File

This file focusses on the work of Clarence A. Gagnon and his participation in various group exhibitions.

A catalogue documents an exhibition of etchings presented May 7 to June 7, 1909, at the Art Gallery of Colonial House, the Henry Morgan & Co. store in Montreal. The event featured 100 etchings by a number of artists, including four by Gagnon: Pont de l’Arche; Grand Canal, Venice; Mont St-Michel; and Rouen.

The file also contains a flyer for an exhibition entitled Aspects de la peinture canadienne, presented by the philosophers of Collége de Saint-Laurent. The name of Clarence A. Gagnon is featured alongside those of renowned artists like Cornelius Krieghoff, Ozias Leduc, Marc-Aurèle de Foy Suzor-Côté, Marc-Aurèle Fortin, Paul-Émile Borduas, Alfred Pellan, Jean-Paul Lemieux, Jean-Paul Riopelle, Jean-Paul Mousseau and Charles Daudelin.

An undated telegram addressed to the artist mentions the organization of an exhibition at the Tate Gallery. Signed "McCurry," the message was very likely sent by Harry Orr McCurry of the National Gallery of Canada. In fact, the clipping of an article published in The Gazette on June 11, 1938, reports that Gagnon is one of the artists commissioned to help the National Gallery of Canada organize the exhibition A Century of Canadian Art at the Tate Gallery in London. However, this assertion is refuted by Gagnon in the rough draft of a letter addressed to Eric Brown, dated June 21, 1938, that is preserved in subseries P116/D2.

Other group exhibitions including works by Clarence A. Gagnon are also documented by press clippings. In 1944, The Gazette reported on an exhibition at the Stevens Art Gallery. This event also included works by Horatio Walker, G. Horne Russell, Frederick A. Verner, Frank Hennessey, Henri Julien and Cornelius Krieghoff. The same newspaper publicized the 1945 opening of The Development of Painting in Canada at the gallery of the Art Association of Montreal. This exhibition, initiated by the Art Gallery of Toronto (today the Art Gallery of Ontario), in co-operation with the National Gallery of Canada and the Quebec Provincial Museum (today the Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec), featured three works by Gagnon: La plage de Dinard (The Beach at Dinard), L’étang en octobre (The Pond in October) and Matinée d’hiver, Baie-Saint-Paul (Winter Morning, Baie-Saint-Paul). The newspaper The Standard noted that Gagnon was among the Canadian artists, along with Horatio Walker, William Brymner, A. Y. Jackson, Goodridge Roberts and Emily Carr, represented in an exhibition at the Dominion Gallery in 1945. Finally, a July 10, 1949, edition of the Boston Sunday Herald announces an exhibition of modern Canadian painting at the city's Museum of Fine Arts. A photograph of Gagnon's painting Laurentian Village (1926) accompanies the article.

In addition, the file contains photographs and printed reproductions of works by Gagnon, some of which are glued onto pieces of paper. A handwritten note dated February 1969 refers to the painting Quebec Street, a photograph of which is included in one of these collages, explaining that it is not actually a work by Gagnon. Finally, the file includes the business card of Guillaume Lerolle, Carnegie Institute of Pittsburgh, Fine Arts Section, in Paris, featuring a handwritten note.