Page 50 - Studio International - October1968

A Canadian scene

The first of three articles by
David Thompson

The exhibition Canada 101 at the Edinburgh Festival received polite ianism' is irrelevant to the quality of art that happens to originate
notice in the British Press, but little in the way of extended coverage, from Canada, or because national characteristics are no longer
which was perhaps foreseeable. Hardly a single Canadian artist is relevant in an international situation)? These may sound patronizing
known here by name, and the Edinburgh College of Art, even in questions for an outside observer to ask, but as any visitor to Canada
Festival time, is not exactly the Tate or the Whitechapel Gallery in knows, they are put into his mouth by Canadians themselves. As
London at whatever time. It is people who have been to Canada such, their tone is both challenging and diffident. Canadian artists
and seen modern Canadian art on the spot who show more than are already reasonably confident about the answers. But it seems
polite interest in it, which might suggest that its very considerable necessary to them to seek assurance from other people at this parti-
qualities are intrinsic to a local situation, difficult to anthologize cular stage rather than risk the immodesty, or indeed the falsity, of
outside the domestic context and present as an objective achieve- making any claims that could not be fully substantiated.
ment to the world at large. The Edinburgh exhibition, consisting of 89 paintings by 22 artists
Is Canadian art in fact exportable? Is it 'ready' to be shown inter- displayed with considerable panache, was, apart from anything else,
nationally, which means on an equal and unselfconscious footing a feeler put out to test these questions. And it followed close on the
with the best of the big leagues? Is there a specifically 'Canadian' heels of a somewhat comparable exhibition, with comparable motives
quality which has anything of its own to contribute to the inter- behind it, which was shown at the Musée d'Art Moderne in Paris
national scene, or is that question irrelevant (either because `Canad- during January and February of this year, and later sent to Rome.
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