James Wilson Morrice

J.W. Morrice (1865-1924) was one of the earliest Canadian modernist painters and the first Canadian to achieve widespread acceptance abroad. 

Born of a wealthy Presbyterian family, Morrice showed an early interest in painting. After studying law at the University of Toronto, he was called to the Ontario Bar in 1889, but never practiced. Instead, he began studies at the Académie Julian in Paris in 1890. A wealthy man, Morrice traveled and painted in Italy, Belgium, Holland, Great Britain, Algeria, Jamaica and Cuba.

Morrice returned to Canada annually where he made winter sketches and pictures of Québec City. These paintings represent the Canadian side of his work. But Paris remained the centre of his world. There he frequented cafés such as the Chat Blanc in Montparnasse and associated with American painter James McNeill Whistler and English writers Arnold Bennett and Somerset Maugham, who portrayed him as a minor character in their books.

Morrice sketched on small wood panels that were always the start of his paintings. He made hundreds, some later worked up into canvases. Around 1909, he met Henri Matisse and found inspiration in Fauvist colours and flattened composition evident in his scenes of North Africa and the Caribbean. Twice he traveled with Matisse to paint in Tangier in 1912 and 1913.

During WWI, Morrice spent a period in London and then as a Canadian war artist. When the war ended, he preferred warmer countries where the colours and light inspired him.

Morrice was well known first in Europe and Paris where he exhibited regularly at the Salon d'Automne, of which he became a vice-president. His work was acquired by European public collections. Morrice was elected to the Royal Canadian Academy in 1913 and after his death the first major exhibitions of his work were held in Canada. His paintings are held in at the National Gallery of Canada, the Art Gallery of Ontario.