Albert Franck

Albert Jacques Franck (2 Apr 1899 - 28 Feb 1973) was a Canadian artist. He is known for his realistic paintings[1] of Toronto winter scenes,[2] dilapidated neighbourhoods[3][4] and back lanes.[5][6][7] His detailed paintings provide a historical record of conditions in some of Toronto's once less affluent neighbourhoods.[8][9]

Early life

Franck was born at Middelburg, the Netherlands.[10] As a young man he was a champion swimmer.[11] He moved to Canada in 1926, making his living as a swimming instructor and by working in factories[5] He later worked in an art gallery and sold picture frames.[12]

Career

Franck opened a studio in his small home on Gerrard Street, Toronto. He began by hanging some of his paintings in a local restaurant,[5] and in this way his work became locally known. In the 1950s he and his wife, artist Florence Vale,[13] developed the studio into a gathering place for the arts community. They hosted and supported the work of many young local artists,[5][14][15] particularly those participating in the emerging Toronto abstract art scene, including Joyce Wieland[16] and Kazuo Nakamura.[17] Franck and Vale later moved to a larger home, which also served as their studio and gallery, on Hazelton Street[18] as part of a general migration of the art community to the Yorkville area during the 1960s.[19]

Franck's first exhibition was presented at York University in 1963.[20] In 1973 he held an exhibition at the Art Gallery of Ontario. Franck also participated in a number of group exhibitions.

Franck's paintings are in the collections of the Art Gallery of Ontario,[21] the London Public Library and Art Museum,[22] the National Exhibition Centre in St. Catharines,[23] the New Brunswick Museum,[24] and McMaster University.[25]

Fellow artist Harold Town, a close friend,[26] wrote two books celebrating Franck's art.[27][28]

Franck also taught art in a local high school[29] and played the cello.[30] He and his wife sent small pieces of their art as greeting cards to friends and relatives, and some of these have survived.[31]

Franck died in Toronto on February 28, 1973.[6] A street in the St. Lawrence Neighbourhood of Toronto is named for him.[32]

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References
  1. Commentator. 7 - 8. 1963. p. 24.
  2. Tony Ruprecht (14 December 2010). Toronto's Many Faces. Dundurn. pp. 122–. ISBN 978-1-4597-1804-3.
  3. Nancy Byrtus; Mark Fram; Michael McClelland (27 September 2013). East/West: A Guide to Where People Live in Downtown Toronto. Coach House Books. pp. 144–. ISBN 978-1-77056-043-7.
  4. Robert C. Thomsen; Nanette Hale (2005). Canadian Environments: Essays in Culture, Politics, and History. Peter Lang. pp. 309–. ISBN 978-90-5201-295-7.
  5. "Looking back at Mary Johns, an artists’ haven in mid-century Toronto ". Toronto Star, John Lorinc, Jul 19 2015
  6. "Albert Jacques Franck". The Canadian Encyclopedia.
  7. Bill Casselman (1 August 1996). Casselmania: more wacky Canadian words & sayings. Little, Brown Canada. p. 86. ISBN 978-0-316-13314-2.
  8. Leonard Brooks (1974). Oil painting ... traditional and new. Galahad Books. p. 110. ISBN 978-0-88365-128-5.
  9. Marjorie Harris (1 January 1984). Toronto, the City of Neighbourhoods. McClelland and Stewart. p. 12. ISBN 978-0-7710-3988-1.
  10. Oliver Arpad Istvan Botar (2009). A Bauhausler in Canada: Andor Weininger in the '50s. Gallery One One One. p. 220. ISBN 978-0-921500-98-8.
  11. John Virtue (25 October 2001). Leonard and Reva Brooks: Artists in Exile in San Miguel de Allende. McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP. pp. 30–. ISBN 978-0-7735-6983-6.
  12. Virtue (2001), p. 71.
  13. Natalie Luckyj; Florence Vale; Agnes Etherington Art Centre (1980). Metamorphosis: memories, dreams and reflections : the work of Florence Vale. Agnes Etherington Art Centre, Queen's University.
  14. Roald Nasgaard (2008). Abstract Painting in Canada. Douglas & McIntyre. pp. 92–. ISBN 978-1-55365-394-3.
  15. Maria Meindl (18 August 2011). Outside the Box: The Life and Legacy of Writer Mona Gould, the Grandmother I Thought I Knew. MQUP. pp. 128–. ISBN 978-0-7735-8638-3.
  16. Balkind, Alvin; Robert Bringhurst (1983). Visions: contemporary art in Canada. Douglas & McIntyre, Limited. p. 83. ISBN 978-0-88894-392-7.
  17. Dennis R. Reid (1988). A concise history of Canadian painting. Oxford University Press. p. 253. ISBN 978-0-19-540664-1.
  18. John Lorinc; Michael McClelland; Ellen Scheinberg; Tatum Taylor (23 June 2015). The Ward: The Life and Loss of Toronto's First Immigrant Neighbourhood. Coach House Books. pp. 251–. ISBN 978-1-55245-311-7.
  19. Stuart Henderson (30 April 2011). Making the Scene: Yorkville and Hip Toronto in the Sixties. University of Toronto Press. pp. 56–. ISBN 978-1-4426-6199-8.
  20. Michiel Horn (11 December 2008). York University: The Way Must Be Tried. McGill-Queen's Press - MQUP. pp. 34–. ISBN 978-0-7735-7724-4.
  21. "Toronto Imagined: The City in Words and Images". Art Gallery of Ontario.
  22. Lela Wilson; Sandra Dyck (3 February 1998). York Wilson: His Life and Work, 1907-1984. MQUP. pp. 217–. ISBN 978-0-7735-9606-1.
  23. Jon Caulfield (1994). City Form and Everyday Life: Toronto's Gentrification and Critical Social Practice. University of Toronto Press. pp. 121–. ISBN 978-0-8020-7448-5.
  24. New Brunswick Museum (1969). Museum Memo. p. 34.
  25. McMaster University. Art Gallery; Kim Gibson Ness (1987). The art collection of McMaster University: European, Canadian and American paintings, prints, drawings and sculpture. McMaster University Press. p. 229. ISBN 978-0-920603-06-2.
  26. Arts/Canada. Society for Art Publications. 1975. p. 48.
  27. Reid (1988), p. 377.
  28. Loren R. Lerner; Mary F. Williamson (1 January 1991). Art and architecture in Canada: a bibliography and guide to the literature to 1981. University of Toronto Press. pp. 575–. ISBN 978-0-8020-5856-0.
  29. Iris Nowell (2011). P11, Painters Eleven: The Wild Ones of Canadian Art. Douglas & McIntyre. pp. 300–. ISBN 978-1-55365-590-9.
  30. Iris Nowell (2001). Joyce Wieland: A Life in Art. ECW Press. pp. 83–. ISBN 978-1-55022-476-4.
  31. "Scene doesn't dwarf this plaque's appeal". Toronto Star, John Sewell, Jul 18 2009
  32. Aaron, Bob (August 1, 2009). "A street by any other name is just as sweet". Toronto Star.
  • HAROLD TOWN, Albert Franck, His Life, Times & Work (McClelland and Stewart, Toronto, 1974) 96 pp.
  • Albert Franck: Keeper of the Lanes, by Harold Town, McClelland and Stewart, 1974
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