Ivan Kenneth Eyre (15 April 1935 – 5 November 2022) was a Canadian artist best known for his

prairie Prairies are ecosystems considered part of the temperate grasslands, savannas, and shrublands biome by ecologists, based on similar temperate climates, moderate rainfall, and a composition of grasses, herbs, and shrubs, rather than trees, as the ...

landscapes and compositionally abstract, figurative paintings. In addition, Eyre was a

Professor Emeritus ''Emeritus/Emerita'' () is an honorary title granted to someone who retirement, retires from a position of distinction, most commonly an academic faculty position, but is allowed to continue using the previous title, as in "professor emeritus". ...

of painting and drawing at the

University of Manitoba The University of Manitoba (U of M, UManitoba, or UM) is a public research university in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. Founded in 1877, it is the first university of Western Canada. Both by total student enrolment and campus area, the University of ...

where he taught for 33 years, from 1959 until his retirement in 1992. He has been described as a "visual philosopher" and "a true outsider and visionary". Ivan Eyre's paintings and drawings have been exhibited internationally and are featured in numerous galleries across Canada. His sculptures are prominently displayed at

Assiniboine Park Assiniboine Park (formerly known as City Park) is a park in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, located along the Assiniboine River. The Winnipeg Public Parks Board was formed in 1893, and purchased the initial land for the park in 1904. Although in use ...

and the McMichael sculpture garden in Kleinburg, Ontario.

Biography

Ivan Eyre was born to Thomas and Katie Eyre in Tullymet, Saskatchewan, in 1935. Eyre began school at the age of five, during which time his family relocated twice: first to Southey in 1940, then again to

Ituna Ituna () is a town in Saskatchewan, Canada. In 2006, it had a population of 622. It is north-east of the capital Regina. The town contains several businesses serving the local residents and rural community, including financial services, gr ...

in 1941. Shortly thereafter, Katie and her three children left their rural environment and moved to urban Saskatoon while Thomas Eyre worked abroad as an Air Force electrician. Eyre developed an artistic interest at an early age. At the age of 15, while still a high school student, he began taking after-school art lessons at the Saskatoon Technical Collegiate where he studied under

Ernest Lindner Ernst Friedrich Lindner LL. D. (1 May 1897 – 4 November 1988) was an Austrian-born Canadian painter. He moved to Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, in 1926, where became a self-taught commercial artist. He soon was recognized locally and then nationally ...

for the duration of 1950–1953. According to Eyre: "Knowing that there was somebody seriously committed to art, somebody who had made it his life's work, was encouraging. indner'sinfluence in this regard was important." Eyre went on to attend evening classes at the

University of Saskatchewan The University of Saskatchewan (U of S, or USask) is a Universities in Canada, Canadian public university, public research university, founded on March 19, 1907, and located on the east side of the South Saskatchewan River in Saskatoon, Saskatch ...

which were taught by

Eli Bornstein Eli Bornstein (born December 28, 1922) is an American-born Canadian artist and teacher who has spent most of his life in Saskatchewan, Canada. He is known for his contributions to abstract art in Canada through his creation of three-dimensional ...

in his final year of high school. In 1953, Eyre moved to

Winnipeg Winnipeg () is the capital and largest city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Manitoba. It is centred on the confluence of the Red River of the North, Red and Assiniboine River, Assiniboine rivers. , Winnipeg h ...

where he attended the

School of Art, graduating in 1957 with a BA in fine arts. In his autobiography, Eyre reminisces about the tutelage of his professors and class trips to the

Chicago Art Institute The Art Institute of Chicago, founded in 1879, is one of the oldest and largest art museums in the United States. The museum is based in the Art Institute of Chicago Building in Chicago's Grant Park. Its collection, stewarded by 11 curatoria ...

. He was a pupil of artists

Wynona Mulcaster Wynona Croft Mulcaster (April 10, 1915 – August 25, 2016) was a Canadian painter and teacher from Saskatchewan, best known for her prairie landscapes. She also played an important role in developing horse show, competitive riding in Saskatoo ...

and George Swinton. During his schooling as an undergraduate, Eyre exhibited several works at the

Winnipeg Art Gallery The Winnipeg Art Gallery (WAG) is an art museum in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. Its permanent collection includes over 24,000 works from Canadian, Indigenous Canadian, and international artists. The museum also holds the world's largest collect ...

, winning the attention and support of then gallery director, Ferdinand Eckhardt. Eyre received the Winnipeg Art Gallery Scholarship for his achievements in 1956. Around the time of his graduation, he married Brenda Yvonne Fenske, a peer student at the university. Eyre continued on to the

University of North Dakota The University of North Dakota (UND) is a Public university, public research university in Grand Forks, North Dakota, United States. It was established by the Dakota Territory, Dakota Territorial Assembly in 1883, six years before the establishm ...

Grand Forks Grand Forks is a city in and the county seat of Grand Forks County, North Dakota, United States. The city's population was 59,166 as of the 2020 census, making it the third-most populous city in the state, after Fargo and Bismarck. Grand For ...

, in 1958–59 as a master's candidate where he both studied and taught as a graduate assistant. He completed several sculptural projects, among them his "first wooden head" which is currently stored in a private collection in Ottawa. The American art scene was in full swing and Eyre's paintings became open to influences from such artists like

Willem de Kooning Willem de Kooning ( , ; April 24, 1904 – March 19, 1997) was a Dutch-American abstract expressionist artist. Born in Rotterdam, in the Netherlands, he moved to the United States in 1926, becoming a US citizen in 1962. In 1943, he married pa ...

Arshile Gorky Arshile Gorky ( ; born Vostanik Manoug Adoian, ; April 15, 1904 – July 21, 1948) was an Armenian Americans, Armenian-American painter who had a seminal influence on Abstract Expressionism. He spent the last years of his life as a national of the ...

Joan Miró Joan Miró i Ferrà ( , ; ; 20 April 1893 – 25 December 1983) was a Catalan Spanish painter, sculptor and Ceramic art, ceramist. A museum dedicated to his work, the Fundació Joan Miró, was established in his native city of Barcelona ...

, and

Max Beckmann Max Carl Friedrich Beckmann (February 12, 1884 – December 27, 1950) was a German painter, drawing, draftsman, printmaker, sculpture, sculptor, and writer. Although he is classified as an Expressionist artist, he rejected both the term and the m ...

Professorship

Due to financial difficulties, Eyre and his wife returned to Winnipeg in 1959 where he was hired on a part-time basis by the

's School of Art. For one year, Eyre taught painting and drawing to students in Brandon and

Neepawa Neepawa () is a town in Manitoba, Canada, on the Yellowhead Highway at the intersection with Highway 5. its population was 5,685. Neepawa was incorporated as a town in 1883. Located in western Manitoba, it is bordered by the Municipality of No ...

as part of the university's extension course program. In 1960, Eyre became a full-time instructor, a position he would hold until his retirement in 1992. Eyre began developing his individualistic style during this period. Eyre remembers that around 1960–1962, "I began to reevaluate my work and decided to begin afresh....I worked at ridding myself of all influences." In 1966, the

Canada Council The Canada Council for the Arts (), commonly called the Canada Council, is a Crown corporations of Canada, Crown corporation established in 1957 as an arts council of the Government of Canada. It is Canada's public arts funder, with a mandate to ...

provided Eyre with a Canada Council Senior Arts Grant which allowed him and his family to spend a year and four months in Europe. Upon his return, Eyre wrote a report for the Canada Council of his experiences, criticizing "what was, for the most part, being hailed in the major centres as 'breakthroughs' in paintings." At Eckhardt's recommendation, Eyre's work was selected for an exhibition at the ''Frankfurter Kunstkabinett'' in 1973 and entered the German art world with great success.

Work

Working primarily in oil and acrylic mediums, Eyre's figurative paintings and still lifes tend to be spatially complex, his landscapes large and panoramic. Canadian art historian

Joan Murray Joan Murray (born August 6, 1945) is an American poet, writer, playwright and editor. She is best known for her narrative poems, particularly her book-length novel-in-verse, ''Queen of the Mist''; her collection ''Looking for the Parade'' which ...

commented on the expressiveness of Eyre's work, noting that Eyre's corpus reflects the artist's imagination, memories, and perceptions of the world. Eyre's subjects and approaches are versatile and prone to mutability. Murray also claimed that Eyre's art "has, to a degree unusual in Canadian art: a pervading sense of stillness and calm." James D. Campbell remarked on Eyre's "existential sensibility" by pointing to the dark and violent undercurrents in Eyre's thematic reinterpretations of the world. About the paintings emanating an unsettling quality, Eyre said: "...underneath the surface ...there is still that mood underground...I'm trying to make a better painting, and by that I mean a painting that will satisfy as many levels of experience as possible". Eyre rejects the notion of "schools" or "movements", whether coined as such by art historians or artists. Prioritizing the concept of artist-as-individual-creator above all else, Eyre has criticized movements such as the ''avant garde'' for restricting the creative capabilities of artists who fall under their umbrella and binding their adherents to a specific style or direction. In 1974, the Winnipeg Art Gallery purchased Eyre's 1973 painting ''Tanglewood'' for a record-breaking price never before paid for the work of a Manitoba artist. Today, a typical Eyre painting has an auction value of approximately $30,000 to upwards of $300,000.

Ivan Eyre Gallery

The third floor of the

pavilion museum in Winnipeg, Manitoba is named for Ivan Eyre who is one of several Manitoban artists (including Walter J. Phillips and Clarence Tillenius) honored and exhibited at the pavilion. The ''WAG @ The Park'' initiative launched in fall of 2016 upon completion of renovations due to moisture and roof leaks. In collaboration with the Assiniboine conservancy, the Winnipeg Art Gallery agreed to curate free exhibitions in the revamped space using only works by Eyre, Phillips, and Tillenius. The Assiniboine Park conservancy houses Canada's largest collection of Eyre's art, made possible by Eyre's donation of 200 paintings, 5000 drawings, and 16 sculptures to the park. The current exhibition is titled "Wasteland Dreamland: Early Works by Ivan Eyre, 1957-1969."

Honours

* 1974:

Royal Canadian Academy of Arts The Royal Canadian Academy of Arts (RCA) is a Canadian arts-related organization that was founded in 1880. History 1880 to 1890 The title of Royal Canadian Academy of Arts was received from Victoria of the United Kingdom, Queen Victoria on 16 ...

, elected member elect * 1977: Queen's Silver Jubilee medal * 1982: University of Manitoba Alumni Jubilee award * 2002: Queen's Golden Jubilee Medal * 2007:

Order of Manitoba The Order of Manitoba is a civilian honour for merit in the Canadian province of Manitoba. Instituted in 1999 when Lieutenant Governor Peter Liba granted royal assent to the ''Order of Manitoba Act'', the order is administered by the Governor-in ...

* 2008: honorary Doctor of Laws from the University of Manitoba * 2015:

Order of Canada The Order of Canada () is a Canadian state order, national order and the second-highest Award, honour for merit in the system of orders, decorations, and medals of Canada, after the Order of Merit. To coincide with the Canadian Centennial, ce ...

with the grade of member

List of solo exhibitions

* 1962: The University of Manitoba, Winnipeg. ''Ivan Eyre Drawings'' (c. 5 December) * 1964: The University of Manitoba, Winnipeg. '' ne-artist' (1964) * 1964: The

Montreal Museum of Fine Arts The Montreal Museum of Fine Arts (MMFA) is an art museum in Montreal, Quebec, Canada. It is the largest art museum in Canada by gallery space. The museum is located on the historic Golden Square Mile stretch of Sherbrooke Street west. The MMFA ...

. '' ne-artist' (–8 March) * 1964: The Winnipeg Art Gallery. ''Ivan Eyre'' * 1965: Fleet Gallery, Winnipeg. ''Ivan Eyre'' (–23 February) * 1965: Albert White Galleries, Toronto. ''Ivan Eyre, Winnipeg'' (c. 17 April – 4 May) * 1966: Yellow Door Gallery, Winnipeg. '' ne-artist' * 1966: The Winnipeg Art Gallery. ''Ivan Eyre Drawings'' (27 September – 16 October) * 1967: Atelier Vincitore Gallery,

Brighton Brighton ( ) is a seaside resort in the city status in the United Kingdom, city of Brighton and Hove, East Sussex, England, south of London. Archaeological evidence of settlement in the area dates back to the Bronze Age Britain, Bronze Age, R ...

, England. ''Painting, Sculpture, Drawing by Ivan Eyre'' (27 January – 11 February) * 1968: Mendel Art Gallery, Saskatoon. ''Ivan Eyre'' (20 February – 25 March) * 1969: The Morris Gallery, Toronto. '' ne-artist' (Spring) * 1969: Fleet Gallery, Winnipeg. '' ne-artist' (c. 1 May) * 1971: The Morris Gallery, Toronto. ''Ivan Eyre, New Paintings and Sculpture'' (27 February – 13 March) * 1973–1974: Frankfurter Kunstkabinett, West Germany. ''Ivan Eyre'' * 1973: Burnaby Art Gallery. ''Ivan Eyre: Sculpture, Paintings, Drawings'' (2–27 May) * 1973: The Morris Gallery, Toronto. ''Ivan Eyre'' (5–19 May) * 1973: Art Gallery of Greater Victoria. ''Drawings by Ivan Eyre'' (8 May – 3 June) * 1973: McIntosh Gallery,

The University of Western Ontario The University of Western Ontario (UWO; branded as Western University) is a public research university in London, Ontario, Canada. The main campus is located on of land, surrounded by residential neighbourhoods and the Thames River bisecting t ...

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

. ''Ivan Eyre'' (17 October – 18 November) * 1974: The Winnipeg Art Gallery. ''Ivan Eyre: Recent Paintings and Sculpture'' (c. 21 March – 9 June) * 1976: Playhouse Theatre, Fredericton/New Brunswick Museum, Saint John. ''Ivan Eyre, paintings'' (18–31 October, 5 –26 November) * 1976: Gallery 111, School of Art, The University of Manitoba. ''Ivan Eyre: Recent Paintings and Sculpture'' (c. 21 March – 9 June) * 1978: The National Gallery of Canada. ''Ivan Eyre Drawings'' * 1979: Mira Godard Gallery, Calgary. ''Ivan Eyre'' (26 October – 17 November) * 2017: The Winnipeg Art Gallery. ''Ivan Eyre: Landscapes and Still Lifes'' (15 September – 29 October)

Posthumous exhibitions

* 2023: Winnipeg Art Gallery, ''The Idea of Trees: Ivan Eyre" (Nov 26, 2022 - Jun 3, 2023).

Record sale prices

At the Heffel Auction, Post-War & Contemporary Art, November 20, 2024, LOT 010, ''High Valley'', acrylic on canvas, 48 x 48 in, 121.9 x 121.9 cm, Estimate: $50,000 - $70,000 CAD, Sold for: $325,250 (including Buyer's Premium).

Notes

References

* Balkind, A., Bringhurst. R. (1983). Visions: Contemporary art in Canada. Vancouver, B.C.: Douglas & McIntyre Ltd. * Bovey, Patricia E., and Ivan Eyre. Ivan Eyre, Drawings, 1965–1981 : 15 April – 15 June 1982. Victoria, B.C.: Art Gallery of Greater Victoria, 1982. * Campbell, James D., Ivan Eyre, and Andrew Oko. Masks & Shadows : The Art of Ivan Eyre. Regina:

Mackenzie Art Gallery The MacKenzie Art Gallery (MAG; ) is an art museum located in Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada. The museum occupies the multipurpose T. C. Douglas Building, situated at the edge of the Wascana Centre. The building holds eight galleries totaling to of ...

, 1996. * ---. Masks & Shadows : The Art of Ivan Eyre. Regina: Mackenzie Art Gallery, 1996. * * Eyre, Ivan, and Helen Coy. Recent Paintings & Drawings. [Winnipeg: Gallery 111, 1976. * Eyre, Ivan. Ivan Eyre : Recent Paintings and Sculpture : A Winnipeg Centennial Exhibition, the Winnipeg Art Gallery – 1974. Winnipeg: The Gallery, 1974. * ---. Ivan Eyre : The Winnipeg Art Gallery, 18 Dec. 1969 – 18 Jan. 1970. [Winnipeg?: s.n., 1969. * Heath, Terrence, and Ivan Eyre. Ivan Eyre : Personal Mythologies. Winnipeg: Winnipeg Art Gallery, 1988. * Murray, Joan, and Ivan Eyre. Ivan Eyre : Exposition. Oshawa, [Ont.]: Robert McLaughlin Gallery, 1980. * Murray, Joan. Ivan Eyre : Exposition. Oshawa, Ont.: Robert McLaughlin Gallery, 1980. * Winnipeg, Man Art Gallery, I. Eyre, and T. Heath. Ivan Eyre – Personal Mythologies. 1988:, 1988. * Winnipeg, Man Art Gallery. Ivan Eyre. 1969:, 1969. * ---. Ivan Eyre: Recent Paintings and Sculpture. 1974:, 1974. * Woodcock, George, and Ivan Eyre. Ivan Eyre. Don Mills, Ont: Fitzhenny & Whiteside, 1981. * Woodcock, George. Ivan Eyre. Don Mills, Canada: Fitzhenry & Whiteside, 1981. * ---. Ivan Eyre. Don Mills, Ont.: Fitzhenry & Whiteside, 1981.

External links

National Gallery of Canada

MacKenzie Art Gallery

{{DEFAULTSORT:Eyre, Ivan 1935 births 2022 deaths Members of the Order of Manitoba 20th-century Canadian painters Canadian male painters 21st-century Canadian painters University of Manitoba alumni University of North Dakota alumni Artists from Saskatchewan Sculptors from Saskatchewan Artists from Winnipeg Sculptors from Manitoba Members of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts Members of the Order of Canada 20th-century Canadian male artists 21st-century Canadian male artists