Spanish Banks Looking Toward the City

Spanish Banks Looking Toward the City, 1983. Pastel on paper, Lillian Irene Hoffar Reid (1908-1994)

Spanish Banks Looking Toward the City, 1983. Pastel on paper, Lillian Irene Hoffar Reid (1908-1994)

Name/Title

Spanish Banks Looking Toward the City

Entry/Object ID

2016.01.17

Description

Drawing This Impressionistic and light-filled image in Pointillist-like strokes depicts Spanish Banks, a series of beaches in Vancouver, B.C. located along the shores of English Bay beyond Kitsilano in Vancouver's West Point Grey neighbourhood. Attention is paid to the curving sweep of the shoreline and the landscape is carefully depicted in a wide variety of muted colour and linear and sponge-like textures, with the tree foliage signalling autumn.

Artwork Details

Medium

Pastel on paper

Subject

Spanish Banks is located between Locarno Beach to the east and the grounds of the University of British Columbia to the west. Spanish Banks Beach is composed of three distinct sections - east, west, and the extension. With a panoramic vista, you can view the open ocean, the North Shore Mountains, downtown's cityscape or even the Gulf Islands on a clear day. And at low tide you can walk out on the sand flats for over 1.5 km. This drawing was done three years after the completion of the 'Seaside Greenway' in 1980 that is now used by walkers, strollers, and cyclists. This seawall route, initiated in 1971 as a retaining wall is now the world's longest uninterrupted waterfront path. It extends from Coal Harbour, around Stanley Park, through to Sunset Beach, False Creek, over to Granville Island, under the Burrard Bridge, to Vanier Park and through Kitsilano on to Spanish Banks. Of note: The Spanish Banks was named by the Hudson’s Bay Company and later made official in 1859. The Banks were shown in Spanish explorer and cartographer Dionisio Galiano’s maps but not British Captain George Vancouver’s, even though the English and the Spanish were at the Banks at the same time in 1792.

Subject Place

Region

Pacific Northwest

Continent

North America

Made/Created

Artist Information

Artist

Lillian Irene Hoffar Reid (1908-1994)

Role

Artist

Date made

1972

Time Period

20th Century

Notes

ARTIST STATEMENT “In 1928, at the Pacific National Exhibition, I viewed paintings by the Group of Seven. I saw a large painting of a mountain by Lawren Harris and I felt that I had never seen a mountain before. I was influenced by the Group and began to paint larger and more boldly designed canvases.” ARTIST BIOGRAPHY Born in Vancouver, Lillian Irene Hoffar Reid was a celebrated Canadian painter of portraits, murals, and decorative panels, as well as an educator. She attended the newly opened Vancouver School of Decorative and Applied Arts (VSDAA, now Emily Carr University of Art and Design), where she was trained by Jock Macdonald RCA, (1897-1960), Frederick Varley RCA, (1881-1969) and Charles H. Scott (1886-1964), and learned about the famed Canadian Group of Seven. Of note, Scott served as principal from 1926 until 1952 and was key in getting Macdonald and Varley to teach at the school. In 1929, she and 11 of her classmates were the VSDAA's first graduating class. Following her graduation, she helped form the “Pioneer Art Students of the Vancouver Art School’ group that mounted annual exhibits. Reid took sketching trips to the North Vancouver Indian Reservation, Burrard Street Bridge squatter's huts and shorelines around Vancouver. In 1930, she was awarded a scholarship for a year’s study at the Royal Academy, London for a year. Reid first worked in oil, and later focused on drawing in graphite, pastels and painting in watercolours. The subject matter of her paintings shifted as well as domestic life took up more time. However she still managed to make sketching trips such as to the Cariboo, Jervis inlet and Bowen Island. On her return from London, Reid established a studio and became a teacher of drawing and painting at her alma mater (1933-1937). A significant and active member of the Vancouver art community, she was a member of both the British Columbia Society of Artists (1940-1967, and president 1965-1967) and the Canadian Group of Painters (1959-1967, and president in 1958, 1960, and 1966-1967). She showed extensively in solo and group exhibitions in Vancouver, central and western Canada and once in the United States. Reid received the Beatrice Stone Medal at the B.C. Artists' Annual (1940), and the Canadian Centennial Medal for her contribution to the arts in Canada. Her work is represented in a number of private and public collections. Reid and the other women in her graduating class were awarded honorary diplomas in 1989 from the Emily Carr College of Art and Design (previously VSDAA). She died in Sidney, B.C. at age 86.

Inscription/Signature/Marks

Type

Signature, Date

Location

Signed and dated lower right: Irene Hoffar Reid '72

Dimensions

Dimension Description

Support

Height

39.4 cm

Width

58.4 cm

Acquisition

Acquisition Method

Purchase

Date

Dec 8, 2015

Notes

Purchased as "From the Estate of I. H Reid". Lunds Lot #174

Relationships

Related Entries

Notes

By Lillian Irene Hoffar Reid: 2016.01.15 Sidney Spit 2016.01.17 Spanish Banks Looking toward the City 2016.04.09 Princess Louisa Inlet 2016.04.10 Mist: Princess Louisa Inlet