Canadian Fine Arts, Toronto
Private Collection, Toronto
Literature
Victoria A. Baker, Modern Colours: the art of Randolph Stanley Hewton, 1888-1960, exhibition catalogue, Art Gallery of Hamilton, January 19 - March 31, 2002, pages 12-13
“Montreal Boys Achieve Success with Paintings,” Montreal Daily Star, February 20, 1913, page 9
Randolph Stanley Hewton was one of the many artists of his generation who travelled to Paris to further his studies in fine art. After training with William Brymner at the Art Association of Montreal, he enrolled at the Academie Julian from 1908 to 1913. Inspired by the artworks of the European Avant-garde that he witnessed first-hand, he adopted a painterly approach of “colourful, flattened surface patterns inspired by his understanding of the modern methods introduced by French Impressionist and Post-Impressionist painters.” Hewton's bright colour palette was well-received in Paris; a 1913 exhibition review described a painting of a garden as stylistically likened to “an early Gauguin of the Pont-Aven period.” Hewton's “Village in Autumn” exemplifies his signature Post-Impressionistic style in its vibrant colours and flattened perspective; at the time, it would likely have been admired in Europe though considered controversial in Canada.
