From Pastels to Chisel: The Changing Role of BC Women Artists ROBERTA J. PAZDRO Women have always been artists, but a modem development of art history has been the virtual denial of their equal capabilities.1 This denial has meant relegation of women to a place within the cultural milieu other than that occupied by men. Language supports this idea: the terms "male artist" or "masculine art" are never used. We simply say "art" and "artist," equating maleness with the standard by which all art is then measured. Modern art history places women artists as the opposite of this standard. So, they are not merely overlooked, but they are used as the negative standard against which male art can be maintained as the positive standard. As Parker and Pollock have noted, the status of one's art work is tied to the status of the maker. 2 Because of women's secondary status in society, their art has been relegated to an inferior place. On the rare occasion when a successful woman artist is recognized by the art history establishment, she is often treated as an exception or a strange phenomenon. The best Canadian example of this is Emily Carr, likely the only nationally known woman artist. It could be argued that many more people know about her lifestyle than those who would be able to recognize her paintings. Her peculiarities have been given more emphasis than her art. The implication is clear: she is atypical of her sex because of her artistic capability. 3 The aim of this essay, therefore, is not to continue in the male vein and argue that there have been many "great" women artists in British Columbia. Instead, many women artists, who have been identified as a result of work done in the 1970s, 4 have produced work worthy of examination. Simply because they existed and produced a substantial body of work makes them a valid subject for study. Throughout this essay, why women have been misrepresented and what this treatment indicates about standard art history Barbara K. Latham and Roberta J. Pazdro, Eds., Not Just Pin Money Victoria: Camosun College, 1984 120 Women Artists methodology will be discussed. John Russell Harper, author of a widely used text on Canadian art history, summarized the development of art in the West: The general pattern between 1900 and 1940 is remarkably constant in all four western provinces. First came a few scattered pioneers, usually landscape watercolourists, who were often English immigrants. They worked in some of the larger communities. Art lovers made themselves known. These two groups combined to organize art schools and galleries. Art teachers were attracted from the East, students attended the new institutions, and an atmosphere was creat_ed which would encourage the creative surge in the years immediately following the Second World War. 5 This quotation_ suffers from a typical phenomenon of patriarchal thought. While its language is non-sexist or inclusive, the content does not include women. In the hands of the patriarchy, women are assumed to be absent unless they are specifically mentioned. Harper's use oflanguage does nothing to alter the status quo. Therefore, this essay will examine what Harper has chosen to omit: women's considerable participation in British Columbia's art. Though there are many women who could have -been included in this discussion, the selection has been limited to four: Sister Mary Osithe (18671941), Josephine Crease (1864-1947), Ina Duncan Dewar Uhthoff (18891971), and Beatrice Lennie (b. 1905). These women are examples of women's presence in each phase of the development of art in British Columbia . . To examine the beginnings of art in British Columbia, one must look to Victoria, the province's oldest permanent settlement. Harper rightly contends that the first artists were primarily English immigrants. However, he ignores the fact that Victoria had a direct female link with French Canada provided by the Catholic Church. The Sisters of Saint Ann of Montreal, who were among the first white women settlers, arrived in the city in 1858. Their initial task was to set up a small school. Teaching art must have been an established part of the Sisters of Saint Ann's curriculum because the 1858 prospectus for ,the school included courses in both music and drawing. However, it was noted that: "The Sisters are not prepared for the present to attend to these last two branches, but they hope ere long they will have teachers fully qualified to teach the same. "6 The nuns, who were able to begin offering music courses in 1863, did not rectify the lack of art classes until 1871 when they moved into their handsome brick structure, Saint Ann's Academy. Clearly, Harper overlooked the possibility of genuine artists among the Sisters, yet Sister Mary Sophie Labelle established an art program at St. Ann's long before there were any art schools in Victoria. The most important talent of the Saint Ann's Academy art program, Sister Mary Osithe, arrived in Victoria in 1897. She taught art from 1897 until her retirement in 1940, with only a few absences for study and travel. Though PAZDRO 121 Sister Osithe taught art for more than forty years in Victoria, her work remains virtually unknown. Of the four artists discussed in this essay, Sister Osithe's role is the most difficult to explain in terms of Harper's stages. Not since the Middle Ages has art history recognized artists who are also members of religious communities. Seen as a nun first and as an artist second, Osithe would normally be dismissed as a mere '"amateur." Yet the amateur vs. professional argument is really a disguised form of sexism; the amateur label is one of the ways women are assigned a "special" place within art history. As an amateur, she can be summarily dismissed in opposition to the serious professional artist, assumed to be male. One justification for calling Sister Osithe an amateur is that she did not have to support herself through her art. Yet, in the face of her lifetime commitment to art, her years of teaching art and her long-time maintenance of a studio, the artificiality of the term becomes clear. Furthermore, Osithe would have called herself an artist. Sister Osithe was determined to produce her own art work, a demand that likely would have not been placed on her by the Sisters of Saint Ann, who would have accepted her as an art teacher only. Her art was not produced in the public sphere for a critical audience but, instead, was and has contiuued to be, valued by the Sisters of Saint Ann. The commitment of her time for production of these works must also have been allowed by the Order, so she had from them lifelong support. Because Osithe created art within the confines of an all-woman environment is no reason to ignore her. Although Osithe did not participate in the Victoria arts community because of the restrictions of her lifestyle, she did contribute to it by teaching hundreds of students as well as local women. Sister Osithe, born Elizabeth Labassiere in Sorel, Quebec, received a Catholic education, and then joined the Sisters of Saint Ann. At the time of her first vows in 1894, she was described as " ... slight, cultured and sensitive, with a good education in French, a very slight knowledge of English, but with a talent for Art which was to determine her special work in religious life.,.., She studied art in 1896 at lhe Mother House in Lachine, Quebec, and with the artist Edmond Dyonnet (1859-1954), a staunch defender of the academic tradition, a style from which Osithe's art never varied. 8 Osithe's studies were interrupted by an urgent call from Victoria for an art teacher. Upon arrival, she found a well-established art department. Her teaching assignment was taken on with great gusto since she expanded the art curriculum to include instruction in charcoal, watercolour, pastels, oils, and ceramic art. 9 Art classes were not only for Academy students, but also for women of Victoria. Students could work in classes or in private lessons. Sister Osithe organized annual exhibitions of both her students' and her own work, making the school an art centre for the city. The demand for her art instruction caused her studio to expand from one room to three. A second art teacher was hired. She was virtually the head of the first art school in Victoria. In 1913, Saint Ann's Academy proudly advertized that: "The course of instruction in the art studio consists of: Drawings from the Antique, Drawings from Life, Perspective and Art Composition, and Decorative China. "10 122 Women Artists Osithe balanced teaching with the production of her own art. She created admirable works in all the media in which she offered instruction, even in decorative china painting. In her later years, she was able to devote more time to her own work as demand decreased for instruction in the academic style and as opportunities increased to study art elsewhere in the city. In British Columbia, landscape was the dominant theme of art produced by both women and men in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. For women, it was more often than not a matter of necessity because they were excluded from classes working from the nude model. With serious study of the figure thus eliminated, women turned to their environment for subjects.1 1 Osithe is an exception to this trend since much of her work focuses on the figure, although it is primarily in the form of portraiture. Some of Osithe's most striking works are portraits of students. In the oil painting Girl with Navy Tam (Photo 1), a carefully posed young girl is shown, half length, in a coat with lace trim and a navy tam. The formality of the pose is relaxed somewhat by the girl's casually opened coat. Though the viewer may have the impression thats/he is being presented with the image of a model student of Saint Ann's Academy, a feeling of intimacy is also conveyed. This child is not an anonymous model; instead she is probably a student well known to Osithe and whatever the final intent of the portrait, the child is obviously one for whom she must have cared. Other student portraits were also done, but the reason for them is unknown and sadly the subjects all remain unidentified. One of Osithe's most important paintings is a large work, entitled The House of Cards (PABC), done in 1904. It may have been painted during her 1903-04 visit to Lachine where she continued her study of art. The painting shows a young girl, identified as "Therese Allard, aged 6," standing next to a table on which she is building a house of cards. She wears a very proper white dress with a lace yoke, fastened with a blue sash. The artist has made an interesting comment in the painting: the girl's expensive doll is carelessly discarded in favour of a single deck of cards. Osithe did paint landscapes, the most interesting of which refer to her way of life. In a watercolour entitled The Rifle Range (Collection of the Sisters ·of Saint Ann, Victoria), she shows the cliffs of Victoria's waterfront, but adds an unusual element: a solitary nun, seated on a log, gazing out to sea. Though the title alludes to an earthly world dominated by men, it is juxtaposed with the peaceful contemplative aspect of religious life. Missionaries Departing for Japan (Photo 2) is a documentary piece rather than the seascape it appears to be. It memorializes October 6, 1934, the date when four Sisters departed for Japan on the steamship Empress of Russia. The experience was a particularly moving one for Sister Osithe who wrote of it in a letter to Mother Mary Leopoldine: Our gaze still fixed on the majestic liner, we follow sorrowfully the movements of the grand palace, gliding on the sea, taking our dear Mother and our three other Sisters. The event is so solemn! The last notes of our prayer, "Ave maris Stella," die away, and PAZDRO 123 behold, like a vision of Celestial Beauty, there is the most glorious sunset I have ever seen! ... On returning home, I have an inspiration to make a reproduction in pastel colours of what I have just seen.1 2 This small pastel contains subtle emotions. Watching the ship, two nuns in black stand on a pier in the foreground with their backs to the viewer. As the ship pulls out, the nuns' silhouette echoes the billows of smoke which pour from the steamer stacks, blackening the brilliant orange and yellow of the west cost sunset. The departing nuns, several years later, would hastily retreat from Japan in order to escape internment at the outbreak of World War Two. Added to these talents was yet another. Oral tradition among the Sisters of Saint Ann claims that Osithe was the first woman architect in British Columbia, though she was not formally trained. It is said she designed the Little Flower Academy, a school built in 1911-12 in Vancouver, and run by the Sisters. She is also said to have designed, in Victoria, the extension to both Saint Joseph's Hospital and the hospital's Nurses' Residence, both of which were managed and staffed by the Sisters of Saint Ann. 13 The existence of Sister Osithe and the Saint Ann's program demands expansion of Harper's concept of art in the West to include non-English settlers and early educators. Because Osithe lived, taught, and worked within an all-female environment, her obscurity has been assured until now. In one sense, she is the ultimate negative: she lived and worked in total isolation from Victoria's incipient secular arts community, yet she was still producing "important" art (i.e., figures). However, there is no good reason for Canadians to pretend she did not exist. While Osithe was quietly providing art instruction to students and women of Victoria, a group of local artists, who likely never would have availed themselves of her services, were founding the Island Arts and Crafts Society. These artists were Protestant members of Victoria's "state set." These women clearly fit into the category of early English immigrants to whom Harper attributed the foundation of the development of the arts in the West. In British Columbia, these artists first organized in Victoria; one of the most energetic and consistently dedicated women was Josephine Crease. If the amateur painter is defined as one who works in the home, pursues art part time, has limited training and often works in a style that is slightly out of date, then Josephine Crease fits this image more surely than did Sister Osithe. But, even so, the term unfairly reduces our expectations of her as an artist. Due to her upper-class status and conservative style of art, her work has been too easily dismissed as the dabblings of a society lady. It is now time to re-examine her role. Josephine Crease, fourth of eight children of Sarah Crease.(1826-1922) and Henry Perring Pellew Crease ( 1823-1905), was born in New Westminster, British Columbia, in 1864 while her father was Attorney-General of the colony. In 1869, the family moved to Victoria where Josephine remained most of her life. Sarah Crease, a skilled artist, introduced a love of art to the family .. Of all the Crease children who became sketchers and watercolourists and attained varying degrees of mastery of these media, Josephine had the 124 Women Artists most enduring interest in art. The style of art perpetuated by the Crease family is typical of their class and family background. Both Sarah and H.P.P. Crease were of the privileged class and, like most, brought their traditions, artistically and otherwise, with tbem from the Mother Country. Watercolour landscape which flourished in nineteenth century Britain grew from the topographical tradition into the "picturesque" or the beauty that would look well transcribed into a picture. 14 Because of the isolation of British Columbia, this tradition endured longer here than in Europe. Josephine Crease's interest in art and especially in the landscape tradition would have been appropriate for a woman of her class since leisured women were expected to be knowledgeable about music and art as part of their education. These were not only signs of gentility, but also these refinements, indicative of a woman's ability to establish a comfortable home, would add to her marriageability. Artistic skills were a further indication of status as it was well known that countesses, ladies and even the Queen were "sketchers. " 15 Sketching was also an integral part of leisure activities such as regattas, picnics, camping trips, and walking.1 6 Josephine Crease's ati education extended well beyond the skills that would have been required for sketching trips. Taught at home and at Angela College, Victoria, she took private lessons also, on occasion. But her most important opportunity to study art came in 1889-1891 when she and her sister, Susan, were sent to Britain to familiarize themselves with their English heritage. 17 While there, they studied art in the Ladies' Department, King's College, London. Related opportunities included viewing exhibitions and exposure to the latest art trends. Upon her return, Josephine intermittently continued private lessons \.Vith artists such as Sophie Pemberton, Josephine Woodward and Samuel Maclure. A favourite subject of Victoria sketchers has been Mount Baker, a distant snowcapped mountain often visible from the city. Crease produced a fine watercolour of this subject, now in the collection of the provincial Archives of British Columbia, which indicates her perception of landscape. She chose not to paint the wild forests and mountains of British Columbia which most certainly were accessible to her. Instead, she focused on a gentle vista of a tamed landscape which dominates the foreground while the massive Mount Baker gently blends into the atmosphere in the background. It is easy to understand how these gentle, realistic depictions of nature attracted wide appeal. The format of the work, small, tidy and manageable, is characteristic of landscape watercolours in general and was maintained by Crease throughout her artistic career. Crease's subject matter was not confined to natural vistas, though they were one of her favourite themes. She also recorded the built environment, and· in this category produced some of her most pleasing work. Victoria, February 1916 (PABC) is a view looking down Government Street after a snowfall. It was based on the view from the studio of artist Margaret Kitto, Crease's friend and colleague from the Island Arts and Crafts Society. 18 Works such as this one are also of archival interest because they document the PAZDRO 125 changing face of Victoria. Sketching parties in Victoria not only ventured into the countryside, but also gathered at friends' houses. There are extant paintings of the Crease family home, Pentrelew, as well as other spots such as Cary Castle, the home of the Lieutenant-Governor. J ohnson;..Dean dates the painting of Cary Castle (Photo 3) from 1880 when Albert Norton Richards was in office. 19 Crease knew and sketched with Ellen and Eliza Richards, wife and daughter of the Lieutenant-Governor. In 1881, Crease painted at least two interior scenes of Government House (Photo 4). This change in subject matter is not as major as it may seem since these paintings are "interior landscapes:" they are as carefully composed as the exterior work and have the same uninhabited serenity characteristic of her landscapes. The works may have also been a logical extension ofthe leisured woman's interest in comfort and elegance in . the private sphere. Josephine Crease could have pursued art in isolation throughout her life or within the confines of her very talented family, but instead she used her art to move into the public sphere. It must be pointed out, however, that in this · sense Crease is not unique. While conventional art historians have identified women artists in the twentieth century only as exceptions or as isolated examples, it is important to realize that Crease was one of many women in Victoria, in North America and in Europe who as the community "arts organizers" laid the foundations of modern art institutions. In this essay, Crease represents all of these women and their work. The first recorded meeting of the Island Arts and Crafts Society (IACS) was on September 29, 1909; Josephine Crease was among its founding members. 20 Though other attempts had been made at forming an art organization in Victoria, the IACS was the first successful one. 21 The IACS, which had the longest history of any art organization in Victoria, was the . most important group until the Art Gallery of Greater Victoria was founded. 22 The objectives of the club were: (a) To bring together artists and those interested in Art; (b) The holding of Public Exhibitions of Art and Craft work; (c) To stimulate general interest in Arts and Crafts. 23 These goals remained consistent throughout the more than forty years of the club's existence. Other activities included the sponsorship of lectures and a sketch club. 24 The IACS 's view of art was essentially synonymous with the British watercolour landscape tradition. This conservative approach is not surprising since the Society was composed of artists like Josephine Crease, who were members of Victoria's British elite and who were frequently affiliated with the Anglican Church, especially Christ Church Cathedral. The IACS was also affiliated with the female elite of Victoria via the 126 Women Artists Alexandra Club. Founded in 1894, it was the female counterpart to Victoria's Union Club, an exclusive all-male domain. Many of the women in the IACS, including Josephine Crease, were also members of the Alexandra Club which was prosperous enough to erect its own building in 1910-11. The IA CS held their early meetings and exhibitions there. 25 Crease who had one of the best attendance records of the group, served on its executive and on the committee that ran the Society's art school and participated regularly in their annual exhibitions. She is typical of women artists such as Maude Lettice and Margaret Kitto who consistently backed the group. Women, as Johnson-Dean has pointed out, formed about seventyfive percent of the original members. 26 Although women were the "movers and shakers" of the group, one never served as president. Always having a man "at the top" coincided perfectly with the conservative nature of the organization. The most important accomplishments of the IACS were the staging of an annual exhibition and the establishment of an art school, though the former was much more successful than the latter. A School of Handicraft and Design was begun by the IACS in 1913. Crease did not teach at the school, but served on its Executive Committee. 27 The courses offered through the IA CS 's school included woodcarving, bookbinding, jewelry and metal work, in contrast to the drawing, perspective and ceramic classes being offered at the same time at Saint Ann's. The success of the school is unknown, but the following year, the IACS suggested that the classes be moved to the high school to be run under the auspices of the local school board. 28 Only with the arrival of Ina Uhthoff in the mid-1920s would Victorians once again have an art school. Competing with the IACS were two world wars and a Depression as well as the Victoria School of Art. As well, students were drawn to the new Vancouver School of Decorative and Applied Art, which began in 1925. Other groups int.he 1940s talked about establishing a permanent art gallery in the city and attracted their own following. Members of the IACS aged, the group became less influential, and eventually dissolved in 1954. 29 It has been too easy for art historians to negate the efforts of groups such as the IA CS because of their conservative outlook. Yet they provided a real service when there were no other alternatives. Their efforts have been negated further by calling them amateurs. When the image of the male artist as "bohemian" became a central part of the modern "art scene," it contrasted so sharply with the image of these genteel ladies who hosted tea parties between sketching outings that there was no room for their gentility nor their kind of society. These women have also been overlooked in favour of their more progressive contemporary, Emily Carr. The role of these artists and their work as volunteers, despite their role in forming the basis of modern art institutions, became news only on the women's pages ofthe newspaper where, in fact, they could be ignored. Josephine Crease cannot be dismissed as an artist. She exhibited with the IACS every year from 1919 to 1941,30 exhibited with the BC Society of Fine Arts and at the Vancouver Art Gallery; she gave sketching lessons and supported herself in part through the sale of her art. PAZDRO 127 0 (D