Owen Staples: Painter of Canada's Past By Rod Staples with Ian Galt
Foreword by A.J. Casson
4to. pp. 163. profusely illustrated in b/w & colour. bibliography. index. hardcover (fine condition). Scarborough: Hogarth Productions, [1994].
ISBN: 0968309607 / ISBN-13: 9780968309605
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Amid the hustle of today's modern society, we often forget the quiet charm of bygone days. Fishing the Don River, summer vacations on "The Island". Life in Toronto was quaint and peaceful indeed.
For today's residents and visitors alike, Owen Staples: Painter of Canada's Past invites you to pause and enjoy our heritage. Staples was a multi-talented artist whose activities also included writing, lecturing and distinguished singing career with the famed Mendelssohn Choir.
From private and public collections, this book features over 150 drawings, photographs, etchings, pastels, oil and watercolour paintings, many in full colour, and all designed to lead you on a nostalgic tour of our fair city.
For over a century the name Owen Staples has been a byword in the arts circles in Toronto, and indeed across Canada. Perhaps Canada's most important historical artist, Owen Staples was born in Somerset, England in 1866 and brought as a child to Hamilton, Ontario. The family settled in Toronto in 1876. Orphaned at a young age, Owen had to make his own way in the world. He studied at the Rochester Art Club, The Philadelphia Academy and in Toronto under G.A. Reid.
As art director at The Toronto Telegram newspaper, Staples created many historical drawings and paintings for the Landmarks of Toronto series of books, produced by the paper's publisher, John Ross Robertson.
Collectors came to prize Owen Staples' charming paintings and etchings, hundred of which hang in galleries and private and corporate collections across Canada, the U.S. and Britain.