Prairie Call to Cold Company (Nativity Series), 1975

Isaacs Gallery, Toronto Equinox Gallery, Vancouver Joyner Waddington’s, auction, Toronto, 27 May 2008, lot 17 Private Collection, Calgary

William Kurelek, “A Northern Nativity”, Toronto, 1976, no. 13, unpaginated, reproduced as “Grain Elevator’s Blind Corner”

In 1976 William Kurelek created a series of twenty paintings depicting the story of the nativity, the basis for the Christian holiday of Christmas. These images were imagined as if Jesus Christ had been born in a Canadian setting, such as an igloo, a fishing hut, at Niagara Falls or in a lumber camp. At the age of twelve, while growing up in the prairies in the 1930s during the depression, Kurelek experienced a sequence of dreams about the nativity. As the artist reflected, “The Nativity story got mixed up with history and geography lessons... A few were long; others were more like pictures that flashed on very briefly. But they all started and ended with the questions: If it happened there, why not here? If it happened then, why not now?” All taking place in Kurelek’s mind as he lay in the cold upstairs room of the farmhouse, these dreams were a combination of his childhood experiences working and living on the family farm, his knowledge of the prairies and the various places he visited while dreaming at night. The grain elevator depicted in this scene is like the one Kurelek had hauled grain to with his father. The nearby wagon stands as if just emptied of grain. Mary and the baby Jesus are huddled in an alcove of the building in the foreground, while the children outside seem to be beckoning to the child to join in their game, or to perhaps go sledding. As Kurelek recalls, he thought about this dream later, and wondered if it was all a tease, saying, “Then slowly its meaning came through... wasn’t it similar to another question often asked: ‘Why can’t the sick in mind pull themselves together?’” The story of the nativity is reflected in many works by Kurelek,na central theme that the artist harkened back to in his oeuvre. This collection of paintings was fondly referred to by the artist as, ‘Christmas dreams of a prairie boy’ in the book, “A Northern Nativity”, highlighting all twenty paintings in the series. The nativity story and the celebration of the birth of Jesus Christ is imagined within the multicultural tapestry of Canada, the adopted home of his Ukrainian family, expanding upon Kurelek’s belief “in the universality of the Christmas message.”