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Uncle Ned Hill: Home in Wesleyville by David Lloyd Blackwood

Artwork by David Lloyd Blackwood, Uncle Ned Hill: Home in Wesleyville

David Blackwood
Uncle Ned Hill: Home in Wesleyville

etching and aquatint
signed, titled, numbered 30/35 and dated 1976 in the lower margin; sold together with the publication, “The Art of David Blackwood” by William Gough (Toronto, 1988); signed and dated by the artist on the title page
10.75 x 13.75 ins ( 27.3 x 34.9 cms ) ( plate size )

Auction Estimate: $3,000.00$2,500.00 - $3,000.00

Price Realized $4,080.00
Sale date: April 27th 2021

Provenance:
George Weber (artist), Edmonton
By descent to the present Private Collection, Ontario
A previous owner of this artwork, Gordon Weber was also a prominent Canadian printmaker. Weber documented the transformation of Alberta from the troubled Depression years to the Post-War oil boom, highlighting society’s impact in the Prairies. A draughtsman trained in wallpaper design and display, the artist became a leading printmaker in Western Canada and has been credited for introducing the process and art of serigraphy to Western Canadian artists. His silkscreen print “Inkaneep Reserve, Osoyoos, B.C.” (1957) was the first serigraph selected as an honorary membership print for the Society of Canadian Painter-Etchers and Engravers.

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David Lloyd Blackwood
(1941 - 2022) OSA, RCA, Order of Canada

Current SalesHighlightsWatch Artist

Born in Wesleyville, Bonavista Bay, Newfoundland, one of the major sealing towns of that province, he is a descendant of a long line of master mariners. Blackwood was awarded a Government of Newfoundland Centennial scholarship to study at the Ontario College of Art in Toronto under Carl Schaefer, John Alfsen, H.W.G. MacDonald and Frederick Hagan. He went on to become Art Master at Trinity College School in Port Hope, Ontario. In 1969, Blackwood became the first artist-in-residence at Erindale College, University of Toronto, Mississauga.

David Blackwood uses his background on the East coast of Canada to create grande visual narratives reflecting both the landscape and culture of the province with an emphasis on combining the history, legends, and myths of settlement and developing culture of Newfoundland. He is best-known for his colour etchings with aquatint. His work was used to provide illustrations for Farley Mowat’s “Wake of the Great Sealers”, a collection of stories about the heroic Newfoundlanders who braved the icy seas of the treacherous North Atlantic in search of seals. Driven by hard times at home it was the only hope many of the men had of making money to feed their families. Men perished when their ships went down during wintry gales. Blackwood, a native of a sealing town himself, and a descendent of fishing skippers and sealing captains, provides Mowat’s stirring text with equally stirring and poetic figurative drawings and prints.

Blackwood was awarded the Order of Canada in 1993 in recognition of his work contributing to and preserving the cultural life and heritage of Canada through his artwork. At the Art Gallery of Ontario, the Blackwood Research Centre within the Morin Gelber Print and Drawing Centre was created after a major acquisition of the artists works in 2000. The museum also elected Blackwood as its honourary Chairman in 2003, the first practicing artist to hold this position. In the same year, he was awarded the Order of Ontario.

As one of Canada's most celebrated print-makers, David Blackwood's works are part of significant Canadian and international private and corporate collections including The Royal Collection, Windsor Castle, the Uffizi Gallery, Florence, the Art Gallery of Ontario and the National Gallery of Canada.

Sources: "A Dictionary of Canadian Artists, Volume I: A-F", compiled by Colin S. MacDonald, Canadian Paperbacks Publishing Ltd, Ottawa, 1977