Emily Carr Biography
Emily Carr Biography
(December 13, 1871 – March 2, 1945) was a Canadian artist and writer heavily inspired by the indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast. One of the first painters in Canada to adopt a post-impressionist painting style, Carr did not receive widespread recognition for her work until later in her life. As she matured, the subject matter of her painting shifted from aboriginal themes to landscapes, and, in particular, forest scenes. As a writer, Carr was one of the earliest chroniclers of life in British Columbia. The Canadian Encyclopedia describes her as a “Canadian icon”.
Born in Victoria, British Columbia in 1871, the year British Columbia joined Canada, Emily Carr was the second-youngest of six children born to English parents Richard and Emily Saunders Carr. The Carr home was on Birdcage Walk, (now Government Street) in the James Bay district of Victoria, a short distance from the legislative buildings (nicknamed the ‘Birdcages’) and the town itself.
In 1898 Carr made the first of several sketching and painting trips to aboriginal villages, visiting Ucluelet on the west coast of Vancouver Island, home to the Nuu-chah-nulth people, then commonly known to English speaking people as ‘Nootka’. The following year Carr traveled to London where she studied at the Westminster School of Art. She traveled also to the artistic colony in Cornwall, returning to British Columbia in 1905, where she took a teaching position in Vancouver at the ‘Ladies Art Club’ that she held for no longer than a month — she was unpopular amongst her students due to her rude behaviour of smoking and cursing at them in class, and the students began to boycott her class. Vancouver at that period was experiencing an economic boom, buoyed by the success of the lumber and fishing industries, and taking advantage of its position as the Pacific terminus of the Canadian Pacific Railway, and had roared ahead of the provincial capital, Victoria, in population and economic activity.
In 1939 Carr suffered a serious heart-attack, and moved in with her sister Alice. Her focus shifted from her painting to her writing. With the assistance of her friend Ira Dilworth, principal of Victoria High School, Carr was able to see her first book, Klee Wyck, published in 1941. Carr was awarded the Governor-General’s Award for non-fiction the following year for Klee Wyck. Carr died in Victoria on March 2, 1945, shortly before she was to have been awarded an honorary doctorate by the University of British Columbia.
Emily Carr died in the James Bay Inn in Victoria, British Columbia