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 studied art in Sheffield and attended the Académie Royale des Beaux-Arts in

Antwerp Antwerp (; nl, Antwerpen ; french: Anvers ; es, Amberes) is the largest city in Belgium by area at and the capital of Antwerp Province in the Flemish Region. With a population of 520,504,

(1900-1902), Belgium, while he worked on the docks. He immigrated to Canada in 1912 on the advice of another Sheffield native (and future Group of Seven member),

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 ...

, and found work at the

Grip Ltd. Grip was a Toronto, Ontario design firm that was home to many of Canada's premier designers and painters during the first half of the 20th century. The company was founded in 1873 by the cartoonist J. W. Bengough to publish his satirical weekl ...

design firm in Toronto, Ontario.Canada Post stamp
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War artist

Beginning in January 1918, he served in the First World War with C.W. Simpson, J.W. Beatty and Maurice Cullen.Davis, Ann. (1992). Varley came to the attention of

Lord Beaverbrook William Maxwell Aitken, 1st Baron Beaverbrook (25 May 1879 – 9 June 1964), generally known as Lord Beaverbrook, was a Canadian-British newspaper publisher and backstage politician who was an influential figure in British media and politics o ...

, who arranged for him to be commissioned as an official war artist. He accompanied Canadian troops in the ''Hundred Days'' offensive from Amiens, France to Mons, Belgium. His paintings of combat are based on his experiences at the front. Although he had been enthusiastic to travel to France as a war artist, he became deeply disturbed by what he saw, saying: Varley's ''Some Day the People Will Return'', shown at

Burlington House Burlington House is a building on Piccadilly in Mayfair, London. It was originally a private Neo-Palladian mansion owned by the Earls of Burlington and was expanded in the mid-19th century after being purchased by the British government. Toda ...

in London and at the Canadian War Memorials Exhibition, is a large canvas depicting a war-ravaged cemetery, suggesting that even the dead cannot escape the destruction. In Varley's painting ''For What?'' (1918), a single gravedigger takes a rest from his labours, a cart full of bodies beside him. It is one of the few official Canadian First World War paintings that does not hide the reality of battlefield death in images of ruins, blasted trees, and battle detritus.

Group of Seven

In 1920, he was a founding member of the Group of Seven. He was the only original member of the Group of Seven to specialize in portraiture, but he also painted

landscape A landscape is the visible features of an area of land, its landforms, and how they integrate with natural or man-made features, often considered in terms of their aesthetic appeal.''New Oxford American Dictionary''. A landscape includes the ...

s. Varley's major contribution to art is his work with the Group of Seven and his portraits.

Later life and death

After living in Ontario for a number of years, Varley moved to Vancouver, BC in 1926 where he became Head of the Department of Drawing and Painting at the School of Decorative and Applied Arts in Vancouver at the invitation of

Charles Hepburn Scott Charles Hepburn Scott (29 November 1886 – 1964) was a Scottish-born Canadian artist. Early life Scott was born in Loudoun, Ayr, to Robert Hepburn and Jean (née Carmichael) Scott. Career Scott was a student at Glasgow School of Art f ...

. He remained in this position from 1926 until 1933. He left British Columbia in 1936 due to his experiences with depression, and two years later joined fellow artist Terry M. Shortt, the

Royal Ontario Museum The Royal Ontario Museum (ROM) is a museum of art, world culture and natural history in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is one of the largest museums in North America and the largest in Canada. It attracts more than one million visitors every year ...

ornithologist, on a trip to the Arctic in 1938. In 1954, along with a handful of artists including

Eric Aldwinckle Eric Aldwinckle (22 January 1909 – 13 January 1980) was a Canadian Official war artist, designer and one of the most prominent illustrators of the 20th century. He was also a teacher at the Ontario College of Art, 1936–42; Principal ...

, he visited the Soviet Union on the first cultural exchange of the Cold War. He died in Toronto in 1969 and was buried alongside other members of the Original Seven at the McMichael Canadian Art Collection grounds in Kleinburg, Ontario.

Recognition

Varley was an associate member of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts. Varley Art Gallery Unionville

In Unionville, the

Varley Art Gallery Frederick Horsman Varley Art Gallery, or the Varley Art Gallery of Markham, is an art museum in Markham, Ontario, Canada. The museum is situated in a building on Main Street Unionville. The gallery was named after Frederick Varley, an artist from ...

of Markham is named after him, as is ''Fred Varley'' Drive, a two-lane residential street. Varley lived nearby at the Salem-Eckhardt House from 1952 to 1969. On 6 May 1994 Canada Post issued 'Vera (detail), F.H. Varley, 1931' in the Masterpieces of Canadian art series. The stamp was designed by Pierre-Yves Pelletier based on an oil painting ''Vera'', (1931) by Frederick Horsman Varley in the National Gallery of Canada, Ottawa, Ontario. The 88¢ stamps are perforated 14 x 14.5 mm and were printed by Leigh-Mardon Pty Limited. His place in the art history of Canada is verified by the government's decision to reproduce his self-portrait as
17-cent postage stamp
On 22 May 1981 Canada Post issued 'Frederick H. Varley, Self Portrait' designed by Pierre Fontaine. The stamps are based on an oil painting ''Self Portrait'', (circa 1945) by Frederick Horsman Varley in the Hart House Permanent Collection, University of Toronto, Toronto, Ontario. The 17¢ stamps are perforated 12.5 mm and were printed by Ashton-Potter Limited. Varley has been designated as an Historic Person in the Directory of Federal Heritage Designations.

Selected works

File:Frederick Varley - German Prisoners.jpg, German prisoners on the Western Front. File:Frederick Varley - Gas Chamber at Seaford.jpg, Gas chamber at Seaford File:Frederick Varley - The Young Man's Element, the Air.jpg, The Young Man's Element, the Air

Notes

Bibliography

* * * Brandon, Laura. (2008)
''Art and War.''
New York: I.B. Tauris.
OCLC 225345535
*Brandon, Laura. (2021).
War Art in Canada: A Critical History
'' Toronto: Art Canada Institute, 2021. ISBN 978-1-4871-0271-5. * Davis, Ann (1992). ''The logic of ecstasy: Canadian mystical painting, 1920–1940''. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. ;
OCLC 26256269
* Reid, Dennis R. (1988). ''A Concise History of Canadian Painting.'' Toronto: Oxford University Press. ;
OCLC 18378555
*

External links

*

CBC Digital Archives - The Group of Seven: Painters in the Wilderness

Watch the NFB documentary ''Varley''
{{DEFAULTSORT:Varley, Frederick 1881 births 1969 deaths 19th-century Canadian painters Canadian male painters 19th-century English painters 20th-century Canadian painters 20th-century English painters Artists from Sheffield Canadian portrait painters Canadian war artists English male painters Members of the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts Persons of National Historic Significance (Canada) World War I artists 20th-century English male artists 19th-century English male artists 19th-century Canadian male artists 20th-century Canadian male artists British emigrants to Canada