D ELI GHT S| THE ART WORLD
Portraits of Canada
I Peter Simpson
Note: Given the continuing uncertainty of public-health lockdowns, be sure to check with museums and galleries before visiting, as dates listed here could change.
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t’s been a long time coming,” sang the Tragically Hip’s Gord Downie, “it’s well worth the wait.” It seems appropriate to use the Tragically Hip — a band that wrote lyrical portraits of Canadian life — to introduce the Portrait Gallery of Canada, which truly has been a long time coming. Now, with its first exhibitions, we start to see what we’ve been waiting for. The Portrait Gallery spent its early years as a political football, firstly booted downfield by the Chrétien Liberals in 2001, then grabbed by the Harper Conservatives and carried around the field in a series of erratic moves that pleased the
base, but accomplished nothing else. By 2009, the idea was dead, or at least comatose. The death of art by partisan antics left many people disgusted, and a couple of years ago a group of private citizens — led by lawyer and Ottawa Art Gallery chairman Lawson Hunter — resurrected the idea, albeit much changed from the original. Prime minister Jean Chrétien had promised the former United States Embassy building on Wellington Street, but in 2021, the privately funded, not-forprofit gallery organization says that “no site has been identified.” However, the gallery says on its website, “Our plan is to SUMMER 2021 | JUL-AUG-SEPT
BEYOND VAN GOGH
Visitors will virtually be swimming in the paintings of Vincent van Gogh in this immersive digital production by Montreal’s Normal Studios, and presented by RBC and Ottawa Bluesfest at Lansdowne Park.
