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176 left history Lenin's ability to persuade the party to aban- entire program has been, or will be, on display don its traditional commitment to bourgeois at five different galleries or museums in dif- revolution in favour of soviet power and pro- ferent parts of Canada over the course of the letarian dictatorship that underlay Bolshevik next year. The Crisis ofAbstraction in Canada political success in 1917. It was this that per- is, in other words, not a simple exhibition but mitted the Bolsheviks to formulate radical rather, a serious endeavour in public history positions in favour of workers' control, land which merits the serious attention of Canadian reform and peace that eventually won over the cultural historians. mass of the popular classes. Le Blanc under- This exhibition takes as its central theme estimates both the extent of this programmatic the concept of crisis. This crisis was not, how- shift and its political impact. Yet, without a ever, triggered by political or economic devel- new program the Bolsheviks would probably opments. Instead, in the extended historical have finished up as arelatively well organized introduction to the catalogue, Leclerc argues but politically impotent party, unable to lead that the crisis of Canadian art in the 1950s was an insurrection and eventually swept away structured largely by the internal efforts of with the rest of the left by a right wing dicta- Canadian artists to respond to the interna- torship. tional challenge to established artistic prac- On the balance, though, Le Blanc has tices raised by abstract art in general, and in made an important contribution to our under- particular American abstract expressionism. standing of Leninism and Bolshevism. Not The crisis emerged as a variety of different only has he read his Lenin, but he has also artists in a series of different locations wres- achieved an impressive mastery of the secon- tled with the impact of abstraction on their dary historical literature. This he deploys in a own artistic ideals and practices. This intellec- highly readable and critical fashion to relate tual wrestling began as a movement away the development of Lenin's organizational from figurative art. But, once severed from its theory to its social and political context. The established moorings, Canadian art entered a result is a fine work of historical synthesis, of period of rapid experimentation as artists great use both to historians of socialism and moved onto qualitatively new aesthetic to activists. ground. In short order artists began to use a variety of new materials, experimented with a Mark A. Gabbert broad array of new styles of painting and University of Manitoba sculpting, transgressed the boundaries defin- ing different types of art, and attempted to Denise Leclerc, The Crisis of Abstrac- establish new aesthetic standards. The result, tion in Canada: The 1950s (Ottawa: according to Leclerc, was both aradical break The National Gallery of Canada with previous aesthetic canons and a vibrant 1992). period of artistic development within which artists such as Jean-Paul Riopelle, Guido To be clear from the start: The Crisis of Ab- Molinari, The Painters Eleven, The Regina straction in Canada: The 1950s is an impres- Five, and Jack Shadbolt moved to the fore- sive undertaking. Denise Leclerc, assistant front of Canadian art. curator of later Canadian art at the National The story which is here being told through Gallery of Canada (NGC), and the staff of the these diverse media is, then, a story of the NGC, have assembled a multi-media produc- transformation of Canadian art and, ultimate- tion. The 158 paintings and sculptures in this ly, of the triumph of abstraction. This story exhibition (representative of 62 artists who develops differently in different parts of Can- lived in seven different urban centres across ada. For example: in Montreal, the Plasticien Canada) are complemented by the presenta- movement emerged in opposition to the radi- tion of someof Molinari's original manuscript cal, surrealist impulses of automatisme and musings on Plasticisme, a short video, a re- the discourse of Refus Global constructed in corded audio commentary, and a well-docu- the 1940s by Paul-Emile Borduas and his mented, finely-written catalogue which also followers. In Toronto, painters such as Jack contains an extended technical essay by NGC Bush and Harold Town moved in a process of art conservationist Marion H. Barclay. The critical interaction with American artistic de- Reviews 177 velopments and against the residue of the other historians and truly does fall outside the ideals of the Group of Seven. And finally, in parameters of this presentation. In particular, the Canadian West, Leclerc explores the inter- the central question here is why we should action between the state institutions (espe- accept The Crisis ofAbstraction in Canada on cially universities), American influences, and its own terms. the western environment to argue for a unique The narrative which is presented does not western approach to abstracted landscape. rely on a mechanistic conceptual framework. And it is a story which is told in an innovative In situating the artists at the centre of her and effective manner. Leclerc's introductory narrative, Leclerc avoids falling into any form essay combines elements of traditional art of reductionism that would establish a mecha- historical writing (with its emphasis on stylis- nistic relationship between social and artistic tic analysis, quality, and the internal develop- developments. This is an effective heuristic ment of art) with a serious effort to style which tells us much about the interaction comprehend the larger historical context. She between individual artists and their historical rightly establishes the artists themselves as the situation and the effect of this interaction on centre of her narrative, but is also sensitive to art. The difficulty here is not with method, but the interaction between artists and the broader rather the way in which this method is em- historical situation. Exhibition material ex- ployed. In limiting the focus to abstraction in plains carefully the importance of develop- the 1950s an artificial time-frame is created. ments in painting materials and the This point Leclerc readily acknowledges. It is significance of economic advancement, the this artificial time-frame that creates the nar- rise of consumer culture, American interna- rative theme from which the title of the exhi- tional hegemony, population growth and the bition is taken. In constructing the narrative changing role of the state in the promotion of on the basis of this conceptual abstraction, culture in Canada. In short, the historical con- however, another, potentially more important text within which this exhibition is set is what narrative has been obscured. Leclerc sees as the final consolidation of a In her historical analysis Leclerc is quite truly modem society, the artistic counterpart clear that she is tracing the evolution of totally of which is abstraction. modem art, defined as non-figurative abstrac- Taken on its own terms this exhibition can tion, in Canada. Yet little time is expended only be considered a success. The compli- addressing the philosophical questions which cated and multi-faceted nature of this exhibi- impelled modem Canadian artists of the pre- tion make it a presentation not to be taken history of abstraction -the 1930s and 1940s lightly. To explore the full scope of this pro- - away from academic and romantic land- duction can be a demanding exercise. The scape modes of painting in the first place. exact meaning of The Crisis of Abstraction in What Leclerc leaves us with, then, is a group Canada truly emerges only through the com- of artists who are entirely concerned with art. posite effort of the various media involved in Larger social or cultural questions receive the presentation of this exhibition. For those scant attention. Yet recent research into who wish to engage the program on this level, French Canadian automatisme, the socialistic theeffort has its rewards. It will also, however, Progressive Arts Clubs, and the art criticism raise issues which require attention. For ex- of such influential intellectuals as Walter A- ample, Atlantic Canadian historians may not bell (a leading force in the establishment of be happy with the lack of consideration of this the Maritime Art Association, founding editor region in the exhibition. But, to be fair, Le- of Canadian Art and its antecedent Maritime clerc demonstrates a sensitivity to regional Art, and akey participant in the 1941 Kingston differences and the relative absence in this Conference) indicates that wider cultural, so- exhibition of Atlantic Canadian artists may cial and political issues were clearly on the indeed reflect this historical record. This ab- artistic agendain the 1930s and 1940s and that sence does suggest important questions about artists saw their art as intricately connected to the Atlantic Canadian artistic response to mo- some form of broadly defined progressive demity which is currently being studied by politics designed to alleviate or to resolve the 178 left history perceived contradictions of Canadian rnoder- sive nature of this presentation. The Crisis of nity. Tying all this together was a fairly sophis- Abstraction in Canada is a fine exhibition. ticated critique of the social and economic Canadian cultural historians should take it as condition of the artist in modern society. a cue to begin a more concerted examination What happened to this broader cultural of the political and philosophical history of critique which infused the arts in the period modern art in Canada. just before the 1950s? Easy answers to this question are not readily available but some Andrew Nurse possible lines of enquiry have been suggested Queen's University by Serge Guilbeault in How New York Stole the Idea of Modern Art, his compelling study Cathy Schwichtenberg, ed., The Ma- of the historical development of non-figura- donna Connection: Representational tive abstraction in the United States.

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