James Wilson Morrice

James Wilson Morrice was a Canadian landscape painter who lived and worked mostly in Paris. From 1882-86 the son of a merchant studied law at the University of Toronto and Osgood Hall Law School. This was followed by art studies at the Académie Julian in Paris in 1892-97. Until the 1920s, he made numerous trips to Canada, Europe, North Africa, and to the Caribbean.

Morrice was a member of the French artist groups Société Nationale and Société Nouvelle, and in 1907 was a co-founder of the Canadian Arts Club. From 1913, he was an elected member of the Royal Canadian Academy. His acquaintance with the English writer William Sommerset Maugham inspired the latter to several literary characters.

In Paris, Morrice initially enjoyed a rather conservative education in landscape painting with great emphasis on drawing. However, he soon developed his own, freer style of painting, in which color took precedence over form. During this period, he was influenced above all by his American friends Maurice Brazil Prendergast (1858-1924) and Robert Henri (1865-1929). The realist James Abott McNeill Whistler (1834-1903) influenced his work as well with his dark-smoky color palette. After 1900, the character of Morrice’ works became increasingly impressionistic.

Morrice traveled regularly to Canada at Christmas time and captured his homeland in numerous winterly scenes. From about 1906, Fauvist paintings increasingly influenced his work. In 1912, after a trip to Morocco, he turned to the genre of portraiture. In 1914, the outbreak of World War I prevented his timely return from Canada to Europe. Instead, he undertook a trip to the Caribbean, where he painted street scenes and views of houses. An uncreative phase followed in 1915-20, probably due to his increasing alcoholism. A series of works produced on another trip to the Caribbean in 1921, is considered one of his best showing influences of Henri Matisse (1869-1954) and Paul Gauguin (1848-1903), but in cooler colors. Morrice exhibited the paintings at the Salon d’Automne, but had lost touch with the avant-garde, which was by then heavily influenced by Cubism. He died on a trip to North Africa before the start of the Olympic Games.