The Agnes Etherington Art Centre is located in

Kingston, Ontario Kingston is a city in Ontario, Canada. It is located on the north-eastern end of Lake Ontario, at the beginning of the St. Lawrence River and at the mouth of the Cataraqui River (south end of the Rideau Canal). The city is midway between Toro ...

, in the heart of the historic campus of Queen's University. Situated on traditional

Anishinaabe The Anishinaabeg (adjectival: Anishinaabe) are a group of culturally related Indigenous peoples present in the Great Lakes region of Canada and the United States. They include the Ojibwe (including Saulteaux and Oji-Cree), Odawa, Potawatomi, ...

and

Haudenosaunee The Iroquois ( or ), officially the Haudenosaunee ( meaning "people of the longhouse"), are an Iroquoian Peoples, Iroquoian-speaking Confederation#Indigenous confederations in North America, confederacy of First Nations in Canada, First Natio ...

Territory, the gallery has received a number of awards for its exhibitions from the

Canada Council for the Arts The Canada Council for the Arts (french: Conseil des arts du Canada), commonly called the Canada Council, is a Crown corporation established in 1957 as an arts council of the Government of Canada. It acts as the federal government's principal in ...

, the

Ontario Association of Art Galleries The Galeries Ontario / Ontario Galleries (GOG), formerly Ontario Association of Art Galleries / Association Ontarienne des Galeries d’Art (OAAG/AOGA), was established in 1968 to encourage development of public art galleries, art museums, community ...

and others.

History

The Agnes has its roots in the Kingston Art and Music Club, founded in 1926, and owes its existence to Agnes McCausland Richardson Etherington (1880–1954), a driving force behind the club. Agnes Etherington's grandfather had founded the grain dealer James Richardson & Sons in 1857 and the family had become very wealthy. Agnes's brother George Richardson, who died fighting in

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

in 1916, left a legacy for her to use as she felt fit to stimulate development of the arts at Queen's University. She used this to found the George Taylor Richardson Memorial Fund, which still provides an important source of arts funding to the university. Agnes Etherington bequeathed her house, an elegant Neo-Georgian mansion, to Queen's University for use as a university and community art gallery. The Agnes Etherington Art Centre opened to the public in 1957. The building was extended in 1962, 1975, 1978 and 2000, and now has an area of 1,720 square metres.

Facilities

In addition to the historical Etherington House and nine galleries, the Agnes Etherington Art Centre features a studio, atrium, a publications lounge and the David McTavish Art Study Room.

Events and public programs

Through the fall and winter, lectures, discussions, tours, custom seminars and screenings. Each summer, the gallery offers an art-intensive summer day camp for children and an art course of teens.

Collections

Agnes Etherington Art Centre holds over 17,000 works ranging from the 14th century to the present, placing it among the largest galleries in Ontario. It includes paintings, sculptures, and graphics by major Canadian artists, European old master paintings, African art, historical dress, quilts, silver and decorative art.

Canadian Historical Art

The Canadian Historical collection primarily representing the history of Canadian fine art in the Euro-American tradition, it also reflects the evolving Canadian cultural matrix through Inuit and Indigenous art and artifacts, as well as historic dress and decorative arts. The collection is notable for fine early topographical watercolours and major 20th-century paintings, and encompasses material connected to regional history in the Queen's University Collection of Canadian Dress, the Heritage Quilt Collection, and the Silver Collection. The Canadian historical collection includes works by: Andre Charles Bieler,

Tom Thomson Thomas John Thomson (August 5, 1877July 8, 1917) was a Canadian artist active in the early 20th century. During his short career, he produced roughly 400 oil sketches on small wood panels and approximately 50 larger works on canvas. His w ...

Emily Carr Emily Carr (or M. Emily Carr as she sometimes signed her work) (December 13, 1871 – March 2, 1945) was a Canadian artist and writer who was inspired by the Indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast. One of the painters in Canada to ado ...

Lawren Harris Lawren Stewart Harris LL. D. (October 23, 1885 – January 29, 1970) was a Canadian painter, best known as a leading member of the Group of Seven. He played a key role as a catalyst in Canadian art and as a visionary in Canadian landscape art. ...

Arthur Lismer Arthur Lismer, LL. D. (27 June 1885 – 23 March 1969) was an English-Canadian painter, member of the Group of Seven and educator. He is known primarily as a landscape painter and for his paintings of ships in dazzle camouflage. Early life ...

Frederick Varley Frederick Horsman Varley (January 2, 1881 – September 8, 1969) was a member of the Canadian Group of Seven. Career Early life Varley was born in Sheffield, England, in 1881, the son of Lucy (Barstow) and Samuel James Smith Varley the 7th. He ...

Edwin Holgate Edwin Headley Holgate (August 19, 1892 – May 21, 1977), was a Canadians, Canadian artist, painter, muralist, and wood-cut artist. Holgate played a major role in Montreal's art community, and the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts, where he both st ...

LeMoine FitzGerald Lionel LeMoine FitzGerald D.F.A., also known as L. L. FitzGerald (March 17, 1890 – August 5, 1956) was a Canadian artist and art educator. He was the only member of the Group of Seven based in western Canada. He worked almost exclusively in Manit ...

Fernand Leduc Fernand Leduc (4 July 1916 – 28 January 2014) was a Canadian abstract expressionist painter and a major figure in the Quebec contemporary art scene in the 1940s and 1950s. During his 50-year career, Leduc participated in many expositions in Ca ...

, Ozias Leduc, David Milne, William Ronald,

Carl Beam Carl Beam (May 24, 1943 – July 30, 2005), born Carl Edward Migwans, made Canadian art history as the first artist of Native Ancestry (Ojibwe), to have his work purchased by the National Gallery of Canada as Contemporary Art. A major retrospec ...

William Henry Bartlett William Henry Bartlett (March 26, 1809 – September 13, 1854) was a British artist, best known for his numerous drawings rendered into steel engravings. Biography Bartlett was born in Kentish Town, London in 1809. He was apprenticed to John Bri ...

William Brymner William Brymner, (December 14, 1855 – June 18, 1925) was a Canadian figure and landscape painter and educator. In addition to playing a key role in the development of Impressionism in Canada, Brymner taught numerous artists who became leadin ...

Kananginak Pootoogook Kananginak Pootoogook (1 January 1935 – 23 November 2010) was an Inuk sculptor and printmaker who lived in Cape Dorset, Nunavut, in Canada. He died as a result of complications related to surgery for lung cancer. Biography Pootoogook was bo ...

Pitseolak Ashoona Pitseolak Ashoona ( – May 28, 1983;) was an Inuk Canadian artist admired for her prolific body of work. She was also a member of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts. Biography Pitseolak was born to Timungiak and Oootochie on Nottingham Island ...

Contemporary Art

The

Contemporary Art Contemporary art is the art of today, produced in the second half of the 20th century or in the 21st century. Contemporary artists work in a globally influenced, culturally diverse, and technologically advancing world. Their art is a dynamic com ...

Collection features visual art, with emphasis on the emerging generation of artists and works that reflect contemporary life and Canadian society. It is national in scope. The Contemporary collection includes works by:

Charles Stankievech Charles Stankievech (born 1978) is a Canadian artist, writer, publisher and curator. Biography As a result of the wide spectrum of strategies and the conceptual drive behind the production, his work has been located in the Conceptual Art Co ...

Rebecca Belmore Rebecca Belmore D.F.A. (born 1960) is an interdisciplinary Anishinaabekwe artist who is notable for politically conscious and socially aware performance and installation work. She is Ojibwe and member of Obishikokaang ( Lac Seul First Nation). ...

Judy Radul Judy Radul (born in 1962 in Lillooet, British Columbia) is a Canadian multidisciplinary artist, writer and educator. She is known for her performance art and media installations, as well as her critical writing. Biography She has exhibited her wo ...

Brendan Fernandes Brendan Fernandes (born 1979) is a Canadian contemporary artist. He specializes in installation and visual art and currently serves as a faculty member at Northwestern University teaching art theory and practice.Loos Ted,The Impresario of 'Ballet ...

Luis Jacob Luis Jacob (born 1971) is an artist, writer, curator and educator living in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. Life and work Jacob was born in Lima, Peru and moved to Canada with his family when he was ten. He graduated from the University of Toronto in 19 ...

Vera Frenkel Vera Frenkel D. Litt (born November 10, 1938) is a Canadian multidisciplinary artist based in Toronto. Her installations, videotapes, performances and new media projects address the forces at work in human migration, the learning and unlearning ...

David Rokeby David Rokeby (born in 1960 in Tillsonburg, Ontario) is an artist who has been making works of electronic, video and installation art since 1982. He lives with his wife, acclaimed pianist Eve Egoyan, and daughter, Viva Egoyan-Rokeby, in Toronto, ...

, Norman White,

Robert Houle Robert Houle (born 1947) is a Saulteaux First Nations Canadian artist, curator, critic,"Robert ...

Shary Boyle Shary Boyle D.F.A. (born May 26, 1972) is a contemporary Canadian visual artist working in the mediums of sculpture, drawing, painting and performance art. She lives and works in Toronto. Early life and education Boyle was born in the Toronto s ...

AA Bronson AA Bronson (born Michael Tims in Vancouver in 1946) is an artist. He was a founding member of the artists' group General Idea, was president and director of Printed Matter, Inc., and started the NY Art Book Fair and the LA Art Book Fair. E ...

General Idea General Idea was a collective of three Canadian artists, Felix Partz, Jorge Zontal and AA Bronson, who were active from 1967 to 1994. As pioneers of early conceptual and media-based art, their collaboration became a model for artist-initiated ac ...

, Ian Carr-Harris,

Sarindar Dhaliwal Sarindar Dhaliwal (born 1953) is a Canadian multi-media artist, based in Toronto. Biography Dhaliwal was born in the Punjab, and moved with her family to England at the age of four and grew up in Southall, London. At the age of fifteen, she mig ...

, Andre Fauteux,

Kim Ondaatje Kim Ondaatje (born Betty Jane Kimbark; born October 2, 1928) is a Canadian Painting, painter, photographer, and documentary film, documentary Filmmaking, filmmaker. Biography Early life and training Born in Toronto, Ontario, Ondaatje studie ...

, Derek Sullivan

Historical European Art

The

European Art The art of Europe, or Western art, encompasses the history of art, history of visual art in Europe. European prehistoric art started as mobile Upper Paleolithic rock art, rock and cave painting and petroglyph art and was characteristic of the ...

Collection holds many paintings, prints, and drawings of exceptional quality and depth. The heart of the European collection is The Bader Collection, with over 200 paintings donated by philanthropist Alfred Bader and Isabel Bader. The European collection includes works by

Rembrandt van Rijn Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn (, ; 15 July 1606 – 4 October 1669), usually simply known as Rembrandt, was a Dutch Golden Age painter, printmaker and draughtsman. An innovative and prolific master in three media, he is generally consid ...

Willem Drost Willem Drost (baptized 19 April 1633 – buried 25 February 1659) was a Dutch Golden Age painter and printmaker of history paintings and portraits. Biography He is a mysterious figure, closely associated with Rembrandt, with very few pain ...

Jan Lievens Jan Lievens (24 October 1607 – 4 June 1674) was a Dutch Golden Age painter who was associated with his close contemporary Rembrandt, a year older, in the early parts of their careers. They shared a birthplace in Leiden, training with Pieter La ...

Govert Flinck Govert (or Govaert) Teuniszoon Flinck (25 January 16152 February 1660) was a Dutch painter of the Dutch Golden Age. Life Born at Kleve, capital of the Duchy of Cleves, which was occupied at the time by the United Provinces, he was apprenticed by ...

Aert de Gelder Aert de Gelder ( or Arent; October 26, 1645 – August 27, 1727) was a Dutch painter.Gerbrand van den Eeckhout Gerbrand van den Eeckhout (19 August 1621 – 29 September 1674) was a Dutch Golden Age painter and a favourite student of Rembrandt. He was also an etcher, an amateur poet, a collector and an adviser on art. Biography Gerbrand was born in A ...

Godfrey Kneller Sir Godfrey Kneller, 1st Baronet (born Gottfried Kniller; 8 August 1646 – 19 October 1723), was the leading portrait painter in England during the late 17th and early 18th centuries, and was court painter to Kingdom of England, English and Br ...

Philip de Koninck Philip de Koninck, or Philips Koninck (5 November 1619 – 4 October 1688 was a Dutch landscape painter and younger brother of Jacob Koninck.

Ferdinand Bol Ferdinand Bol (24 June 1616 – 24 August 1680) was a Dutch painter, etcher and draftsman. Although his surviving work is rare, it displays Rembrandt's influence; like his master, Bol favored historical subjects, portraits, numerous self-port ...

El Greco Domḗnikos Theotokópoulos ( el, Δομήνικος Θεοτοκόπουλος ; 1 October 1541 7 April 1614), most widely known as El Greco ("The Greek"), was a Greek painter, sculptor and architect of the Spanish Renaissance. "El G ...

Dosso Dossi Giovanni di Niccolò de Luteri, better known as Dosso Dossi ( 1489–1542), was an Italian Renaissance painter who belonged to the School of Ferrara, painting in a style mainly influenced by Venetian painting, in particular Giorgione and early T ...

Michael Sweerts Michiel Sweerts or Michael Sweerts (29 September 1618 – 1 June 1664) was a Flemish painter and printmaker of the Baroque period, who is known for his allegorical and genre paintings, portraits and tronies. The artist led an itinerant li ...

Luca Giordano Luca Giordano (18 October 1634 – 3 January 1705) was an Italian late-Baroque painter and printmaker in etching. Fluent and decorative, he worked successfully in Naples and Rome, Florence, and Venice, before spending a decade in Spain. Ear ...

Georg Pencz Georg Pencz (c. 1500 – 11 October 1550) was a German engraver, painter and printmaker. Pencz was probably born in Westheim near Bad Windsheim/Franconia. He travelled to Nuremberg in 1523 and joined Albrecht Dürer’s atelier. Like Düre ...

, Sebastien Bourdon,

Peter Lely Sir Peter Lely (14 September 1618 – 7 December 1680) was a painter of Dutch origin whose career was nearly all spent in England, where he became the dominant portrait painter to the court. Life Lely was born Pieter van der Faes to Dutch ...

Joseph Wright of Derby Joseph Wright (3 September 1734 – 29 August 1797), styled Joseph Wright of Derby, was an English landscape and portrait painter. He has been acclaimed as "the first professional painter to express the spirit of the Industrial Revolution". Wr ...

Raphael Raffaello Sanzio da Urbino, better known as Raphael (; or ; March 28 or April 6, 1483April 6, 1520), was an Italian painter and architect of the High Renaissance. List of works by Raphael, His work is admired for its clarity of form, ease of ...

Parmigianino Girolamo Francesco Maria Mazzola (11 January 150324 August 1540), also known as Francesco Mazzola or, more commonly, as Parmigianino (, , ; "the little one from Parma"), was an Italian Mannerist painter and printmaker active in Florence, Rome, Bo ...

Guido Reni Guido Reni (; 4 November 1575 – 18 August 1642) was an Italian painter of the Baroque period, although his works showed a classical manner, similar to Simon Vouet, Nicolas Poussin, and Philippe de Champaigne. He painted primarily religious ...

Gustav Klimt Gustav Klimt (July 14, 1862 – February 6, 1918) was an Austrian symbolist painter and one of the most prominent members of the Vienna Secession movement. Klimt is noted for his paintings, murals, sketches, and other objets d'art. Klimt's prim ...

Pablo Picasso Pablo Ruiz Picasso (25 October 1881 – 8 April 1973) was a Spanish painter, sculptor, printmaker, ceramicist and Scenic design, theatre designer who spent most of his adult life in France. One of the most influential artists of the 20th ce ...

African Art

Numbering over 500 objects, the Justin and Elisabeth Lang Collection of

African Art African art describes the modern and historical paintings, sculptures, installations, and other visual culture from native or indigenous Africans and the African continent. The definition may also include the art of the African diasporas, su ...

ranks among Canada's most comprehensive and significant African Art collections. Comprising primarily works by West and Central African peoples.

Selected Works from the Collection

File:Johann König - Apollo und Coronis (Agnes Etherington Art Centre).jpg, Johann König, ''Apollo and Coronis'', c. 1607 File:Granida and Daifilo, by Jacob Backer.jpg,

Jacob Adriaensz Backer Jacob Adriaensz Backer (1608 – 27 August 1651) was a Dutch Golden Age painter. He produced about 140 paintings in twenty years, including portraits, religious subjects, and mythological paintings. In his style, he was influenced by Wybrand d ...

, ''Granida and Daifilo'', c. 1640 File:Man wearing a high beret with jewels and pearls, by Ferdinand Bol.jpg,

, ''A Man in a Fancy Robe and a Tall Cap Strung with Pearls'', c. 1643 File:Michael Sweerts - self portrait with a skull c.1660.jpg,

Michiel Sweerts Michiel Sweerts or Michael Sweerts (29 September 1618 – 1 June 1664) was a Flemish painter and printmaker of the Baroque period, who is known for his allegorical and genre paintings, portraits and tronies. The artist led an itinerant lif ...

, ''Self portrait with a skull'', c. 1660 File:Rembrandt Lighting Study of an Old Man in Profile.jpg,

Rembrandt Rembrandt Harmenszoon van Rijn (, ; 15 July 1606 – 4 October 1669), usually simply known as Rembrandt, was a Dutch Golden Age painter, printmaker and draughtsman. An innovative and prolific master in three media, he is generally consid ...

, ''Head of a Man in a Turban'', c. 1661 File:Jacob van Ruisdael - Winter Landscape - Bader collection.jpg,

Jacob van Ruisdael Jacob Isaackszoon van Ruisdael (; 1629 – 10 March 1682) was a Dutch painter, draughtsman, and etcher. He is generally considered the pre-eminent landscape painter of the Dutch Golden Age, a period of great wealth and cultural achi ...

, ''Winter Landscape with a Wooden House'', c. 1667–1673

Selected publications

The Art Centre has issued many publications over the years. A selection follows:

References

External links

Agnes Etherington Art Centre
- official site {{authority control Art museums and galleries in Ontario Museums in Kingston, Ontario University museums in Canada Queen's University at Kingston Arts centres in Canada 1957 establishments in Ontario Art museums established in 1957 James Richardson & Sons