Frederic Marlett Bell-Smith (Canadian 1846-1923)

Siwash Indian Canoes
watercolour, indistinctly signed with initials lower left, circa 1889
Size: 10 h x 17 w in (with frame: 18 ¼ x 25 in)
ZJ21147                            

Provenance:
Gallerie d’Art Michel Bigué, Saint-Sauveur-des-Monts, Quebec
Levis Auctions April 17, 2016 lot 7
Collection of Mark & Barbara Cullen, Vancouver

Frederic Marlett Bell-Smith is a major figure in the development of Canadian art history. Founding member of the Society of Canadian Artists and the Ontario Society of Artists, he was also a member of the Royal Canadian Academy where he exhibited often. He applied his rigorous training in traditional artistic techniques to every subject he painted. His skills are exemplified in the detail found in all of his pieces from small to large scale, in both oil and watercolour.

Bell-Smith’s first formal excursion through the Rocky Mountains on the newly built CPR in 1887 marked a notable change in his subject matter, as he strived to capture the sublime beauty and boldness of the rugged Canadian landscape. Along with photographer William Notman Jr. and fellow artist Lucius O’Brien, Bell-Smith was one of the first to take advantage of this free pass promotional program. This trip provided him with access to Western areas including Banff, Kicking Horse, the Selkirk Mountains and the lower mainland including Vancouver and Victoria. He returned to Western Canada often in later years, painting poetic works which were more solemn and reflective than his earlier large landscapes.

This view titled “Siwash Indian Canoes”, circa 1889, is from Bell-Smith’s many travels to the Pacific Northwest. The location is just north of Horseshoe Bay in West Vancouver, on the way North to Lions Bay. In the distance can be seen “Intchekai”, currently named Mt. Garibaldi. Interestingly the watercolour above is the same view painted by Lucius O’Brien “Mt Intchekai Howe Sound”. Upon returning to eastern Canada the two artists held a joint exhibition in 1888 including works from their trip out West. Whether O’Brien and Bell-Smith were at this location at the same time is unknown, but the image is similar in the rendering of the canoe, figures, landscape and even rendering of the clouds.

Dennis Reid states in his book Lucius R. O’Brien: Visions of Victorian Canada, Art Gallery of Ontario, 1990:

"O’Brien left for the West on June 1, 1888, carrying his trusty sketchbook for the first time. By June 16 he was in Vancouver en route to Howe Sound, the first major indentation in the coast north of Burrard Inlet, Vancouver’s Harbour” and “…Howe Sound…is over twenty miles deep, irregular in outline…and walled by mountains rising steeply from the water…One in Particular, called by the Indians “Intchekai”, cannot be les than ten thousand feet…This mountain is seldom seen, the valley being constantly filled with clouds, and its appearance one lovely afternoon, at a distance of nearly forty miles, took me entirely by surprise…"

Whether painted on the same trip when the artists were together, or later from sketches or photographs, these two works are excellent examples by Bell-Smith and O’Brien from their time painting in British Columbia.

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