Lucius O’Brien (1832-1899)
Doon, Ontario, 1891
Watercolour on paper
Gift of Helen and Arch Brown, 1995
Permanent Collection at the MacLaren Art Centre, Barrie, Ontario
"Suppose that instead of Exhibiting Canadian art, Canadian artists should help to represent Canada by such portrayal as they can give of the picturesque aspects of her scenery & life. (…) Pictures and drawings of Canadian life and scenery would have in this connection, an interest due to the subject & would materially help to make the country known and understood."
-O’Brien’s letter, Tupper papers quoted in Reid, D., (1990). Lucius R. O’Brien Visions of Victorian Canada, p.63
Text from the MacLaren Art Center website:
When Lucius O’Brien painted Doon, Ontario, 124 years ago in 1891, he could not have anticipated the ways in which light, fluctuations of temperature and humidity, atmospheric pollutants and a backing board of unpurified woodpulp would deteriorate this intimate work over time. Nineteenth century watercolours are notoriously delicate, and this one was no different. Stained and yellowing, paint loss in key areas of the image and mounted poorly, Doon, Ontario and eight other works by O’Brien require major work from a specialist conservator to stabilize them for exhibition and to preserve them for future generations. In the summer of 2014, MacLaren curators selected Doon to be the first of O’Brien’s work for treatment. Over the course of several weeks, Jayne Woods removed the acidic backing board, dry cleaned the surface and stabilized the work for exhibition.
The conserved image of Doon, Ontario is printed on our gift cards and journals, and your purchase of this stationery directly supports our special fund for conserving and framing the remaining eight images we hold by O’Brien in our Permanent Collection. These watercolours will be exhibited in our summer 2017 exhibition of works by Lucius O’Brien, Beloved, which forms a key part of our Canada’s 150th anniversary celebrations.
Lucius O’Brien was born in 1832, in nearby Shanty Bay. A significant Canadian painter in the Victorian era, he was the founding president of the Royal Canadian Academy of Artists. Best known for his travels throughout Canada, documented in the monumental Picturesque Canada (1882-1884), O’Brien was a seminal figure in the early Canadian arts movement. A treasured regional figure, many of the works in our collection were donated either by family members or local collectors, including his grandniece Norah (Simmelhag) Wishart, Helen and Arch Brown and John D. Holden. Lucius O’Brien died in Toronto in 1899.
To view before and after photos of the conservation of Doon, Ontario, select images on the right hand side of this page (images at the MacLaren Art Center website here).