Product Code Database
Frederick Horsman Varley (January 2, 1881 – September 8, 1969) was a member of the Canadian Group of Seven.
Varley's Some Day the People Will Return, shown at Burlington House in London and at the Canadian War Memorials Exhibition, is a large canvas depicting a war-ravaged cemetery, suggesting that even the dead cannot escape the destruction.
In Varley's painting For What? (1918), a single gravedigger takes a rest from his labours, a cart full of bodies beside him. It is one of the few official Canadian First World War paintings that does not hide the reality of battlefield death in images of ruins, blasted trees, and battle detritus.
In British Columbia, he painted images of mountains and mountainsides, drawing upon several influences from Chinese painting to William Turner and Samuel Palmer. He left in 1936 due to his experiences with depression, and two years later joined fellow artist Terry M. Shortt, the Royal Ontario Museum ornithologist, on a trip to the Arctic in 1938. In 1954, along with a handful of artists including Eric Aldwinckle, he visited the Soviet Union on the first cultural exchange of the Cold War.
For the last twelve years of his life, Varley lived in Markham, Ontario with Kathleen and Donald McKay. Kathleen nurtured Varley’s later artistic career by setting up a studio for him in the basement of her ancestral home, now the McKay Art Centre located at 197 Main Street Unionville. After Varley’s death in 1969, Kathleen promised to donate her considerable collection of works by Varley and his contemporaries to Markham, to be housed in a gallery suitable for their display and preservation. That promise resulted in the building of the Varley Art Gallery of Markham, which opened in 1997. He was buried alongside other members of the Original Seven at the McMichael Canadian Art Collection grounds in Kleinburg, Ontario.
In Unionville, the Varley Art Gallery of Markham is named after him, as is Fred Varley Drive, a two-lane residential street. Varley lived nearby at the Salem-Eckhardt House from 1952 to 1969.
On 6 May 1994 Canada Post issued 'Vera (detail), F.H. Varley, 1931' in the Masterpieces of Canadian art series. The stamp was designed by Pierre-Yves Pelletier based on an oil painting Vera, (1931) by Frederick Horsman Varley in the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, Ontario. The 88¢ stamps are perforated 14 x 14.5 mm and were printed by Leigh-Mardon Pty Limited. Post stamp
His place in the art history of Canada is verified by the government's decision to reproduce his self-portrait as a 17-cent postage stamp. On 22 May 1981 Canada Post issued 'Frederick H. Varley, Self Portrait' designed by Pierre Fontaine. The stamps are based on an oil painting Self Portrait, (circa 1945) by Frederick Horsman Varley in the Hart House Permanent Collection, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario. The 17¢ stamps are perforated 12.5 mm and were printed by Ashton-Potter Limited.
Varley has been designated as an Historic Person in the Directory of Federal Heritage Designations.
|
|
