Emily Carr’s life was a remarkable journey from a privileged Victorian childhood in Victoria to becoming one of Canada’s most distinctive painters and writers. Born in 1871, she studied art in San Francisco, London and Paris before travelling throughout British Columbia, where the forests, landscapes and Indigenous communities profoundly influenced her work. Recognition came slowly. After her ambitious 1913 Vancouver exhibition, Carr withdrew from the art world for more than a decade,…

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The relationship between Emily Carr and the BC Archives actually predates the building on Belleville Street by many decades. The provincial archives traces its origins to 1894, when librarian R.E. Gosnell began actively collecting records documenting British Columbia’s early history. The Provincial Archives was formally established in 1908 and opened to the public in 1920. By 1970, its collections had outgrown the Provincial Library, and the Archives moved into its purpose-built facility…

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The relationship between Max Stern and E. J. Hughes was one of the most consequential dealer–artist partnerships in Canadian art. Stern did much more than sell Hughes’s paintings like he did for Emily Carr. Instead he provided Hughes with the unusual security that allowed him to remain a private, almost reclusive artist on Vancouver Island while Stern built his reputation nationally. Read more: Chronology of Emily Carr (1871–1945)…

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