1904: A Calendar for the Year Nineteen Hundred and Four with Drawings Illustrations Some of the Characteristic Landscape Features of Canada, Designed & drawn by the Toronto Art League
The Toronto Art Students' League, founded in 1886, was not only a school but a setting where members met to draw, discuss, comment on each other's work, and create projects together. The annual calendars they produced are milestones in the history of Canadian graphic arts. This issue includes art by A. C. Good, A. A. Martin, C. W. Jefferys, F.H. Brigden, R. Holmes, D. F. Thomson, Thos. G. Greene, C. M. Manly, and A. H. Howard. Charles William Jefferys (1869 1951) worked for the Toronto Globe as an illustrator and artist. Having an interest in history, Jefferys produced accurate and meticulous portrayals of early Canadian life. The best known collection of his historical sketches is the three volume Picture Gallery of Canadian History (c. 19421960).In 1898, Frederick Henry (Fred) Brigden RCA (1871 1956) became the art director of the Toronto Engraving Company which in 1910 changed its name to Brigdens Limited. He was also a landscape painter in oils and watercolour. Robert Holmes RCA (1861 1930) was a Canadian naturalist painter and artist-illustrator who was President of the Toronto Art Students League from 1891 to 1904. Canadian landscape painter and etcher Thomas Garland Greene (1875-1955) once worked for an advertising company in our very own London, Ontario, as well as teaching and drawing at a variety of institutions in Canada and the USA. Charles Macdonald Manly (1855 1924) was one of the founders of the Art League whose work appeared in nearly all their calendars. He wrote an unpublished history of the League. Alfred Harold Howard RCA (18541916) was an illustrator, graphic artist, calligrapher, and decorative designer. He and his wife Isabella founded a graphic design firm in Toronto.
