Ken Kirkby, A Painter’s Quest for Canada

excerpt

The Dream of Nunavut
Back in Toronto, he pondered the persistent problem of disseminating
his Arctic message – and he recalled his insight on the morning his alarm
clock woke him – and he suddenly realized that all news was numbers.
I’d learned that in North America everything is quantified. Everything is
numbers. That’s how people talk to each other. So never mind talking about
art – never mind talking about politics. Let’s see what happens if we think
about all of this just in terms of numbers. So, given that everything has to
be bigger and bigger – like the Reichmann venture that I knew in my guts
was going to happen – then after that huge painting, then what? Where do
I go then?
I let my mind wander, and I didn’t try to rein it in. Quantification – a
giant painting – super giant! No – super, super giant! How about on the
scale of the Sistine Chapel ceiling? Yes, that was right. And what would it be
of? Well, a portrait of the Arctic. How about a portrait of the Northwest Passage?
The arrogance of Europeans, who wouldn’t even stop for two minutes
to question the people who built the Inuksuit – people who would have told
them where to find the passage – those Europeans who had to go and find
it all by themselves. They didn’t wear fur clothes and they weren’t savages
so they must have been superior, yet they all killed themselves – a cost of so
many lives and huge sums of money and they didn’t find the Northwest Passage.
Okay – portrait of the Northwest Passage. And yes – a portrait – that’s
what it would be. For the Inuit, the land is mother and the sky is father, so,
I am painting a portrait of the mother and the father. And, of course, the
people in the south will say, “No, it’s a landscape!” and we can get into a rhubarb
about it, and I can use that and point out they’re goddammed ignorant.
They don’t even know the reason behind this painting, where it comes from
or on whose behalf it’s being painted. I could see all sorts of things taking
shape here.
Where would it go? Obviously it would be too big to sell, and there would
be no point putting it in a church because there was no church big enough.
Besides, no one goes to church anymore. Where to put it? People aren’t religious.
Where do people go? Wait! Canadians are religious! Hockey is their
religion! Hockey arenas are right across the country.

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Ken Kirkby, A Painter’s Quest for Canada

excerpt

Fraser didn’t answer. Paint more, he said. Paint more paintings of the
southern landscapes that he could exhibit in galleries in Kelowna and
Calgary.
On the evening of the exhibit, Fraser monopolized him: taking him
by the arm, steering him around the room, and introducing him to the
guests. Some complained that all the paintings bore red sold stickers.
Fraser assured them that as soon as a painting was available they would
be contacted to come and view it.
“Just one?”
“Yes. Just one. He’s not a machine – he’s a painter.”
“But what if I don’t like it?”
“Not a problem. Your name will be placed on the bottom of the list and
another person will be called.”
Doreen followed them, carrying a small notebook in which she entered
orders. When the evening wound down, Fraser told Ken’s parents
that they should be proud of their son – he was potentially brilliant and
would go far. “But don’t tell him that,” he said in a bellowing aside. “His
head is already swelled quite enough.”
Later that night, while having dinner with Helen, he opened the envelope
Fraser had slipped into his pocket. Inside was a note full of praise for
his work. At the bottom was a postscript. “Your Arctic paintings will have
to wait a while. You aren’t ready to paint them yet and your public is not
ready to receive them.”
“Do you realize how lucky you are?” Helen asked when he showed her
the note.
“I think so. I think I was born lucky.” Or perhaps it was something more
than luck. His grandfather and the old grandmother had predicted that
power would come to him – that life would be kind to him and open many
doors for him. Perhaps they had seen something in him that he had not.
The next morning, Fraser called. “Come and see me at noon – I have
an idea,” and he hung up.
At noon, Ken walked into the gallery. “There’s something I want you to
do for me,” Fraser said. “I want you to go to auctions for me. I’ll give you a
list of paintings for each auction, and I will put a price on each of the pictures
I’m interested in. But you have to agree not to go a penny over the
amount I say. And I’ll give you cash. I don’t want to do this by cheque.”
“Why me?” Ken asked. “Why don’t you do it?”
“Because as soon as I enter one of these auctions and start bidding the
jig is up, and the prices are up too. I’m too bloody well-known for my
own good. You understand?”
“I think so. Where are these auctions?”
“All over the bloody place – Winnipeg, Victoria, Vancouver, Regina –
all over.”

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Ken Kirkby, A Painter’s Quest for Canada

excerpt

It struck me that there was a point in fairly recent history when we
changed from being artisans to becoming the modern idea of the artist. That
moment came with the death of van Gogh. He had played a major role in
getting the world to look at new forms of art, which had much to do with
the impressionist movement. I had read considerably on it. Van Gogh sold
just one painting in his lifetime. I think in large part he was too busy, he was
moving things ahead and I think he had a vision that very much included
the future – and that idea excited me a lot. What is art? It isn’t just something
pretty. Art is something that changes the world and it can only be done
one piece at a time.
My understanding of art, relative to my new country, was forged at this
moment. Art and politics were inextricably entwined. Van Gogh had a most
peculiar and unhealthy relationship with his brother, Theo. They corresponded
every day so we have an immense pool of information. Van Gogh
wasn’t mad at all. He was very ill and became sicker as he grew older. I
think he had many things wrong with him, including epilepsy. After he cut
off his ear, and eventually shot himself and took three days to die, a friend
of Theo’s, a well-known journalist in Paris, asked if he could see some of the
correspondence. Theo agreed. After the fellow researched a goodly amount of
it, he asked if he could write some articles. Theo agreed – and those articles
created damnation for the artists of today, because van Gogh was presented
as a madman and a victim. It so hit the sensibility of France that he became
the grand, tragic figure, and the model for how all artists would be viewed
in the eye and the mind of the public. And because the world in those days
looked to Paris for matters artistic, the story spread like quicksilver. To my
mind, that was the birth of the modern perception of the artist.
Ken compared the “artist as victim” mythos with the Renaissance
view of artists, when people like him commanded the attention of kings,
queens, princes and Popes. Pleased with the clarity of his thoughts, he
picked up his fishing rod and got back to the business at hand, promising
himself that if he did nothing else in his life he would never join that
anaemic club of modern day artists. He would be an artist in the tradition
of the Italian Renaissance. If he were to follow in anyone’s footsteps, it
would be in those of Michelangelo. He would be a warrior artist.
To burn off some of the restless energy that possessed him since returning
home, he began to play tennis, at the courts in Stanley Park,
where he met Helen Michaelchuck, a local teacher. He also studied real
estate investing, which seemed to him like a false-fronted building in an
old black and white western movie. It was an empty concept set up to
make money – no value traded hands. No service was purchased. But he
wanted at least two or three million dollars to tell the story of the Arctic

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Ken Kirkby, A Painter’s Quest for Canada

excerpt

An Artist in Vancouver
Ken packed his meagre belongings, wrapping his rolls of drawings in
sealskin to protect them from cold and damp. He left the north as he had
arrived, more than five years earlier, hitching rides on bush planes, boats,
and rickety trucks until he arrived in northern Manitoba. He travelled
across Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta until, in the fall of 1965, he
arrived at the Vancouver airport, in a small bush plane.
He called his parents from the airport, his first contact with them in
five years. They walked past him three times before they recognized the
young man with the full black beard, long black hair, and a body heavy
with muscle.
In his parent’s apartment, in the West End, the deafening noise kept him
awake at night. The food was insipid, and the ways of the people strange.
He rented a small apartment in the West End, and got a job with Gordon
Spratt, the former chief engineer of Coast Eldridge, who had formed
his own company. But Ken’s focus was on painting. However, when he
unwrapped the sealskin from his rolls of tape he discovered that his thousands
and thousands of drawings were ruined. In the heat, fat had oozed
out from his inexpertly prepared sealskin, staining the drawings and
making them useful only as rough references for his paintings.
Regardless, he painted in a frenzy of excitement. He painted the Inuit
hunting, preparing meals and making tools. He painted every scene engraved
on his mind, from the minutiae of daily life to the vast emptiness
of the landscape. When he took his paintings to art dealers, they shrugged
and turned away. He told his stories to the owners and was met with bottomless
indifference.
He grew increasingly angry and annoyed with the Vancouver art scene
and sent photographs of the paintings to galleries across Canada. Not one
offered to show them.
He tried to give them to the galleries, and still they didn’t want them.
Finally, he stopped. “Maybe it’s me. Maybe I have to learn how to paint
this place.”
One day, while poking through an antique shop, he found a book titled
The Group of Seven and as he leafed through it, he reacquainted him…

https://www.amazon.com/dp/0981073573

Ken Kirkby, A Painter’s Quest for Canada

Excerpt

A deafening roar that sounded like a thousand thunderclaps crashing
down at once interrupted their conversation. The shock reverberated
through the earth, setting every tree and leaf trembling.
With some trepidation, they motored back to camp. The row of ten
double-wide trailers closest to the blasting site had taken the full brunt
of the shock. Windows were blown out, curtains were strewn around the
camp and the force had bent the walls inwards.
The rock that should have been pulverized had broken up into jagged
boulders weighing at least ten and twenty tons apiece.
One night while Ken was visiting the ranch, and after Patrick and Margaret
had gone to bed, he sat down opposite Jessica and began drawing
her face in the golden glow of the kerosene lamps.
It was late when he finished. Leaning over his shoulder, she said, “Pretty
good. I wish I could do that. Now I want you to do a drawing of me the
way I want you to do it.”
“What’s that?” Ken asked.
“Nude.”
He shook his head. “That’s not the deal I made with your brother. It didn’t
have anything to do with nudes and I’m not comfortable with the idea.”
“My brother isn’t the only one with ideas around here,” she said softly.
“And neither are you.”
Standing in front of him she did something magical with the dress she
was wearing. One minute she was clothed and the next she was standing
naked in front of him, her head turned slightly away – her body angled
toward him. She stood tall and straight like a golden statue, the warm
glow of the lamps reflecting off her body. She was more than beautiful
– handsome, magnetic, lustrous – a beauty that compelled his complete
attention. Ken drew deep, silent breaths, trying to still the turmoil inside
him. The everyday Jessica was gone – or perhaps not gone – perhaps she
had simply unleashed all the power inside her. She was the most commanding
figure he had ever seen.
There was nothing for Ken to do but to take out a fresh sheet of paper
and begin drawing. And as so often happened to him in moments
of profound significance, showers of unseen icy crystals poured into his
stomach. He could not have explained anything that was happening to
him in that moment – not intellectually – but emotionally and spiritually
he was lost.
He drew, his hand moving at lightning speed. No thought was required
– no caution. Something had taken over his soul and the drawing appeared
almost of its own accord.

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