James Archibald Houston
(1921 - 2005)

Born in Toronto, Ontario, he studied as a youth at the Art Gallery of Toronto under Dr. Arthur Lismer; later the Northern Vocational School, Toronto, under R.A. Findley; the Ontario College of Art under L.A.C. Panton; in Tokyo, Japan at the Hanga under Unichi-Hirasuka; in France at the Atelier 17, Paris, under William Hayter. From 1948 until 1961 he was directly connected with Canadian Inuit art and spent most of this period at Cape Dorset, West Baffin Island. His sketches of Inuit were exhibited at the Willistead Art Gallery, Windsor, Ontario in 1953 and at the Robertson Galleries, Ottawa in 1955. His work was part of a display by Northern Affairs which included 125 Inuit carvings. In 1957 the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts acquired a number of his sketches of Inuit.

In 1962 the following comment appeared in the editorial column of ‘The Ottawa Journal’ regarding Houston, “For the sake of the educational opportunities open to his young sons, he will shortly move from the North to the United States where he will take an industrial post. It was Mr. Houston, an artist himself, who introduced Inuit carving to Southern Canada. He has gone north to paint and been impressed with the work of the Inuit. It was Mr. Houston who suggested to the Inuit carvers of Cape Dorset, who had never worked with paint and paper, that they might enjoy making prints from stone cuts. Mr. Houston has recently been an area administrator with the Department of Northern Affairs. His departure will be a loss to the department and to Canada.”

He was the author of a number of articles and books, which he also illustrated admirably. He lived in New York where he was Associate Director of Design, Steuben Glass; Board Member, Pratt Graphic Arts; and Arctic Representative, Canadian Handicrafts Guild Montreal. A solo show of his drawings took place at Robertson Galleries in 1968 when his work was very well received.

Source: "A Dictionary of Canadian Artists, Volume II”, compiled by Colin S. MacDonald, Canadian Paperbacks Publishing Ltd, Ottawa, 1979