Low Down Articles
Artist Profiles - Ed Robinson
Article 56 of 73
From the book Artists of the Gatineau Hill by Catherine Joyce. This article first appeared in the "Artist Profiles" column in the December 6, 2006 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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Painting the History of the Hills
You may remember seeing Ed Robinson in his jeep heading into the Hills with his golden retrievers to hike the landscape that feeds his art. He has lived here for nineteen years, painting the enduring beauty of the area and celebrating its history. A recent show at Galerie Old Chelsea, entitled "Chelsea Pages", captures this sense of interwoven memories, steeped in the past yet still vitally alive today.
"This show is really about gratitude for the Hills filling my daily pages with beautiful memories. "Chelsea Pages" represents my life up here, my way of giving back all that this place has givtm to me.
Born in Montreal, Ed grew up in Almonte in a family of five where he possessed the lone artistic temperament. Although it would be years before he began to paint, he was fortunate enough in the 1970s to have met well known Canadian artists, Henri Masson, Stanley Cosgrove and Philip Surrey, and more currently to have become good friends with Robert McInnis and David Alexander. Through reading and conversation he became deeply influenced by these artists and passionate about art.
Retired for 11 years, Ed worked 30 for Bell Canada in every capacity from engineering to marketing. "The thing is that painting lasts. For all those very fine years I worked at Bell, it is the people and relationships I remember best. There are not too many marketing plans gracing coffee tables but with painting there is a lasting joy that you can share with others."
For a brief time Ed studied at the Ottawa School of Art in the evenings, taking figurative and landscape courses that laid the foundation for his own exploration.
"We all begin with the Group of Seven and then we branch out. I became fascinated by the work of David Milne. I liked his minimalist style and his monochromatic use of colour. In my own work I underpaint with raw sienna and then I sketch on top, allowing the underpaint to show through. It's like a veil that lets the painting breathe.
"I am also influenced by the Impressionists. I like the sketchiness and looseness of their painting where they achieve effects with minimal brush strokes. Of late I have been finishing some of my paintings with a liquid mixture of beewax and resin which gives texture and relief to the oil paint."
In 2000 Ed began to look into the history of the Gatineau as a way of incorporating structural historical elements into his landscape paintings. With the help of Adrienne Herron and the image bank of the Historical Society of the Gatineau, he was able to find photos of old inns, hotels and railway stations up and down the line. He painted his first Chelsea Station in 2003 as part of his historic series on the Gatineau.
"The stations around the turn of the century were very light in colour, all yellow with burgundy trim. Then, in the 1930s, to save on upkeep, they were sided with brick. Chelsea Station was torn down in 1970 but up in Venosta I found the Holy Grail of stations, an exact replica of Chelsea's, with some of the original colours still remaining."
Documenting the history of the area has opened doors. In hiking the Hills and talking to people, Ed gathers stories that enrich his art and feed his passion for painting. "Reworking a summer sketch from a hike with my dogs becomes a mini holiday in the dead of winter. You're likely to find a golden retriever hair in my oil paint as a little reminder of a great day".