Sarah Margaret Robertson

Canadian, 1891 - 1948

BiographySarah Robertson studied and worked in Montreal, and her images of the urban and rural environment were painted in and around the city, on the Ile d'OrlÚans, near Brockville and in rural Vermont. She was primarily a landscape painter, but also painted still-lifes and portraits. Robertson absorbed the influences of the Impressionists, post-Impressionists and the Group of Seven. At the Art Association of Montreal she studied under William Brymner, Maurice Cullen and Randolph Hewton and was awarded honours in Life Drawing, Painting and Composition. She was invited to contribute to the Group of Seven exhibitions (1928, 1930, 1931) and was selected by jury in 1924 and 1925 to contribute to the Wembley Exhibitions in England. "terrific importance" of being involved in art.
Robertson was at the centre of the group of women who painted and worked together for many years after the Beaver Hall Hill Group officially disbanded. This association of 19 Montreal artists, eight of whom were women, had been committed to developing distinctive artistic visions, while acknowledging the influence of the Group of Seven and French modernism. From this time, Robertson maintained a correspondence with A.Y. Jackson, who had a great respect for her critical judgment about artwork. She and Prudence Heward, also part of this network of women, were particularly close friends over a thirty-year period, and some of Robertson's paintings were inspired by her visits to the Hewards' summer home near Brockville.
In 1933 Robertson was a founding member of the Canadian Group of Painters, and she exhibited with them for many years. This group was instrumental in establishing a new direction for Canadian art, expressing the diversity of the Canadian experience of the landscape and building on the vision of the Group of Seven.

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