Provenance

Acquired directly from the artist, Toronto

Private collection, Toronto

By descent, Private collection

Masters Gallery, Calgary

Private collection, Calgary

The drawing for St. Hilarion, Quebec is in the collection of the University Club, Toronto and reproduced in One Summer in Quebec by Naomi Jackson Groves.

Beginning in 1921, Group of Seven painter A.Y. Jackson began his well-documented trips to the villages and rural countryside of the north and south shores of the St. Lawrence River. There were two known sketching trips to the charming town of St. Hilarion, in 1925 with Arthur Lismer and Canadian ethnographer Marius Barbeau, and then in again in 1933. Other Saint-Hilarion works in the collection of the National Gallery of Canada suggest additional trips in 1926 and 1930 to Saint-Hilarion which is located on the inland road from Baie-Saint-Paul to La Malbaie. Jackson described the village as being “like one of the Italian hill towns; the country around is cleared of trees, and the town stands on the top of the hill.” Our sketch is a classic Quebec Jackson, depicting a peaceful winter village with the church at its heart, at the end of a winding road.