Expect to be surprised is how Royal British Columbia Museum chief executive Tracey Drake describes Canadian Modern, which opened this week for a six-month run.
Canadian Modern is an eye-opening display of experimentation, innovation and ingenuity in design by Canadians.
There are more than 100 objects — some mass produced, others on a limited scale — that put Canada on the global map of design.
From John Fluevog’s Dr. Bonnie Henry Shoes, furniture and jewelry to the BlackBerry smartphone and Bombardier’s early Ski-Doo, the exhibition showcases examples of culturally significant items designed and crafted in Canada, and the stories behind them.
The Clairtone Project G Stereo with its globe speakers, the Paperclip Stool and the Work Station, a self-contained office pod, were all trendsetters with designs that influenced others.
The exhibition features well-known designers and makers such as Alfred Sung, Jacques Guillon, Kjeld and Erica Deichmann, Robert Larin and Victoria’s Peter Cotton, considered one of the country’s most innovative architects and furniture designers.
One of the works featured is the 1951 Springback chair designed by Cotton, provided by private collector, curator and writer Allan Collier.
“The Springback is a fine example of regional modernism,” said Collier, who helped to open the exhibit this week at the museum. “Cotton expressed modernist ideas like simplicity, practicality, inventiveness, and honest use of materials by specifying locally available steel fabrication for its frame and regional materials like moulded fir plywood, veneered in teak, for its seat and back.”
Cotton moved to Victoria from the Lower Mainland in the late 1950s. He was president of the Victoria Heritage Advisory Committee, tasked with keeping many of the heritage houses and buildings of Victoria intact. He was also hired as the architect to rebuild Government House after the 1957 fire, and did the refurbishing of Emily Carr House, Craigflower Manor and St. Andrew’s Cathedral.
Cotton developed several pieces of sleek, modern furniture and, for a time, had a company called Perpetua.
Canadian Modern is a Royal Ontario Museum original exhibition developed by guest curator Rachel Gotlieb and Arlene Gehmacher, curator of Canadian art and culture at the Royal Ontario. It is the first time that the exhibition is being featured outside of Toronto.
Gotlieb said the exhibition highlights the spirit of modernism by Canadian designers and artisans in their “pursuit of excellence and professionalism.”
Gehmacher said design and craft often speak to the moment in reflecting or shaping perspectives and needs.
“Canadian Modern allows us to appreciate historical and current initiatives, and imagine possible new directions,” she said.
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