hills
• First Snow, North Shore of Lake Superior (1923, Vancouver Art Gallery):

• his subsequent depictions of Lake Superior and of the Arctic in the late 1920s were even more simplified
• work after 1934 became almost entirely abstract
• best known paintings include:
  • Above Lake Superior (1922)
  • The ice house, Coldwell, Lake Superior (1923)
  • North shore, Lake Superior (1926)
  • Lighthouse, Father Point (193)
  • North shore, Baffin Island (1930)
  • Equations in space (1936)
  • Composition #1 (1940)
• further reading: The Group of Seven and Tom Thomson: an introduction (1995) by Anne Newlands
• more info at the McMichael Canadian Art Collection
• more Group of Seven information

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