Goodridge Roberts (William Goodridge Roberts)
 
1904-1974

Goodridge Roberts was born in Barbados where his parents were on holiday from Fredericton. In 1914, his father was sent on duty in England, where they lived first at Tidworth and later at Folkestone, before moving to London in 1916. In London, Roberts made frequent visits to the Kensington Gardens. One spring day, after a brief shower of rain, he was struck by the beauty of the scene and felt the desire to record what he saw. From then on, he drew and painted intermittently.
 
Following his father’s work for the army, Roberts’s family moved back to Canada in 1919 where they stayed in Fredericton. For a short while, Roberts attended the Charlotte Street School before the family moved to Ottawa. They spent the summer of 1920 in Kingsmere where Roberts’s urge to paint became very strong. His father retired from the army in the fall of 1920 and they moved back to Fredericton.
 
In 1923, Roberts graduated from the Fredericton High School and the following autumn, he entered the newly opened École des Beaux-Arts in Montreal. He studied there until the spring of 1925, notably under Edmond Dyonnet and Charles Maillard, and won all the prizes during his first year as a student. In early 1925, a visit made to the retrospective exhibition of James W. Morrice left a vivid impression on the young artist.
 
Roberts went to New York in 1926 and studied at the Art Students League under John Sloan, Max Weber and Boardman Robinson. He returned to Fredericton in 1929 where he worked for a year as a draftsman with the provincial forestry service. During this time, he often painted two watercolours or gouaches a day, one before work and another after.
 
In 1930, he moved to Ottawa and worked briefly as a salesman for Fuller Brushes. In 1931, he turned to teaching and opened a summer art school in Wakefield, Quebec. During that year, he exhibited drawings and watercolours for the first time at the Ottawa Art Association and at Lyle Courtney’s.
 
The next year, he spent a rent-free summer tenting on the property of H.O. McCurry, Assistant Director of the National Gallery of Canada. He stayed there until late autumn, painting the ample subjects the property offered. Later that year he had his first one-man show at the Arts Club of Montreal which was organized by fellow Beaux-Arts student Ernst Neumann. At this exhibition, Roberts was introduced to Canadian Artist John Lyman, who gave Roberts his first critical recognition and acquired a work.
 
In 1933, John Lyman invited Roberts to participate in a group exhibition at Henry Morgan & Co. in Montreal. During the summer of this year he stayed in his tent on the outskirts of Ottawa where he painted until he moved to Kingston in September. There, on a grant provided by the Carnegie Foundation, he became first resident artist at Queen’s University. It was also during this year that Roberts got married. In the years that followed, Roberts divided his time between painting, exhibiting and teaching. In 1935 he took the important step of producing his first landscapes in oil, a medium for which he eventually became most well known.
 
After the 1936 spring semester at Queen’s University, Roberts’s contract with the school wasn’t renewed. He was replaced by André Biéler as resident artist, but Roberts felt somehow relieved having more time to paint. He then moved with his wife to Montreal, sharing a studio with his friend Ernst Neumann and opening the Roberts-Neumann School of Art. During this period he painted in Ottawa as well as in the Laurentians and Gatineau areas, and in 1938 he had his first major exhibition at W. Scott and Sons in Montreal with renowned Canadian artist A.Y. Jackson. He had three other exhibitions during this year and also became a charter member of the Eastern Group of Painters.
 
The next year, Roberts exhibited many times and was awarded the Jessie Dow Prize at the Spring Exhibition of the Art Association of Montreal. He also participated at the New York World fair that same year. During that summer and the following one, he painted near St-Jovite in the Laurentians where John Lyman had a cottage. In the autumn, he began teaching at the Art Association of Montreal and did so until 1949, except during his war service from 1943 to 1945. He was a charter member of the Contemporary Art Society and was elected a member of both the Canadian Society of Painters in Water Colour and the Canadian Society of Graphic Art.
 
Over the course of the next few years, Roberts participated in many exhibitions. He showed his works at the Art Association of Montreal, the Contemporary Art Society, the Arts Club of Montreal and at the École des Beaux-Arts in Quebec. By 1942, he was the chief instructor at the Art Association of Montreal. The year of 1943 marked his first financial success when forty-eight of his sixty works were sold at an exhibition at Dominion Gallery in Montreal. Later that year, he enlisted in the Royal Canadian Air Force as a war artist and was soon sent overseas. There, he produced many drawings and water colours for the Canadian War Record. While he was overseas, exhibitions of his works took place in Western Canada, at Collège Brébeuf in Montreal (organised by Jacques De Tonnancour) and at the War Art Exhibition of the National Gallery of London, England. Roberts came back to Canada in 1945 and was discharged two months later. He then spent the summer painting in the Eastern Townships and started teaching again at the Art Association of Montreal in autumn. The following year, he separated from his first wife.
 
Over the next seven years he painted in the areas of Georgian Bay (1947, 1952), the Eastern Townships (1948, 1952), the Laurentians (1949, 1950) and Charlevoix (1950-1951) where he painted with Jean Paul Lemieux and Edmund Alleyn. He also exhibited on numerous occasions and received many honours. In 1946, he represented Canada at the UNESCO Exhibition of International Art, along with fellow Canadian artist Henri Masson. In 1948, he was included in the Canadian Contemporary Painting exhibition held by the Canadian Club of New York and exhibited at the Six Canadian Painters exhibition held in Palm beach, Florida. In 1949, he was awarded the 2nd prize for painting in the Concours Artistiques of the Province of Quebec and was also included in the Forty Years of Canadian Painting exhibition at the Boston Museum of Fine Arts. Still in 1949, he exhibited at the Musée National des Beaux-Arts du Québec and at the National Gallery of Canada (1950) along with Paul-Émile Borduas and Stanley Cosgrove. Later that year he was included in the Painters of Canada exhibition at the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts; in 1950, he participated at the Canadian Painting exhibition organised by the National Gallery of Canada, held at the National Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C. In 1951, he was represented at the Sao Paulo Biennial in Brazil and the year after, he was chosen for Canada’s first participation at the Venice Biennial along with Emily Carr, David Milne and Alfred Pellan. In 1952, he was included in the Carnegie International Exhibition of Contemporary Painting in Pittsburgh, the first Canadian participation in twenty years. It was also during this year that one of his works was presented to her Majesty Queen Elisabeth II. Throughout these years he exhibited annually at the Dominion Gallery in Montreal, and kept doing so until 1956.
 
In the winter of 1953, he did thirty to forty still lifes in his studio. After his father passed away that same winter, he spent a brief period painting self-portraits. Later that year, he was once again represented at the Sao Paulo Biennial in Brazil and was also awarded a Canadian Government overseas fellowship, as was his friend Stanley Cosgrove, for one year of work and study in France. He arrived in Paris in November where he painted still lifes and interior scenes. He later travelled to London, Brussels, Amsterdam, The Hague and Rotterdam. That year he married his second wife and they travelled to Italy where they visited the cities of Florence, Rome, Venice and Padua. Upon their return to France, they moved near St. Raphael on the Côte d’Azur. Roberts returned to Canada in late June of 1954. He returned to Paris briefly in late 1954 to attend a retrospective show of his work held at the Galerie R. Creuze.
 
From late 1954 to 1956, Roberts exhibited abroad often: he was included in the Exhibition of Canadian Painting organized by the National Gallery of Canada that travelled to Sri Lanka, Pakistan and India (1954-1955); in 1955, he took part in an exhibition of Canadian artists organized by the Ontario Government and shown at Fortnum and Mason in England; he was represented at the Carnegie International Exhibition at Pittsburgh ; he exhibited works at the International Exhibition of Paintings at the IV Centennial of Valencia in Spain. During that year he returned to paint at Georgian Bay and did so almost annually until his later years. In 1956, Roberts was elected a member of the Royal Canadian Academy.
 
In 1957, he was awarded his second Jessie Dow Prize at the Spring Exhibition of the Art Association of Montreal. He also won the Junior League Award at the Winnipeg Show that same year. The following year, Roberts was represented at the Inter-American Biennial of Painting in Mexico, and at the Canadian Pavilion at the Brussels International and Universal Exhibition. In 1959, Roberts was presented with the Glazebrook Award for landscape at the National Gallery’s 3rd Biennial of Canadian Art. That year, he became the first resident artist at the University of New Brunswick upon receiving a sponsorship from the Canadian Art Council. For the first time, he painted a series of winter landscapes while in New Brunswick. He worked at the University until 1960, and received an honorary degree upon his leaving. He then went back to Calumet, Quebec, to his summer home he had bought in 1956.
 
From 1960 to 1974, Roberts kept exhibiting at many different venues, notably at the National Gallery of Canada, the Beaverbrook Art Gallery, the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, the Tate Gallery and the Commonwealth Institute in London, England, and at the Canadian Pavilion at Expo 67. He also kept painting in the areas of Georgian Bay, Calumet, Montreal and the Eastern Townships and had many solo exhibitions in private galleries across Canada. In 1969, The National Gallery of Canada held a retrospective show of his work, a rare honour for a living artist. That same year he was made a member of the Order of Canada. He died in Montreal at the age of 69. Following his death, a retrospective show was held at the McMichael Canadian Art Collection in Kleinburg, Ontario. The exhibition also travelled to the Beaverbrook Art Gallery, The Musée National des Beaux-Arts du Québec, the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts and the Museum London.