The Quebec and Canadian Art Collection is Enriched by Several Significant Drawings (continued)

Eric Goldberg: Selfportrait as a Violinist

Born in Berlin in 1890, Eric Goldberg studied in Paris from 1906 to 1910, initially at the Académie Julian, where he met Canadian artists, including John Lyman, A. Y. Jackson and Randolph Hewton, and then at the École nationale supérieure des beaux-arts. In 1911, he began his studies at the Berlin Academy of Arts, under Lovis Corinth, who freed him from the Academicism of his Parisian instructors. Some years later, in 1928, he moved to Montreal, where he married Regina Seiden, who was also a painter. Goldberg then became a founding member of the Eastern Group and the Contemporary Arts Society.

In Self-portrait as a Violinist, the figure and his instrument cover the sheet of paper from top to bottom. Overlapping and intersecting, a plethora of tight, precise strokes establish volume as well as the interplay of light and shadow, lending the figure a distinct lifelike quality in contrast to the untouched background.

Charles William Jefferys: Linemen in Northern Ontario

The job of lineman came about with the advent of the telegraph in Canada, in 1846, and then carried over to the installation of telephone (1870) and electrical (1890) lines. It required exceptional physical skill, because climbing up the wood ties and conductors, to which the lines were attached, demanded excellent coordination and, above all, the ability to work at great heights.

To complete this drawing, Jefferys likely found inspiration in photographs, and the graphic rendering of the ink strokes bears testament to his desire to pull prints from it. In fact, this is a preparatory drawing for The Mines, 1900, the illustration for the month of January in the calendar issued by the Toronto Art League in 1900. The Globe’s art critic wrote of this drawing: “There is originality in his conception of the Mines – men working on the telegraph poles in the front to open communication with the lonely mines on the far hillside.”¹

David Milne: Fifth Avenue Bus, New York

This work is part of a remarkable group of drawings Milne completed during his last New York period, between 1911 and mid-1916, when he was finding his own style. While there are a few lines in graphite, the composition is mainly made up of juxtaposed marks and lines of colour, used sparingly, on a paper whose surface has been left mostly in reserve. Everything is suggested with the greatest simplicity, and several elements are delineated by empty spaces between the coloured-in shapes. In the foreground on the left, we can make out a female form in maroon and brown. The road itself is just a stroke of blue wash, the drippings evident. Some strokes and touches of ochre, brown and green establish the bus. To the right of the image, a building’s facade is rendered in reserve, while to its left, at the height of the “piano nobile” (the noble floor), there is the realistic depiction of the wall of a business, topped with a sign or a free-standing wall covered in signage.

Louis Muhlstock: The Homeless

This three-quarter portrait depicts a middle-aged man whose face has been lined by a life of hard knocks. In the tight frame, his hunched shoulders are covered by a shapeless garment or blanket. The smooth swathes of this clothing mirror the uniform background of the composition. The figure’s mostly bare forehead illuminates the scene. Meanwhile, his thinning hair encircling his scalp, and the scruffiness of his beard, moustache and eyebrows, serve to create contrast. Thin black lines mark the contours of his right ear, nose and eyes. The homeless man’s amused expression is highlighted by the wrinkles on his face. In 1925, during his first Montreal exhibition, at the Spring Salon of the Art Association of Montreal (AAM), now the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, Muhlstock presented two charcoal drawings, including the portrait of a blind man. A decade later, he exhibited more portraits, among which might have been our drawing, The Homeless. As a critic from the Montreal Star wrote: “The drawings are all of interest either as good drawings or as studies of character, and most of them are portrait heads or, in a few cases, only faces,” adding, “Mr. Muhlstock is at his best when he has character as well as form to put into his drawings.”⁴

Ernst Neumann: Study of a Head (Max Neumann, the Artist’s Father)

This graphite portrait was completed in 1927. Ernst Neumann was just twenty years old when he was a student at the AAM. At the time, he was also studying with Edwin Holgate, a master of portrait and print. The drawing was exhibited the following year at the AAM’s 45th Spring Salon, but it was not for sale. It is likely the artist wanted to keep this portrait of his father, Max Neumann, for himself. The inscription of the address on the back of the work (757 Bloomfield Ave., in Outremont) suggests that Ernst Neumann was still living at home with his father when it was drawn. The subject’s features are also outlined and marked by age; the wrinkles on his cheeks are clearly visible and his hairline is receding, leaving the forehead bare. The man seems to be deep in thought, with his eyes half-closed and his face tilted downwards.