Subseries

This subseries contains Clarence A. Gagnon's personal and professional correspondence. There are 78 letters in all, including 17 letters written by Gagnon (13 transcriptions and 4 handwritten letters), 2 postcards and 3 telegrams. Spanning a large part of Gagnon's career, these missives document his many relationships and his fame in Canada, Europe and the United States.

The subseries notably includes several letters from museums and government institutions chronicling the artist's professional involvement in these various organizations. The list includes, but is not limited to, a letter from the Art Museum of Toronto (later called the Art Gallery of Toronto and now known as the Art Gallery of Ontario) (1915) about engravings loaned for the Canadian National Exhibition in Toronto, a letter (1925) from the Canadian committee working on the British Empire Exhibition in Wembley about expenses the artist incurred as part of his mandate, and two letters from Eric Brown of the National Gallery of Canada (1927). There are several exchanges about the loan of a painting belonging to the Provincial Museum of Quebec (now called the Musée national des beaux-arts du Québec), including a vitriolic letter from Gagnon in response to curator Pierre George Roy's refusal (1937). The subseries also contains four letters from the Institut canadien de Quebec (1938) in which it invites Gagnon to give a lecture and exhibit his illustrations for Maria Chapdelaine, along with letters from Montreal mayor Camillien Houde and Susan Tweedsmuir thanking him for his contributions during the royal visit of 1939. Several communications document the demand for the painter's work, including one from the Carnegie Institute (1925) and a telegram from Athanase David (1920) on behalf of the provincial government.

In addition, the subseries chronicles Gagnon's personal and professional relationships with other artists of his era. In particular, there are four letters from "Père Raquette" (Alexander Young Jackson) (1925-1935) that Gagnon received when he was living in France, which recount the latest news about his colleagues back in Canada. The subseries also includes a letter from Edwin Holgate (1926), two letters from Albert H. Robinson (1930-1934), two copies of a letter from Gagnon to Fred Hutchison (1935), along with five letters from Alexander Young Jackson (ca 1926-ca 1933) and one letter from Frances Loring (1932) that inform him of rivalries within the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts. Moreover, the subseries contains a note from French artist Roger Reboussin (1927), asking to meet Gagnon.

The correspondence documents more personal topics as well. There are ten letters sent by Gagnon over several decades (1916-1935) to Dr. Euloge Tremblay, in which he describes his activities in France and at Wembley and asks for news of Baie-Saint-Paul. He also shares his impressions of the various areas of Europe he is visiting and, in a letter from 1934, mentions some rumours about the coming war. Finally, the subseries contains six missives (1920-1929) from Armand Dayot, the founder and editor of the French journal L’Art et les artistes, which chronicle the friendship between the two men and Dayot's interest in Canadian art.