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Alex Colville:
An Everyday Order


Curated by Ray Cronin

Painting by Alex Colville of a nude woman standing by a window in an empty room with blue walls. She is looking back at the torso of a tailor's dummy, also nude, which is large in the frame.

Taking his subjects from his surroundings, the Maritime-based artist Alex Colville (1920–2013) returned to similar themes throughout his seventy-year career: family life, desire, individual will, and relationships between men and women, humans and animals, nature and the machine. He was intent on creating a world of order from the reality of chaos, always aware of the essential and tragic fragility of this Sisyphean task. Colville’s paintings are distinctive and easily recognizable, marked by his careful, unified brushwork and meticulously arranged compositional structures. For more on Alex Colville read Ray Cronin’s Alex Colville: Life & Work.



About the Curator: Ray Cronin

Ray Cronin is a Nova Scotia–based writer and curator. A former director and CEO of the Art Gallery of Nova Scotia, he is the founding curator of the Sobey Art Award and the author of Mary Pratt: Still Light (2018) and Our Maud: The Life, Art and Legacy of Maud Lewis (2017).



Banner Image: Alex Colville, Nude and Dummy (detail), 1950, glazed gum arabic emulsion on board, 60.9 x 81.2 cm, New Brunswick Museum, Saint John.

Gallery

Painting by Alex Colville depicting a line of Canadian soldiers in WWII uniforms and helmets. They are walking towards the viewer on a thin strip of land surrounded by water, stretching into the horizon and getting smaller, under a low-hanging sun in a hazy sky.

Infantry, Near Nijmegen, Holland, 1946

Painting by Alex Colville of a nude woman standing by a window in an empty room with blue walls. She is looking back at the torso of a tailor's dummy, also nude, which is large in the frame.

Nude and Dummy, 1950

Painting by Alex Colville of three women undressing on a wharf near blue water, their clothes at their feet.

Three Girls on a Wharf, 1953

Painting by Alex Colville of a black horse, seen from behind, galloping down a train track towards an approaching train.

Horse and Train, 1954

Painting by Alex Colville of a women with shoulder-length grey hair looking straight at the viewer through a pair of binoculars, the opaque lenses blocking her eyes. She is on a boat surrounded by blue water with a man sitting behind her, arms stretched across the bench seat. A lifeboat looms large in the background.

To Prince Edward Island, 1965

Painting by Alex Colville of a nude woman with shoulder-length grey hair sitting in a partially filled bathtub in a stark room with white tiles. Another figure in a navy robe stands behind her, the top half of their body out of frame.

Woman in Bathtub, 1973

Print by Alex Colville of a black cat, seen from behind, standing on a table and batting a triangular ruler hanging off the edge. Before him is a seated dark-skinned man with short hair wearing wire-rimmed glasses. In the background is a wall of windows with wooden frames.

Black Cat, 1996

Painting by Alex Colville of a waving man standing on a highway overpass with a sign reading "West Brooklyn Rd" on the side. Below him is a blue semi-truck driving on a perpendicular road, towards the viewer. The ocean and hills are visible in the distance under a cloudy sky.

West Brooklyn Road, 1996

Painting by Alex Colville of an elderly nude man, wearing only glasses and a watch, holding his hands in front of his private parts and facing the viewer. He is in front of a blank wall with windows visible overhead.

Studio, 2000

Painting by Alex Colville depicting a line of Canadian soldiers in WWII uniforms and helmets. They are walking towards the viewer on a thin strip of land surrounded by water, stretching into the horizon and getting smaller, under a low-hanging sun in a hazy sky.

Infantry, Near Nijmegen, Holland, 1946

Painting by Alex Colville of a nude woman standing by a window in an empty room with blue walls. She is looking back at the torso of a tailor's dummy, also nude, which is large in the frame.

Nude and Dummy, 1950

Painting by Alex Colville of three women undressing on a wharf near blue water, their clothes at their feet.

Three Girls on a Wharf, 1953

Painting by Alex Colville of a black horse, seen from behind, galloping down a train track towards an approaching train.

Horse and Train, 1954

Painting by Alex Colville of a women with shoulder-length grey hair looking straight at the viewer through a pair of binoculars, the opaque lenses blocking her eyes. She is on a boat surrounded by blue water with a man sitting behind her, arms stretched across the bench seat. A lifeboat looms large in the background.

To Prince Edward Island, 1965

Painting by Alex Colville of a nude woman with shoulder-length grey hair sitting in a partially filled bathtub in a stark room with white tiles. Another figure in a navy robe stands behind her, the top half of their body out of frame.

Woman in Bathtub, 1973

Print by Alex Colville of a black cat, seen from behind, standing on a table and batting a triangular ruler hanging off the edge. Before him is a seated dark-skinned man with short hair wearing wire-rimmed glasses. In the background is a wall of windows with wooden frames.

Black Cat, 1996

Painting by Alex Colville of a waving man standing on a highway overpass with a sign reading "West Brooklyn Rd" on the side. Below him is a blue semi-truck driving on a perpendicular road, towards the viewer. The ocean and hills are visible in the distance under a cloudy sky.

West Brooklyn Road, 1996

Painting by Alex Colville of an elderly nude man, wearing only glasses and a watch, holding his hands in front of his private parts and facing the viewer. He is in front of a blank wall with windows visible overhead.

Studio, 2000

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Online Exhibitions

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Alex Colville: An Everyday Order