Online Teacher Resources on Canadian Art

Follow-up activities

1. Illustrate a Traditional or Urban Legend
   As you most likely saw in the Canadian collection during your visit, Alfred Laliberté, a master sculptor who worked at the beginning of the twentieth century, often illustrated legends and customs from days gone by. By doing so, Laliberté wished to help keep alive a memory of a Canadian past before the machine age. In the sculpture below, fishermen from the Île d’Orléans fish eel at night by the light of torches. For inhabitants of the nearby shore, the weird spectacle of lights waving, dancing and breaking the usual darkness of the river probably gave rise to a number of legends, including the stories of witches on the island.

   Research legends from the region where your school is located and have the students document them. Or find some examples of contemporary legends, often called urban legends. Have the students tell these legends to the class. Where might the legends have begun? Legends usually have some basis in reality.

   As an art activity, do imagery based on these legends. It could be in a two- or three-dimensional medium- paint, pastel, clay or Plasticine.

Alfred Laliberté (1878-1953) Fishing by Torchlight, Île d’Orléans 1928-1932 Plaster 51.5 x 49 x 32.5 cm MMFA, gift of David and Claire Molson 1989.34

 

2. Myself in All My Finery
   As you may have noticed in the galleries, some of the earlier paintings in the collection consist of portraits done in an almost naïve style. A bourgeois class was growing in both Quebec City and Montreal around the turn of the nineteenth century and more and more of these well-to-do families were interested in having their portraits painted. The portraits were often done by itinerant painters who travelled around the countryside filling an increasing need. The painters often remained anonymous, and their subjects were painted in all their finery, to suggest their social stature. Often, painters paid a great deal of attention to decorative details such as the headdress and collar of Madame de Sabrevois Bleury in the portrait below.

   Have your students do a search on the Internet of some of our early Canadian portraits. Some names that you could look up are Théophile Hamel, Antoine Plamondon and Jean-Baptiste-Roy Audy. Following the research, have your students do self-portraits in fancy dress. Study proportions of the face and body. As for the clothing, their finery could be inspired by the clothes worn by some of the portraits they saw in the Museum galleries or some of the early portraits found on the Internet. Or they could paint themselves in dress inspired by contemporary celebrities. Work on portraits that represent the figure to the waist, and suggest that they include details like jewellery, lace and hats or headdresses.

Anonymous Quebec Madame de Sabrevois de Bleury About 1780 Oil on canvas 73.6 x 59.9 cm MMFA, gift of Maurice Corbeil 1975.29

 

3. Travel the World with James Wilson Morrice
   As you have no doubt seen from your visit to the Canadian galleries, the Museum has a wonderful collection of paintings by the Montreal artist James Wilson Morrice. His paintings are a virtual voyage around Europe, North Africa and the West Indies.

   Before starting this project, give a short introduction to the artist:

   • James Wilson Morrice was born in Montreal in 1865. The Morrice family was quite well-to-do and they lived near Sherbrooke Street, the same street where the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts is located.

   • Morrice studied law in Toronto, but really wanted to be an artist, so he went to Europe in 1890.

   • In Paris, he studied with French artist Henri Harpignies, who encouraged him to paint directly from nature.

   • He travelled extensively and documented his travels with drawings, pochades (small oil sketches) and paintings.

   • In 1914, James Wilson accepted a proposal from the Canadian War Records Office to paint the various activities of Canadian troops on the Allied Front.

   • During the War, he also travelled to the West Indies and continued to paint.

   • Morrice’s health deteriorated from the 1920s on. He died in Tunis in 1924 at the age of 59.

   
   
   

   This project will require some research on your students’ part. First, they will have to find the various places that Morrice travelled to. Have them search the Internet for sites on James Wilson Morrice. (There are quite a few of them.) In teams, they can document all the places where he travelled. How would he have reached these places at the beginning of the twentieth century? Try to come up with an itinerary of all the places he visited using all the modes of transportation that were used at that time. Starting from Montreal, find the most logical routes from one place to another, so that you can cover all the places and return to your take-off point, Montreal. If you can, calculate the kilometres between each stop.

   Have the students research the places that Morrice visited. For each stop, have them do watercolour sketches of these places on postcard-size pieces of paper.

   James Wilson Morrice (1865-1924) The Old Holton House, Montreal About 1908-1909 Oil on canvas 60.5 x 73.2 cm MMFA, purchase, John W. Tempest Fund 1915.129		James Wilson Morrice (1865-1924) Venice, Looking Out over the Lagoon About 1904 Oil on canvas mounted on aluminum 60.6 x 73.9 cm MMFA, gift of James Wilson Morrice Estate 1925.334
   James Wilson Morrice (1865-1924) Study for “Afternoon, Tunis” About 1914 Oil, graphite on panel 13.3 x 16.8 cm MMFA, gift of Mrs. Alan G. Law 1925.340b		James Wilson Morrice (1865-1924) The Pond, West Indies About 1921 Oil on canvas 81.5 x 54.8 cm MMFA, gift of the Louise and Bernard Lamarre family 1998.29

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