Lot 29: KATHLEEN MOIR MORRIS 1893 - 1986

KATHLEEN MOIR MORRIS 1893 - 1986 WINTER STREET SCENE signed lower left K.M. Morris oil on panel 30.5 by 35.6 cm. 12 by 14 in.

A.K. Prakash, Independent Spirit, Early Canadian Women Artists, Richmond Hill, 2008, p. 154

Private Collection, Charlottetown

Children with their sleds on a winter day is a rare and welcome departure in subject matter from Morris's usual winter scenes of market places, taxi-stands with horses and sleighs in line, church congregations coming or going, and other normal urban sights. Yet since her subject was most frequently the everyday street life of Quebec's small towns and cities, it is not surprising, but nevertheless gratifying to find such a delightful panel as this.

As a member of the Beaver Hall Group of artists in Montreal, Morris, like her friends Anne Savage, Mabel May, Nora Collyer, Edith Seath, and Sarah Robertson, recorded the domestic world they knew, and were not as drawn to the remote and rugged landscapes that were the specialty of the Group of Seven. Their world of homes and families, knitting and gardening, markets and street scenes, and still lifes of flowers, were perhaps less exotic, but equally sensitive and strong as paintings.

As A.K. Prakash notes:

Her passion for life and love for her subject matter enlivened her work; the street scenes she celebrated conveyed the 'joie de vivre' that prevailed in the seemingly mundane world of small-town Quebec in the early twentieth century.