These days studying Homer Watson, Landscape Painter.

Famous Kitchener/Doon Artist (1855-1936)

Farm Boy schooling curtailed early following Father’s death. Working the family mill. Wandering Waterloo district countryside. Sketching. Little formal art training. Famous work entitled Pioneer Mill, acquired by Windsor Castle with the help of our Receiver General. Trips overseas. Little success with postings in galleries, but only initially. For a time wondered if England or Scotland might become permanent home. But No...Doon would always win out. Homer and Roxa happily adopted little Mary. Added gallery to the family home. Sister Phoebe and wife Roxa would play major roles. Roxa died during World War One. Years of adjustment through inactivity and understandable melancholy/depression. Commissioned to do war art, paying tribute to gallant efforts of Canadians (initially commissioned by Sir Sam Hughes.) Subsequent trips to Britain and Europe and friends and gallery owners brought back THE SPARK. A GOLDEN AGE of slap-dash colour work, with uninhibited immediacy (no preliminary sketches). Textured in a way not found in the Group of Seven work. This was coupled marvelously with a mystical understanding of the harmony and flow of nature’s phenomena, perspective and seasons, the Farm Boy again, where Canadian feelings won out over speakings.

Onslaught of deafness; ear surgery with serious subsequent infections; heart attacks, convalescence, isolation at Home. The 1929 Stock Market Crash. Art considered as no substitute for groceries and basic needs in Canada. Mortgage taken out on the Home. Money issues, money, money. Homer disinclined to advertise his paintings. Many of them sold off unceremoniously to meet the needs...and meanwhile Group of Seven works receiving all the noise out of Toronto and Ottawa. Admittedly their northlands bush, falls, lakes and icebergs were stupendous.

Still came opportunities to tour the Prairies and Canadian Rocky Mountains. Gathering impressions for later large canvas work. Politician, friend and art enthusiast William Lyon Mackenzie King laboured and negotiated for a few pieces of work to be sold into the National Gallery in Ottawa. Homer developed bronchial pneumonia and succumbed to the infirmity and general fatigue on May 30, 1936.

Sister Phoebe attended a Convocation in London, University of Western Ontario, in order to receive on Homer’s behalf an Honorary Doctor of Laws. He is also remembered for certain civic services: a Justice of the Peace, leadership in various Art Councils, lobbying for a railroad line into Galt and conservation efforts to establish and sustain the Cressman Woods (Homer Watson Park).

And let us not forget that legacy of warmth, imagination and good humour extended annually to young school children who enjoyed their sunny visit to the Watson House, Gallery and Park. Homer would be there smiling, just like a kid again. Enjoying their sparkling eyes of approval.