Thomas (Tom) John Thomson 1877 - 1917

Masters Gallery, Vancouver

Roberts Gallery, Toronto

Private Collection, Toronto

Vancouver, Canadian Painting, Vancouver Art Gallery, 1970, no. 2 where it remained on an extended loan.

This work has been viewed under UV and it is in excellent condition. A panel reinforcement on verso with four wooden buttons. Under UV a faint line is visible in the area of the recto reinforcement of the fissure. We would like to thank "In Restauro Conservart Inc." for examing this painting and their original notes are available upon request to Sotheby's.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING CONDITION OF A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF SALE PRINTED IN THE CATALOGUE.

The range of subject, mood and technique that Thomson marshalled in his three-hundred-odd small oil sketches between 1913 and 1917 was almost infinite. Not only does he mark the changing of the seasons, the endless varieties of landscape, the anecdotal record of lumbering, fishing and camping, he also shifts effortlessly from sunsets to nocturnes, from misty days to brilliant autumn days, from detailed close-up studies of flowers to immense vistas. Amidst these multitudinous possibilities one occasionally finds a gem like this one - a painting whose virtues lie more in its remarkable structure than in flashy colours or sumptuous subjects. Here, Thomson confronts us with a fairly ordinary, mundane corner of the wood. What lifts this painting up so forcibly are two things: the blunt and powerful composition and the bravura handling of the pigment.

The composition is what strikes one first. The bold, insistent bands that mark the sky (which in itself has both blue sky and cloud bands), the almost Prussian blue of the distant hills, the mid-distance band of silhouetted chocolate trees (against which are set five black sentinels), and the tawny foreground, which leads us into the picture and compresses the middle against the band of the sky.

The spectacular way Thomson has executed this scene is also masterful. He has squeezed the relatively flat middle section between two extremes of long, thick brushstrokes in the sky at the top and in the scumbled and highlighted foreground. This device gives the painting a dramatic textural contrast. Knitting the stacked bands together are the leafless trees that also provide the only vertical elements of the picture.

Thomson's small oil sketches constitute one of the great achievements in Canadian art. This was something recognized immediately by Lawren Harris, J.E.H. MacDonald and all the members of the Group of Seven, who joined together to promote and extend the lead that Thomson had set before them. Each and every panel from these magical years is a part of Thomson's legacy and each contributes in some significant way to the whole. This remarkable painting is no exception. As Harold Town once noted, "perhaps Thomson was in touch with the zeitgeist of the times and, like Harris and others, on his way to abstraction".