Doris Shabolt's 1979 monograph on the art and life of Victoria's Emily Carr (1871-1945), as it was reprinted eight years later, in 1987, a fact that might tell us about the author's failure to "provide ... a fuller appreciation of [Carr's] dimension as an artist than now exists." (11) Or could we say the time it took to reprint was based on factors other than a lack of public interest, if indeed that's how we measure pubic interest -- through sales?
Those familiar with the monograph will recall its "Epilogue", where Shadbolt compares and contrasts Carr's career with that other non-Group of Seven member, Tom Thomson, who waited until his mid-30s to pursue painting more seriously -- after years of working as a commercial artist. Carr, for her part, knew early on what she wanted, but as Shadbolt writes, "at the age of 41 [after her first exhibition of paintings, and earlier trips to Post-Impressionist France]... something was not mixing properly in the complex chemistry of hand, eye, head and heart, and for almost a decade and a half, her art, while kept alive, went nowhere." (195)
Doris Shadbolt was, lest we forget, a curator, first, but a critic second or and art historian? Does it matter? It doesn't. We no longer write as Doris did, because today everywhere is "nowhere," and there is no need. Nor does anyone paint (pictures of) totem poles anymore. I'm not even sure people photograph them, unless as documentation, as one would a sculpture.
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