Alex Colville was the perfect artist to reflect Canada's transition into the modern age during the second half of the 20th century. His paintings frequently depicted rural life and peaceful setting but there was often something disturbing embedded in the image, the way the subjects didn't seem to quite fit into the landscape.
He died this week at age 92.
Horse And Train captured the collision between the urban and rural, the modern and the traditional, nature and technology, the living beauty of a powerful horse facing off against the much more powerful and menacing freight train.
The horse is running at full speed, its hooves coming off the tracks as it charges proudly toward its inevitable death.
The viewer is trapped behind the horse and to the side of the track, unable to stop the oncoming tragedy. The horse and train will meet at the signpost at the left edge of the painting's frame and that signpost will serve as a marker for the death of the horse and everything it represents.
The same clash is at play in Pacific, which shows a shirtless man, with his back to the viewer and seen only from the neck down, leaning in a doorway and looking out onto the ocean waves breaking on the nearby shore. Directly in front of the viewer is a plain wooden table with nothing on it except for a large handgun.
There's no doubt what's about to happen in Horse And Train but Pacific is more mysterious. Something terrible has happened, is about to happen or perhaps nothing is going to happen and the gun will continue to remain there, uttering its silent threat. The uncertainty forces the viewer to imagine the outcomes.
In To Prince Edward Island, a woman aboard a ferry is gazing through binoculars directly at the viewer. Since she's so close, she would have a distorted view of a tiny part of our face. Behind her sits a man, his face obscured and his arms spread out casually across the back of the bench. A white lifeboat looms large directly behind and over him.
It's an odd and disconcerting piece. Why is the woman using binoculars to see us when we, the viewers, are right in front of her? What is she trying to see about us that she is unable to see with just her eyes?
All three of these paintings are typical of Colville's work and that's what makes them so Canadian. They are not brash and aggressive, demanding the viewer's attention. They are gentle and polite, often beautiful, on the surface but the deeper the viewer goes inside the image, the more elusive and troubling the answers become.
Just like people.
Just like life.
