Daybreak (Modality Series), 1936

Private Collection, British Columbia

“B.C. Society of Fine Arts,” Vancouver Art Gallery, April 29 – May 15, 1938 “Jock Macdonald, Evolving Form,” Vancouver Art Gallery, October 18, 2014 – January 4, 2015, travelling to the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria and The Robert McLaughlin Gallery, Oshawa, 2015

Michelle Jacques (ed.) and Ian Thom (ed.), “Jock Macdonald, Evolving Form,” Vancouver Art Gallery, Vancouver, 2014, reproduced page 23 Roald Nasgaard, “Abstract Painting in Canada,” Toronto/Vancouver, 2007, page 41 Ian Thom, “ ‘The Early Work: An Artist Emerges’, Jock Macdonald, Evolving Form,” Vancouver Art Gallery, Vancouver, 2014, pages 23-24 Joyce Zemans, “Jock Macdonald: the inner landscape/a retrospective exhibition,” Art Gallery of Ontario, Toronto, 1981, pages 81, 83 and 86

Jock Macdonald focused on his semi-abstracts, which he called “Modalities”, during the late 1930s. The artist claimed that his Modalities were of “a deeper value” to him than his landscapes at the time. He described these works: “[I] put down in paint, in a concrete form, my feelings about the sea, wind, rain, etc. - feelings which had nothing to do with visual effects of the seas, windstorms and rainstorms. The feelings must have been something similar to those which brought Cezanne to the awareness that ‘the life and energy of a tree does not end at the visual limitation of the tree’s silhouette form.’” Macdonald painted “Daybreak” while residing in Nootka Sound on Vancouver Island. Ian Thom discusses this important canvas: “The whole work shimmers with energy and it is unclear if we are looking at ocean or sky. Brilliant yellows and oranges mark the divisions between darkness and light, and strange triangular shapes appear within the dark section. At the top left of the canvas is the orb of the sun, surrounded by a halo of clouds. Clearly Macdonald is creating a view of nature that can be seen by the imagination rather than the eye... ‘Daybreak’ reveals his rich visual imagination and remarkable ability to transcend the enormous difficulties that he and his family faced while in this remote region of British Columbia.” The artist’s eighteen month stay at Nootka was truly a fantastic stimulant for his work. This work was exhibited by the artist at the Vancouver Art Gallery in April 1938 with three other Modalities. These celebrated paintings reveal how Macdonald truly “sought to explore, through material means, the immaterial aspects of nature.”