Visual Arts

The visual arts have long played a part in the history of Newfoundland and Labrador, though they may never have been as significant or visible as they are today.

Aboriginal peoples produced the earliest examples of art in the province. A small ivory carving of a bear, found in Labrador having been identified with the Dorset Eskimo people and dates to around 800 A.D. In terms of more recent history, up until about 1900, most of "Newfoundland and Labrador" art was the work of visiting artists. By the turn of the century, however, a population born and raised in this province was well established, and a new category of art came into being: Newfoundland and Labrador art created by people living and working here, most of which was about this place.

By the mid 1900s visual arts came into its own when several young people returned to the Island following formal studies abroad in the late 1940s - including Rae Perlin and Reginald and Helen Parsons. Significant forces emerged in the provincial art scene in the 1960s, including Christopher Pratt, Mary Pratt, David Blackwood and Gerry Squires, all of whom began to achieve a level of national and international recognition, both for their individual work and the “Newfoundland and Labrador” arts scene as an entity. The local arts scene began flourishing in the late 70’s/early 80’s with the establishment of a provincial Arts Council, and numerous artist-run spaces in the City of St. John’s such as the RCA Gallery and Eastern Edge Gallery.

Today’s visual arts sector has evolved to include a network of public and private galleries, international and emerging artists, significant provincial investment and the development of entirely new public venues for exhibition. These infrastructure factors coupled with the continuing expansion of the diversity of local visual art, both in terms of subject and medium, have led to the sector being (appropriately enough) one of the most visible and recognized expressions of our culture.