Maternity by Mary Riter Hamilton
The Canadian Magazine of 1912 had an article about a ‘famous’ Canadian impressionist painter, Mary Riter Hamilton.
Apparently, in November 1911, she exhibited at the Toronto Exhibition and was an instant hit. It didn’t hurt that Her Royal Highness, the Duchess of Connaught, who was in the news a lot at that time, purchased 3 of her paintings.
Born in Ontario, Mrs. Hamilton had just returned from 8 years study in Europe. She had only taken up her art seriously after the death of her husband.
Apparently, a painting (or more) of hers had been accepted at the Paris Salon, I guess the same Salon where Cezanne’s submissions were rejected, because according to some critics, his paintings looked like they were painted by monkeys playing with their poop.
I’d never heard of Mary Riter Hamilton. A scan of the Internet, reveals that she did some pretty stuff, but that she is most famous for her WWI paintings.
One Internet site wonders aloud why she has been forgotten. Yes, she was deriviative, copying the style of her time, but not on the cutting edge. No daring. But so what? the site says. Why can’t pictures be judged on their own merit? Why must great artists be innovators?
I disagree. It’s easy to copy. An artist should be slightly ahead of his or her time, I feel, to be important. A shaman. And shamans shock with their work, they also struggle because few people recognize it for what it is. If a work of art doesn’t shock us out of our complacency, what good is it? In the article, Mrs. Hamilton is quoted as saying that she avoids painting the “freakish, the sensual, the sensational.” Too bad for her. (Of course, later on she paints scenes from the trenches, pretty horrible, one might say.)
That’s why Mary Riter Hamilton isn’t a ‘great artist’ but Emily Carr is. In 1912, Carr was in Paris, and she returned to apply her newly learned expressionist techniques on native people in B.C.
Hmm.
Mary Riter Hamilton. Nice Dress! Nice hat!
Anyway, Flora Nicholson, of my Flo in the City novel, went on to become an amateur painter. I have three of her works in my house. One is a tall sketch in pastel, I think, of an embattled fir tree.
So, I may have to introduce Mary Riter Hamilton into my story. She apparently exhibited in Montreal, too. Hmm. And I’ll use this picture. (I just noticed: It shows a baby breastfeeding).I bet it did ‘shock’ in the old days: I know people today who are shocked at the sight of a baby nursing at his her mother’s breast. This was painted in 1906. Did she not think her subject “sensual”?
