Low Down Articles
Artist Profiles - Robert Hyndman
Article 30 of 73
From the book Artists of the Gatineau Hill by Catherine Joyce. This article first appeared in the "Artist Profiles" column in the September 28, 2005 issue of the The Low Down to Hull and Back News.
Reprinted with permission. Search complete list of Low Down Articles.
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Living by his Paintbrush
In 1930, at the age of 15, Robert Hyndman was already passionate about art. Asked by his stern father, newly appointed judge of the Canadian Court of Pension Appeal, "How do you expect to eat?" he replied simply, "I don't know."
Today, at the age of 92, Robert Hyndman is still a self-employed artist. Every day he paints in his studio on Old Chelsea Road. And twice a week he teaches figurative drawing and landscape at the Ottawa School of Art.
"I have never sat behind a desk for five minutes. I know you're taking a terrible chance in giving your whole life to art but I have been very lucky. All good things have come to me through my painting. Even the war - it gave me my start as a portrait painter."
The early years set up the contrast between security and daring that would shape his life. From the requisite but miserable years at Ashbury College in Ottawa, Robert went on to Toronto's Central Technical Art School. "It was a revelation. I knew I had found my path in life. I learned so much. I am not an academic. I need to see things with my own eye. I need to feel with my paintbrush."
He was young. The world was opening up. Europe called, as it beckoned to so many of his peers. Travel and further studies at the Central School of Arts and Crafts in London, England, expanded his vision and his life. Then the war broke out. Chaos and trauma awaited him. By 1943 he was flying Spitfires over the English Channel.
"In a year and a half I flew 150 missions over France. I saw my squadron leader blown to pieces in front of me. My nerves were shot. I was not a born fighter."
In September 1944 he got the call to become an Official War Artist. Back in London, he produced 68 war paintings, most of them portraits of Canadian senior commanders and fighter aces in the RCAF. Two of them are now on permanent display at the new Canadian War Museum.
Love of the human face has defined Robert's art. "I was very influenced by Augustus John, the Welsh portrait painter. He changed my life. We met at his country place - he was almost 80 and I, 27. We talked. There was some magic in his paintings, not just skill but some deep feeling, some understanding of the human soul. Seeing his work and meeting him kept me going in the world of portraiture.
"I ignored abstraction. It didn't mean anything to me - it was just amusing colours and shapes. But a human face - ah, there's the challenge. It's very difficult to create a good portrait. If an artist can capture a likeness - that magic moment when you see 'him' or 'her' coming off the canvas - you must stop. Not another brush stroke. You've got the magic right there. It's not about the drapery. It's not about creating a scene - that's all glorification. It's about the magic of the human face. That is hard. Yet that is what I wanted to spend my life doing."
And to this day, he has.