signed lower right; dated “840722” (July 22, 1984) on the reverse
36 × 48 in (91.4 × 121.9 cm)
Auction Estimate:$12,000 - $15,000
Sale date:November 22, 2021
Price Realized
$66,000
(including Buyer's Premium)
Provenance
Mountain Galleries, Jasper Park Lodge, Alberta
Private Collection, Nebraska
Literature
Dr. Nancy Campbell, “Doris McCarthy: Roughing it in the Bush” [online publication], Doris McCarthy Gallery, University of Toronto, Scarborough, 2010
Nancy Campbell writes in her curatorial essay accompanying the exhibition “Doris McCarthy: Roughing it in the Bush”: “The simplification of form was pivotal in McCarthy’s major breakthrough following a trip to Resolute, Nunavut, in 1972. The Arctic landscape not only captured the artist’s imagination but also served as a springboard for her studies in form. The sharp edges of the icebergs, the blocks of colour and the shifting light offered a setting that perfectly suited the expansion of her earlier explorations during the sixties.”
While studying at the Ontario College of Art, McCarthy was mentored by members of the Group of Seven, but it was Lawren Harris’s simplification of the landscape that heavily influenced her work, as seen in “Reflections in the Melt Water”. In this composition, she has taken the landscape and stripped it back to its simplest abstract shapes, continuing her exploration of the North through hard edges and geometric forms.
